Chuck Spinney

Franklin C. "Chuck" Spinney joined the Pentagon's Office of Program Analysis and Evaluation in 1977, "a division set up in 1961 to make independent evaluations of Pentagon policy, ... to work with John Boyd who, with his open contempt for authority, had become somewhat of a mentor to Spinney." [1] Spinney retired in 2003.

In a 2003 interview with PBS's Bill Moyers, Spinney explained "the workings of 'the military industrial Congressional complex'" and discussed "defense boondoggles from the malfunctioning M-16 rifles in Vietnam to the ballistic missile defense system." [2]

Published Works by Chuck Spinney

"Defense Facts of Life: The Plans/Reality Mismatch", Westview Press; Hardcover April 1985 ISBN 0865317186; Paperback May 1985 ISBN 0865317194.

Articles, Reports & Testimony

• Statement by Franklin C. Spinney, Staff Analyst, Department of Defense Before the Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs and International Relations, Committee on Government Reform, U.S. House of Representatives, June 4, 2002.
• "Strategic Scamming," First of the Month, January 2004.

Quotes

• "'At the core of the RMA is a radical hypothesis that would cause Sun Tzu, Clausewitz and George Patton to roll over in their graves,' Chuck Spinney, a thirty-year Pentagon veteran and weapons specialist, says of the doctrine. 'That is, that technology will transform the fog and friction of combat-the uncertainty, fear, chaos, imperfect information which is a natural product of a clash between opposing wills-into clear, friction-free, predictable, mechanistic interaction.'" [3]

• "If you want to understand how the Pentagon operates, like everything else in Washington you follow the money." [4]

Related SourceWatch Resources

• Army After Next
• military-industrial complex
• revolution in military affairs

External links

• Defense and the National Interest website.
• "The RMA Debate: Specialists," Project on Defense Alternatives.
• Ken Silverstein, "Buck Rogers Rides Again," The Nation, October 25, 1999.
• "Fighting the Next War: Reshaping the Military," InsideOut.org, 2002.
• "Transcript: Bill Moyers Interviews Chuck Spinney," PBS NOW with Bill Moyers, November 1, 2002.
• "Chuck Spinney to Receive POGO's 'Good Government Award' May 29," Project On Government Oversight, May 28, 2003.
• "Inside the Pentagon: Franklin 'Chuck' Spinney," PBS NOW with Bill Moyers, August 1, 2003; Information Clearinghouse.
• Stan Crock, "Preemptive War Is the Wrong Weapon," BusinessWeek Online, October 22, 2003: "the electronic newsletter sent out by Chuck Spinney, a retired Pentagon analyst ... starts out with a quote from the late journalist H. L. Mencken: "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed [and hence clamorous to be led to safety] by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."
• Jason Vest, "Shots Across the Bow," GovExec.com, March 1, 2006.