Ryan McBeth on Why the U.S. Doesn't (Yet) Have a Munitions Crisis

About this episode

Ryan McBeth discusses the reasons behind the U.S. not facing a munitions crisis despite high demand for military supplies.

From the phone that sits in his pocket, a person can now order almost anything online and have it delivered to his door the next morning. For all of human history, no one on earth had that kind of power, and now, within a single lifetime, every middle-class American has it. Walmart or Amazon or other major e-commerce platforms will bring you whatever you want: a vintage edition of a particular book, a specific article of clothing in a specific size, same-day delivery of kosher pastrami from Costco. Americans are now used to getting what they want, when they want it, with very little delay. That's because the interpretation of vast amounts of data has already told retailers that a person is likely to want diapers and baby formula, or the new Winston Churchill biography, or, having bought a new phone, an extra phone charger, already prepositioned in nearby warehouses, just waiting for someone to want it and press "ship." As a result, it's hard for us to understand intuitively why some things take time to manufacture, and why, when we read reports of missile and interceptor stockpiles, the American military, with all its might, can't just order up another arsenal and have it at the…

People in this episode

Guest: Ryan McBeth

Topics covered

• U.S. military
• munitions crisis
• e-commerce
• missile stockpiles
• manufacturing delays

Keywords

• munitions crisis
• U.S. military
• missile stockpiles
• e-commerce
• manufacturing delays

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Center for Strategic and International Studies, Walmart, Amazon, Costco

Products: Tomahawk

Places: Iran, U.S.

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