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ABSTRACT
Both Israel and Singapore engage in military-technological innovation in areas deemed critical to strategic sovereignty. Both countries have consistently championed high levels of funding for military R&D and for maintaining and nurturing indigenous defense industries. Both countries have, to a varying degree, also strongly supported the cultivation of local S&T, including the spin-on of commercial high-technology breakthroughs into the defense sector. Israel has been more successful when it comes to military-technological innovation, mostly because it has to: its strategic situation is much more tenuous than Singapore’s. Singapore, on the other hand, faces much less of an existential threat, and so its military-technological innovation activities are more one of desire than necessity.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 The author would like to thank Tai Ming Cheung, Yoram Evron, Shannon Brown, and an anonymous reviewer for their comments on earlier drafts of this article.
2 Tai Ming Cheung, ‘Critical Factors in Enabling Defense Innovation: A Systems Perspective’, Research Brief 2018–2, May (UC Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, Study of Innovation and Technology in China 2018).
3 Ibid.
4 Marc R. DeVore, ‘Commentary on the Value of Domestic Arms Industries: Security of Supply or Adaptive Innovation?’ Defense Studies, 17/3 (2017), 248.
5 Michael Raska, Military Innovation in Small States: Creating a Reverse Asymmetry (New York: Routledge 2016), 63–66.
6 Dima Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation: The Impact of Cultural Factors on the Revolution in Military Affairs in Russia, the US, and Israel (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press 2010), 125–126.
7 Yoram Evron, ‘4IR Technologies in the Israel Defense Forces: Blurring Traditional Boundaries’, Journal of Strategic Studies (online article, published 7 December 2020), 4; see also Nissim Hania, Transformations in the Israeli Defense Development and Production System, and the Contemporary Relevance, The DADO Center for Interdisciplinary Military Studies, Israel Defense Forces (https://www.idf.il/en/minisites/dado-center/vol-6-force-design-a/transformations-in-the-israeli-defense-development-and-production-system) (undated), 1.
8 Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation, 114.
9 Raska, Military Innovation in Small States, 73–76.
10 Raska, Military Innovation in Small States, 59, 80–84.
11 Raska, Military Innovation in Small States, 84–89. See also Israel Tal, National Security: The Israeli Experience (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2000); and Brig.-Gen. Itai Brun, ‘While You’re Busy Making Other Plans’: The ‘Other-RMA’ (Jerusalem: DADO Center for Interdisciplinary Military Studies, Israel Defense Forces 2010).
12 Evron, ‘4IR Technologies in the Israel Defense Forces’, 4–5.
13 David A. Lewis, ‘Diversification and Niche Market Exporting: The Restructuring of Israel’s Defense Industry in the Post-Cold War Era’, in Ann Markusen, Sean DiGiovanna, and Michael C. Leary (eds.), From Defense to Development: International Perspectives on Realising the Peace Dividend (London: Routledge 2003), 130.
14 Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation, 125–126.
15 Uzi Rubin, ‘Israel’s Defense Industries – An Overview’, Defense Studies 17,3, 229.
16 Rubin, ‘Israel’s Defense Industries – An Overview’, 229–231.
17 Lewis, ‘Diversification and Niche Market Exporting’, 129.
18 Yaacov Lifshitz, ‘Defense Industries in Israel’, in Andrew T.H. Tan (ed.), The Global Arms Trade: A Handbook (New York: Routledge 2009), 266–268.
19 Rubin, ‘Israel’s Defense Industries – An Overview’, 231–232.
20 Rubin, ‘Israel’s Defense Industries – An Overview’, 233.
21 Rubin, ‘Israel’s Defense Industries – An Overview’, 233.
22 Lifshitz, ‘Defense Industries in Israel’, 268.
23 DeVore, ‘Commentary on the Value of Domestic Arms Industries,’ p. 249.
24 William F. Owen, ‘Punching Above its Weight; Israel’s Defense Industry’, Defense Review Asia (May 2010), 12–16; David Saw, ‘The Israeli Defense Industry’, Asian Defense & Diplomacy, June/July 2011, pp. 26–30; Rubin, ‘Israel’s Defense Industries – An Overview’, 235.
25 Pieter D. Wezeman, Alexandra Kuimova, and Siemon T. Wezeman, SIPRI Fact Sheet: Trends in International Arms Transfers, 2020 (Stockholm: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute March 2021), 2.
26 Evron, ‘4IR Technologies in the Israel Defense Forces’, 9.
27 Daphne Getz and Zehev Tadmor, ‘Israel’, in UNESCO Science Report: Toward 2030 (Paris: United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization 2015), 410.
28 David Shamah, ‘How Intel Came to be Israel’s Best Tech Friend’, Times of Israel, 23 April 2015; Saw, ‘The Israeli Defense Industry’, p. 29.
29 Joanna Dyduch and Karolina Olszewska, ‘Israeli innovation Policy’, Polish Political Science Yearbook 47/2 (2018), 265–266.
30 See, for example, Daphne Getz and Vered Segal, The Israeli Innovation System: An Overview of National Policy and Cultural Aspects (Haifa: The Samuel Neaman Institute for Advanced Studies in Science and Technology 2008); also Tal, National Security: The Israeli Experience.
31 Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation, 116.
32 Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation, 119.
33 Raska, Military Innovation in Small States, 59.
34 Raska, Military Innovation in Small States, 60.
35 Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation, 126.
36 Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation, 117–119; Yaakov Katz and Amir Bohbot, The Weapons Wizards: How Israel Became a High-Tech Military Superpower (New York: St. Martin’s 2017), 9–12.
37 Robert Orkand, ‘Review: The Weapon Wizards: How Israel Became a High-Tech Military Superpower, by Yaakov Katz and Amir Bohbot’, Reformjudaism.org, https://reformjudaism.org/jewish-life/arts-culture/literature/weapon-wizards-how-israel-became-high-tech-military-superpower (accessed 2 December 2017).
38 Katz and Bohbot, The Weapons Wizards, 12.
39 Raphael Bar-el, Dafna Schwartz, and David Bentolila, ‘Singular Factors Behind the Growth of Innovation in Israel’, Athens Journal of Mediterranean Studies 5/3 (2019), 143–144.
40 Katz and Bohbot, The Weapons Wizards, 12.
41 DeVore, ‘Commentary on the Value of Domestic Arms Industries’, 250.
42 Evron, ‘4IR Technologies in the Israel Defense Forces’, 4.
43 Evron, ‘4IR Technologies in the Israel Defense Forces’, 11–16.
44 Daphne Getz and Zehev Tadmor, Israel: UNESCO Science Report, Toward 2030 (Paris: UNESCO), 409–229.
45 Ori Swed and John Sibley Butler, ‘Military Capital in the Israeli Hi-tech Industry’, Armed Forces & Society 41/1 (2013), 123–141.
46 Dyduch and Karolina Olszewska, ‘Israeli Innovation Policy’, 270; Getz and Segal, The Israeli Innovation System, 34–41.
47 Katz and Bohbot, The Weapons Wizards, 9–12.
48 Swed and Butler, ‘Military Capital in the Israeli Hi-tech Industry.’
49 Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation, 119.
50 Milana Israeli, ‘National Innovation Systems of Israel: Features and Structure’, Scientific Journal of Economics, Social, and Engineering Science 3/1–2 (2020), 157.
51 Stephen McCarthy, The Political Theory of Tyranny in Singapore and Burma (New York: Routledge 2006), 115–116.
52 Tim Huxley, Singapore and Military Transformation, paper delivered to the conference on ‘The RMA For Small States: Theory and Application’, Singapore, 25–26 February 2004, p. 2.
53 Michael Urquhart, ‘Singapore Faces Spending, Population Challenges’, Defense News, 20 February 2006.
54 Evan Laksmana, ‘Threats and Civil–Military Relations: Explaining Singapore’s “Trickle-Down” Military Innovation’, Defense & Security Analysis 33/4 (2017), 355.
55 See Edward Chen, et.al., Integrated Knowledge-based Command and Control for the ONE SAF Building the 3rd Spiral, 3rd Generation SAF (Singapore: Pointer: Journal of the Singapore Armed Forces 2008).
56 IHS Jane’s, Navigating the Emerging Markets: Republic of Singapore (Coulsdon, Surrey: IHS Jane’s Citation2011), 11.
57 IHS Jane’s, Navigating the Emerging Markets: Republic of Singapore, 18.
58 Richard A. Deck, ‘Singapore: Comprehensive Security – Total Defense’, in Ken Booth and Russell Trood (eds.), Strategic Cultures in the Asia-Pacific Region (London: Palgrave Macmillan 1999), 247–269; Bilveer Singh, ‘ASEAN’s Arms Industries: Potential and Limits’, Comparative Strategy 8 (1989), 251.
59 Tim Huxley and Susan Willett, Arming East Asia (Oxford: Oxford University Press July 1999), 50; Tan Peng Yam, ‘Harnessing Defense Technology: Singapore’s Perspective’, DISAM Journal of International Security Assistance Management 21/3 (1999).
60 Ron Matthews, ‘Singapore Buys Longbows and Grows its Defense Industry’, Asia-Pacific Defense Reporter, December 1999, p. 20.
61 Technically, ST Engineering is a ‘government-linked company’ (GLC); 50.15% of its stock is owned by Temasek Holdings, a state-owned holding company.
62 IHS Jane’s, Navigating the Emerging Markets: Republic of Singapore, 20.
63 Four vessels for the RSN and one for the Royal Thai Navy.
67 Laksmana, ‘Threats and Civil–Military Relations’, 357–358; Michael Raska, ‘A Nimble 4 G SAF Needs Space for Mavericks’, Straits Times, 13 May 2017.
68 McCarthy, The Political Theory of Tyranny in Singapore and Burma, 115–116.
69 Alan Chong and Samuel Chan, ‘Militarizing Civilians in Singapore: Preparing for “Crisis” within a Calibrated Nationalism’, The Pacific Review 3/3 (2017), 365–366.
70 Poh Kam Wong, ‘From Using to Creating Technology: The Evolution of Singapore’s National Innovations System and the Changing Role of Public Policy’, in S. Lall and S. Urata (eds.), Foreign Direct Investment, Technology Development, and Competitiveness in East Asia (Elgar, 2002); Vivian Shao, ‘Singapore Budget 2018: Innovation, R&D to Get Shot in the Arm’, Straits Times, 20 February 2018.
71 Stephen Ortmann, ‘Singapore: From Hegemonic to Competitive Authoritarianism’, in William Case (ed.), Routledge Handbook of Southeast Asian Democratisation (Routledge 2015); Wong, ‘From Using to Creating Technology.’
72 Winston T.H. Koh, ‘Singapore’s Transition to Innovation-based Economic Growth: Infrastructure, Institutions, and Government’s Role’, R&D Management 36/2 (2006), 143–160.
73 Ortmann, ‘Singapore: From Hegemonic to Competitive Authoritarianism’, 392.
74 Koh, ‘Singapore’s Transition to Innovation-based Economic Growth’ 158.
75 Richard W. Carney and Loh Yi Zhang, ‘Institutional (Dis)Incentives to Innovate: An Explanation for Singapore’s Innovation Gap’, Journal of East Asian Studies 9 (2009), 299–300.
76 Carney and Loh, ‘Institutional (Dis)Incentives to Innovate’, 301–302.
77 Carney and Loh, ‘Institutional (Dis)Incentives to Innovate’, 305.
78 Richard W. Carney and Loh Yi Zheng, ‘An Explanation for Singapore’s Innovation Gap’, RSIS Commentary CO200849, 21 April 2008, p. 3.
79 Adapted from Tai Ming Cheung, Thomas G. Mahnken, and Andrew L. Ross, ‘Analyzing the State of Understanding of Defense and Military Innovation in an Era of Profound Technological Change’, Paper prepared for the ‘Workshop on Comparing Defense Innovation in Advanced and Catch-up Countries’, Washington DC, 3 May 2018, 5.
80 See Seng Tan and Alvin Chew, ‘Governing Singapore’s Security Sector: Problems, Prospects, and Paradox’, Contemporary Southeast Asia 30/2 (2008), 252–257.
81 Cheung, Mahnken, and Ross, Analyzing the State of Understanding of Defense and Military Innovation in an Era of Profound Technological Change, 16.
82 Adapted from Tai Ming Cheung, ‘Critical Factors in Enabling Defense Innovation: A Case Study of China’s Defense Science and Technology System’, Paper prepared for the ‘Workshop on Comparing Defense Innovation in Advanced and Catch-up Countries’, Washington DC, 3 May 2018, 6–8.
83 Tan and Chew, ‘Governing Singapore’s Security Sector: Problems, Prospects, and Paradox’, 249.
84 Tan and Chew, ‘Governing Singapore’s Security Sector’, 249, 251–252; Deck, ‘Singapore: Comprehensive Security – Total Defense’, 258–260.
85 Bar-el, Schwartz, and Bentolila, ‘Singular Factors Behind the Growth Of Innovation In Israel’, 143–147; Getz and Segal, The Israeli Innovation System, 6–7.
86 Ortmann, ‘Singapore: From Hegemonic to Competitive Authoritarianism’, 394–395.
87 Chong and Chan, ‘Militarizing civilians in Singapore’, 366. See also Tan Tai Young, ‘The Armed Forces and Politics in Singapore: The Persistence of Civil-Military Fusion’, in Marcus Mietzner (ed.), The Political Resurgence of the Military in Southeast Asia: Conflict and Leadership (Routledge 2012); and Tan Tai Yong, ‘Singapore: Civil-Military Fusion,’ in Coercion and Governance: The Declining Political Role of the Military in Asia, edited by Muthiah Alagappa (Stanford University Press 2001).
88 Koh, ‘Singapore’s Transition to Innovation-based Economic Growth’, 158.
89 Cheung, Mahnken, and Ross, Analyzing the State of Understanding of Defense and Military Innovation in an Era of Profound Technological Change, 4.
90 Ibid.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Richard A. Bitzinger
Richard A. Bitzinger is a Visiting Senior Fellow with the Military Transformations Program at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), where his work focuses on a variety of security, defense, and military-technological issues, including military modernization and force transformation in the Asia-Pacific, the global defense industry, armaments production, and the proliferation of armaments and military technologies. He was a Senior Fellow at RSIS from 2006 to 2018, and headed up the Military Transformations Program from 2012 to 2018. Mr. Bitzinger has written several monographs and book chapters, and his articles have appeared in such journals as International Security, Orbis, China Quarterly, and Survival. He is the author of Arming Asia: Technonationalism and Its Impact on Local Defense Industries (Routledge, 2017), and Towards a Brave New Arms Industry? (Oxford University Press, 2003). Other key publications include ‘Come the Revolution: Transforming the Asia-Pacific’s Militaries,’ Naval War College Review (Fall 2005) and ‘Military Modernization in the Asia-Pacific: Assessing New Capabilities’, Asia’s Rising Power (NBR, 2010). He is the editor of The Modern Defense Industry: Political, Economic and Technological Issues (Praeger, 2009) and Emerging Critical Technologies and Security in the Asia Pacific (Palgrave, 2015). Mr. Bitzinger has previously worked at the RAND Corporation, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Affairs, the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, and the US Central Intelligence Agency.