There are some obvious culprits: legislators who doggedly insist on maintaining military bases, and industrial assembly lines, in their home districts, and service chiefs who are keener on scoring points over rivals than on shaping America's overall defence posture.

ECONOMIST: New wars and old

Industrial robots are getting better at assembly, but they are expensive and need human experts to set them up (who can cost more than the robot).

ECONOMIST: Automation

Top-down assembly line processing is a remnant from the rusty industrial age, and no longer works in the fluid, spreadable hoodoo environments of the information era.

FORBES: Google Says It's Time For Agencies To Get Agile

Here and across America's industrial heartland, millions clocked in each day at foundries and on assembly lines to make things.

WHITEHOUSE: A Renaissance in American Manufacturing

This assembly method was a great success and was widely adopted throughout the industrial world.

FORBES: Ford: The Remake Of An American Icon

The second industrial revolution was driven by Ford, and others, who created mass production and moving assembly lines.

FORBES: The New Manufacturing Lifecycle: An Interview With PTC's Hepplemann