A Sustainment History of the 20th Century

I have completed a draft of the chapter that David K. Stumpf requested for his upcoming book: Minuteman III. The chapter is entitled: Sustainment. 

Look for it on Amazon.com in about a year. 

So now I am taking that chapter and expanding it into a book, entitled: 

Fundamentals of Complex System Sustainment

A Management Model for Effective and Economical Support

Suitable for

Any Sufficiently Complex System

That Must Maintain Its Capability Beyond Its Planned Lifespan

Chapter 3 is entitled: A Sustainment History of the 20th Century

It briefly sketches the history of strategic bombardment from the Wright Brothers to the end of TRW's support of ICBMs. Army Signal Corps Air Doctrine, von Braun's rocket experiments, Zeppelin D.I, B-17, B-52, Bell Labs' birth of systems engineering, first SLBM patrol, Minuteman deployed, WWI, Spanish Civil War, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Cold War, First Gulf War. 

The intent is to show how we transitioned from rapidly fielding new versions of aircraft and missiles to keeping the B-52 and Minuteman employed for over a half century and how this made modern sustainment methods a necessity. 

Now that everyday life is filled with complex systems needing sustaining (Internet of Things, commercial space, internet for the poor, etc), everyone can learn from methods created in the last century. 

This chapter starts with a quote from Michael Crichton: "If you don't know history, then you don't know anything. You are a leaf that doesn't know it is part of a tree."

Here is an excerpt from that chapter:

If none of the previously discussed history was apparent to Minuteman sustainers in the 1980s, simple numbers tell the story. By 1985, Minuteman III, with an often-quoted design life of 10 years, had been on alert for 13 years. And there seemed to reason to suppose it wouldn’t follow the pattern of Minuteman II which had been on alert 20 years by this point. Perhaps more telling, the venerable Strategic Air Command aerial nuclear bombing weapon system, the B-52 and KC-135, were already 30 years and 28 years old, respectively.

... and, of course, the Minuteman, B-52, and KC-135 weapon systems are all still going strong today. 

As always. Any comments to this blog on sustainment are appreciated and will likely wind up in this upcoming book.