Why is Weaponry so Expensive?

Complexity and Bullshit

Today I am going to introduce two new concepts for understanding the asymmetry between manufacturing industries:

1. Complexity

2. BS

It is very important to understand that these two are independent variables.

Complexity is about how easy it is to fuck it all up. The easier it is to fuck things up, the more complex is the industry

An aircraft engine would be an example of a highly complex product. Production chain is long, including a broad range of operations, from the precision machining to manual wiring & assembly. Extremely tight tolerances, extremely high requirements to the material. Meanwhile, a slightest variety in the quality of final product is catastrophically dangerous. It is astonishingly easy to fuck it all up. All of this makes the aircraft industry a highly complex field, one of the most complex manufacturing industries to exist.

NB: That is a major reason why new industrial powers, e.g. China struggle with the aircraft production. As it is too easy to fuck it all up, catching up with the older industrial powers requires a long, arduous learning process. Advancing to their level is not completely impossible. Just takes time.

A cast iron pot would be an example of lower complexity product. The production chain is short: crude casting → crude polishing → crude coating. All the operations are simple, requiring neither precision, nor excessively high consistency of the product. A slight variety in geometric dimensions, or mechanical properties of the material is perfectly fine. It is much more difficult to fuck it all up..

NB: Production of most household goods is a lower complexity industry. That’s why new industrial powers tend to enter the market and take it over more easily. It’s not that hard, complexity-wise.

Now let’s cover the Bullshit. Which, again, is a totally independent variable.

Bullshit is about suboptimal, cost-inefficient solutions, design & execution-wise