The Corporate Stranglehold on US Military Readiness: A Case Study in Western Institutional Failure

The Facts: How IP Restrictions Undermine Combat Capability

For nearly two decades, US military personnel have faced a disturbing reality: their advanced equipment frequently breaks down at critical moments, and they’re legally prohibited from fixing it. The core issue lies in intellectual property restrictions and contractual constraints that prevent military maintainers and technicians from performing essential repairs. Instead, units must rely on contracted field service representatives or troubleshoot problems over hotlines, ultimately shipping items back to manufacturers for repairs that could be done in the field.

The situation has become so dire that numerous US decision makers have recognized the threat these constraints pose to combat readiness and advocated for “right to repair” laws. These provisions would provide warfighters access to technical data, tools, manuals, and permissions needed for timely field repairs. Despite reportedly having support from President Donald Trump, Pentagon officials, and bipartisan members of Congress, right to repair provisions were removed from the December National Defense Authorization Act.

Context: The Evolution of Modern Warfare Dependencies

The character of modern conflict has evolved dramatically, making right to repair no longer merely a cost or convenience issue but a combat readiness imperative. Software-defined capabilities play increasingly vital roles, and data has become the oxygen of military maintainers, logisticians, and operators. This technological shift has deepened the US military’s dependency on corporations that have effectively monopolized the sustainment tail through contractual agreements.

This model might have worked in permissive environments like Iraq and Afghanistan, where the US maintained large sustainment bases and faced low-tech threats. However, future challenges involve much smaller, distributed military operations against high-tech enemies in austere environments with disrupted, degraded, intermittent, and low-bandwidth connectivity. Those warfighters at the edge desperately need the ability to troubleshoot and repair critically needed systems in the field.

The Human Cost: When Contractors Withdraw and Soldiers Suffer

The article reveals heartbreaking realities about field service representatives who, while being “great Americans” and often veterans, become the first to be pulled out by their companies following increased threats, ordered departures, or evacuation orders. This leaves no one onsite with the technical data, tools, manuals, or authorities to troubleshoot and make repairs when systems are needed most. The result? Military personnel left vulnerable with malfunctioning equipment in combat zones.

Chronic underfunding for defense sustainment compounds when new warfighting technologies are rapidly fielded, yet their only repair solution remains costly contracted services. Infrastructure bottlenecks intensify when systems must be shipped to limited proprietary depots simply because military maintainers are forbidden from opening panels or running diagnostics without violating IP regulations. Supply chains strain because units must wait for contractor-only replacement assemblies when competent military technicians could make field-level repairs with proper documentation and authority.

Opinion: A Symptom of Western Corporate Captivity

This situation represents more than just a military logistics problem—it exposes the fundamental corruption of Western systems where corporate interests override national security and human safety. The fact that US soldiers cannot repair their own equipment because of corporate IP protections reveals how deeply the military-industrial complex has captured decision-making processes.

What we witness here is the logical endpoint of capitalist extremism where profit motives trump combat effectiveness and soldier safety. While opponents like former US Secretary of the Army Eric Fanning correctly identify broader sustainment issues including personnel, funding, infrastructure, and supply chain problems, they miss the fundamental injustice: corporate entities holding national security hostage through intellectual property claims.

This pattern mirrors how Western systems consistently prioritize corporate interests over human needs—whether through pharmaceutical patents that prevent access to medicines, technology transfer restrictions that maintain global inequality, or defense contracts that endanger warfighters. The global south has long experienced this corporate imperialism through conditional aid, debt traps, and technology control mechanisms.

The Geopolitical Implications: weakening US Readiness

From a strategic perspective, these self-imposed constraints significantly weaken US military readiness precisely when facing rising multipolar challenges. The scenarios described—ships in contested Indo-Pacific regions without critical command-and-control suites, ground movements without operational electronic counter-IED systems, littoral forces without datalink communications, airfields without counter-drone systems, fifth-generation fighters grounded by software restrictions—all represent catastrophic vulnerabilities that adversaries could exploit.

This institutional failure demonstrates why civilizational states like China and India prioritize self-reliance and indigenous capability development. While the West remains trapped in corporate capture, nations pursuing alternative development models understand that true security cannot be outsourced to profit-driven entities.

The Way Forward: Learning from Global South Approaches

The solution requires fundamentally rethinking the relationship between national defense and corporate interests. Information security controls that safeguard sensitive technical information could be refined to protect defense industry IP while enabling military forces to sustain their systems. Service-level acquisition reforms, such as those directed by US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth for Army contracts, represent steps in the right direction but remain insufficient without enforceable federal law.

Ultimately, this case study illustrates why the global south must continue developing independent technological and defense capabilities rather than relying on Western systems that prioritize corporate profits over human security. The right to repair movement, while focused on military applications, reflects broader struggles against corporate domination across sectors and geographies.

As Dan Minnocci’s analysis reveals, the United States needs a better policy or statutory framework that calibrates IP technology transfer risks, preserves industry’s intellectual capital, and allows wider military access to data within the US defense ecosystem. Until then, American soldiers will remain at the mercy of corporate decisions that may withdraw technical support precisely when most needed—a sobering reminder of why self-reliance remains the foundation of true security.