America Is Waging A Technology War On Russia
ByRobert FarleyPublished17 hours ago
The Biden administration has taken drastic measures to limit the transfer of technology to Russia in the months since that country invaded Ukraine. This is not the first time that the United States has waged a war of technology against Moscow. Beginning in 1945, the United States engaged in a decades-long effort to restrict the Soviet Union’s access to the most advanced military and civilian technologies.
It isn’t quite correct to say that export controls were invented to contain the Soviet Union, but it isn’t quite wrong, either. Before World War II, efforts to control the export of military equipment were haphazard, and they did not generally focus on technology. In United States vs. Curtiss Wright, the ruling that the Roosevelt administration had the inherent authority to prevent the export of military technology to Bolivia created the basic legal foundation for export management. Beginning in 1935, the Neutrality Acts restricted U.S. arms exports to combatants, out of the belief that these weapons could spark or extend wars.
Shifting the Focus of Battles Over Technology
Civilian equipment that contained technology with possible military applications was a different question entirely. For a time, it received little attention. The U.S. exported significant amounts of technology to the Soviet Union in the interwar period, and so did France and Britain. During World War II, the U.S. transferred huge amounts of military equipment to the Soviets, including tanks, trucks, and aircraft. One piece of equipment that the U.S. did not export was the B-29 Superfortress, an aircraft that the Americans had spent an enormous amount of money developing. They did not intend to just give it away. But it didn’t matter: The Russians got their hands on three aircraft that landed after bombing raids against Japan, took them apart, and eventually produced the bomber in bulk.
https://www.19fortyfive.com/2022/06/technology-cold-war-restrictions-are-back/
