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Oregon Daily Emerald
The independent campus newspaper for the University of Oregon
Military: Department of Defense allotted $419.3 billion budget for 2006
Continued from page 1
5 percent of University research fund
ing over the past 40 years.
Other universities across the coun
try, including Oregon State University
in Corvallis, accept DoD grants.
OSU spokesman Todd Simmons
said DoD grants accounted for 7 per
cent of OSU’s overall research budget
of $209 million during the 2004-2005
fiscal year.
“It hasn’t been anything that’s
generated any controversy on this
campus,” Simmons said.
Linton said the amount of military
funding at the University as a percent
age of all research funding has been
relatively stable over the past 15 years,
explaining the slight spike during the
2003-2004 fiscal year as two years of
funding for the Brain, Biology and Ma
chine Initiative administered at once.
More heavily used federal funding
sources are the National Institutes of
Health and the National Science
Foundation, Linton said.
This funding is consistent at
universities nationwide.
During the 2003 fiscal year, the
NSF spent nearly $4 billion on science
and engineering at universities,
while the DoD spent $2.5 billion,
according to the NSF’s Survey of
Federal Science and Engineering
Support to Universities, Colleges and
Nonprofit Institutions.
However, the DoD’s budget is sub
stantially larger than that of the NSF,
and it is increasing at a faster rate. Ac
cording to the Budget of the United
States Government, the DoD has a
$419.3 billion budget for the 2006 fis
cal year, up 5 percent from 2005 and
up 41 percent from 2001.
The NSF has a $5.6 billion budget
for 2006. This is an increase of 2 per
cent from 2005, but it is still much
smaller than the DoD’s budget.
“Most (researchers) go to DoD to
get money because that’s where the
money is,” Stahl said. “It’s the same
reason Willie Sutton robbed banks.”
The Association of American Uni
versities, which University President
Dave Frohnmayer is on the executive
committee for, includes 62 public and
private research universities in the
U.S. and Canada. In May 2004, the
AAU Executive Committee wrote a let
ter to the Defense Subcommittee of
the House Appropriations Committee
urging the DoD to fund more research
at colleges and universities.
A statement on Edugate, a Web site
with information about educational
programs in science, mathematics and
engineering that are fully or partially
sponsored by the DoD, discussed the
Linton said any University researcn
that is funded by the DoD could just
as easily have been funded by the NIH
or NSF, and that sometimes re
searchers switch back and forth be
tween NSF and DoD funding for the
same project based on whichever
source is most convenient at the time.
“It’s not that the DoD is steering us
into areas we’re not already interested
in at a basic level,” Linton said. “It’s
another source of funding that helps
us pursue those interests.”
Linton said DoD funding gives the
University the capacity to do more
research by providing equipment
and research facilities. For example,
DoD funding helps the Lewis
Center for Neuroimaging with basic
operating expenses.
“I don’t make any distinction
between its impact and that of NSF,”
Linton said. “Any time you can
bring more funding sources to bear on
faculty work, they’re going to be
better scholars. ”
History, prevalence
Chemistry professor Tom Dyke,
who came to the University 31 years
ago and previously served as interim
vice provost for research, said he con
ducted DoD-funded research in the
early and mid-1980s, studying the
structure of molecules held together
by intermolecular forces such as mi
crowaves and radio frequency light.
These findings may have been applied
to communications devices, he said.
Dyke said he doesn’t consider the
DoD grant any different from other re
search funding he has obtained over
the years and said that faculty mem
bers should be free to pursue research
funding from any source that doesn’t
violate University policies.
“I think it’s a straightforward aca
demic freedom issue,” Dyke said.
“Faculty need to be free to pursue
teaching and research free of political
pressure groups that would try to
constrain that freedom.
“After all, there are many political
viewpoints in this country and many
different groups that would like re
search to be different from what it is.
Should we stop work on evolutionary
theory because there are groups that
don’t believe?”
Three Oregon universities — the
University, OSU and Portland State
University — share DoD funding
through the Oregon Nanoscience and
Microtechnologies Institute.
University chemistry professor Jim
Hutchison heads ONAMI’s Inherently
Safer Nanomaterials and Nanomanu
facturing initiative, which is funded
by the U.S. Air Force.
1111 ODl vJ 11 UL UUU ICO
“At the Depart
ment of Defense,
we base our
strong commit
ment to quality
education on the
realities of life,”
the statement
said. “Without
well-educated
Americans we
cannot have a
well-educated
military force and
without such a
force we cannot
hope to success
fully defend our
nation against
those who seek to
diminish us and
our freedom.
cai i_n gi anio.
UPCOMING MEETINGS
Who: University Senate
When: Today from 3 p.m. until 5 p.m.
Where: EMU Fir Room
What: Senate members will vote on a motion to
hold public hearings about campus research
funded by the U.S. Department of Defense.
Who: Campus Planning Committee
When: Thursday from 1 p.m. until 2:30 p.m.
Where: 220 Deschutes Hall
What: A discussion on issues related to the con
struction of an underground building for the Oregon
Nanoscience and Microtechnologies Institute on
campus.
Both meetings are open to the public.
1 lit? UUl
come, I think, is
going to be a re
ally terrific op
tion for the U of
O to develop
safer nanoma
terials and
nanomanufac
turing methods
that wouldn’t
be possible
without that
funding,”
Hutchison said.
Hutchison
said that in his
work with the
Air Force, he
has learned that
the military is
an organization
with a lot of
Mathematics and
science skills are, therefore, vital
building blocks of our democracy, and
work to the
benefit of all Americans. ”
Linton said DoD funding is often
more reliable for researchers than NSF
and NIH funding.
“In an ideal world, the value of the
NSF and NIH would be recognized at a
level where projects worthy of
support would get support," Linton said.
people who
need the same things that civilians
need, such as medicine, clothing and
food, and that his contacts at the Air
Force research labs care about the im
pact of their materials on the
environment and on human health.
Applications
Bogart, the peace studies graduate
student, said he’s most concerned
about how the research DoD funds
pay tor is used.
“I’m not really against any of the
projects, per se,” Bogart said. “I’m
against the Defense Department
putting them together in a horrible
package to be used for future wars. ”
Linton said he does not know what
all the applications of DoD research
at the University have been. Research
conducted at the University is
not classified, Linton said, and it
is published in publicly accessible
scientific journals, so anyone could
use it for anything.
“It’s a distinction between the
development of fundamental knowl
edge and the application of it,” Linton
said. “How it ultimately gets used by
society is not something we can really
control or even predict.”
Stahl said most DoD research has
harmless and even beneficial
short-term uses but said that even
trying to make the Internet faster
could have homicidal implications, as
soldiers might use a very fast Internet
connection to control, from a safe
distance, robots that kill enemies on
the battlefield.
“The Defense Department realizes
that to control the world, which is the
aim under the present administration, we
need the best technology,” Stahl said.
One DoD-funded project that
has come under particular scrutiny
from those opposed to military
research is the Brain, Biology and
“It's a distinction between
the development of
fundamental knowledge
and the application
of it. How it ultimately
gets used by society is not
something we can really
control or even predict. ”
Rich Linton | Vice President
for Research and Graduate Studies
Machine Initiative.
“BBMI is the one that really stands
out as being connected to the FCS (the
U.S. Army’s Future Combat Systems)
program,” Bogart said.
The FCS program, which Bogart
named as one of his top concerns, “is
the core of the Army’s efforts to en
sure that the Army ... will move,
shoot and communicate better than
ever before and better than any oppo
nent it will face in the 21st century,”
according to the program’s Web site.
An April 2004 University report en
titled “Federal Priorities” describes
some defense applications for military
research conducted at the University.
Uses for knowledge obtained from
the BBMI include, “optimizing the train
ing of performance of military person
nel, such as their ability to function in
stressful and complex environments
and to improve the integration of hu
man and machine. Examples include
developing the ability to ‘lock out’ un
desirable battle responses, or to assess a
soldier’s suitability to particular military
tasks involving aspects such as atten
tion, decision making, emotion, memo
ry and communication,” according to
the report.
Stahl said the BBMI might use its
biology component to find the genes
that cause emotions and block the
expression of those genes.
“We’ll get rational treatments
for sympathy so soldiers don’t
sympathize with the enemy,” Stahl said.
Michael Posner, psychology
professor emeritus and BBMI coordi
nator, said he wasn’t aware of the
Federal Priorities report until people
opposed to military research brought
the claim about locking out undesir
able battle responses to his attention.
He spent a weekend going through
every paper he’d ever written about
the BBMI searching for the sentence
and then discovered that the sentence
in question came from what he
described as a document produced
by the University’s public relations
department in 1998.
“It is kind of an offensive sentence,
but it doesn’t really describe the
work very well,” Posner said.
Boyd, the University’s federal af
fairs director, wrote in an e-mail that
the Federal Priorities report is pre
pared by the University’s Office of
Public and Government Affairs in
consultation with senior University
staff, and that the BBMI description
in the 2004 report included some lan
guage, such as the phrase “lock out,”
that predates Linton and the current
government relations staff.
Posner said that to his knowledge,
recipients of DoD grants are not re
quired to submit any documents
about possible defense applications
of their projects.
Posner also said that using knowl
edge of genetics to prevent people
from experiencing emotions is not
likely in the near future.
“It doesn’t seem like the way
genetics actually works,” Posner said.
The Budget of the U.S Govern
ment, available online at
www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget, said
the DoD’s research efforts include
technologies — such as improved
camouflage that stands up to harsh
conditions — that can help military
personnel do their jobs safely and
more effectively. Projects also include
detectors for improvised explosive
devices, chemical and biological
agents, radioactive materials, aerial
sensors and hypervelocity missiles.
Improving communications is also
one of the department’s goals.
“The 2006 Budget supports
substantial investments in advanced
technology to provide advantages
over our enemies, particularly in
remote sensing and high-perform
ance computing. U.S. intelligence
capabilities are employing advanced
technology systems to exploit,
process, and produce information
from enemy signals, imager, and
human and other sources,” the
budget said. “These developments
are improving our ability to detect
and counter the broad range of
threats facing the United States,
reaping benefits for both U.S. forces
and homeland security.”
Stahl said that while administra
tors at universities are aware of the
uses of military research, many of the
researchers themselves are not
aware, or choose to do the research
anyway to improve their status in the
scientific community or increase
their salaries.
“I think they just don’t face it, face
the degree to which the American
military is the world’s greatest threat
to peace,” Stahl said.
Options for the future
Keyes said that as far as the
University Senate is concerned, mili
tary research may be part of a larger
issue of externally funded research.
For example, some schools that
accept research funding from phar
maceutical companies have found
this to be a problem.
Keyes said he doesn’t know if the
University Senate has the power to
make University researchers stop
accepting DoD funding.
“There are certainly faculty mem
bers who would be very upset with
Tim Bobosky | Photo editor
Chris Minson, an associate professor of human physiology, left, helps Gregg McCord, graduate student in human physiology, prepare for a
demonstration of the University’s new environmental chamber, which was funded in part by the U.S. Department of Defense.
other faculty members telling them
what kind of research they could do
and what kind of funding they could
accept,” Keyes said.
Stahl said if the University quit
doing military research, it would not
have a noticeable impact on the mili
tary unless it started a trend and
other universities also quit doing
military research.
“To what extent does the U of O
want to be complicit in illegal
military aggression?” Stahl said.
Linton said the issue of military
funding is impossible to escape.
“To think that we can and
should isolate ourselves from
anything that connects to the military
is not feasible and probably not
desirable,” Linton said. “The further
we’re isolated and divided from
the military, the less opportunity
we have to impact on it in
positive ways.”
Linton said that the country
must make decisions about priorities
from an informed perspective. While
funding science and technology
to thwart terrorists will protect
national security and other interests in
the short term, a long-term
solution to global problems
will require the sort of understanding
and knowledge that comes from the hu
manities disciplines, Linton said.
Contact the business, science
and technology reporter at
esylwester@dailyemerald.com
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