The Myth of Dual-Use Technology

The Times reports on the painfully obvious: Russia exploits third countries to smuggle critical pieces of technology for its war effort in Ukraine. Is anyone surprised? Russia played this game for years during the Cold War. Check out Schweitzer’s beautiful book, Victory, for the story and how we stopped it.

The core problem here is the concept of dual-use, which contains a profound lie. The basic idea is that certain technologies and products have both civilian and military applications, and that we can sell these products while restricting their use to civilian applications.

In a rule-of-law society that is closely allied, perhaps this can have some force, except when it actually matters. The moment that there’s an existential problem, whatever technologies are available will be used for warfighting. This is universally true.

And of course there’s the profit motive: In an open society, commercial parts can be purchased on the basis of an assumption of good faith, stuck into a box, and shipped elsewhere, where they can be used for anything. That’s what the Russians are doing. And if you’re prepared to pay above-market prices, there’s almost always someone willing to sell.

But the fundamental lie is that you can enforce civilian-only use in an autocratic country. In such places, the first use for any dual-use technology, regardless of any papers that might get signed, is national security, oppression, and warfare.

We need stronger controls among our allies to prevent our enemies from accessing our technologies and those of our allies.