Several years ago, while serving as the Pentagon’s chief weapons buyer, he spoke to investors about mergers in the defense industry. “He told the assemblage that the Pentagon would frown on mergers among the five giant military contractors—the so-called primes: Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Raytheon, Northrop-Grumman and Boeing,” according to a 2011 article by New York Times business columnist Joe Nocera. “However, he added, the Defense Department was going to encourage mergers among smaller military contractors. And, he said, ‘we will be attentive’ to innovative smaller companies that provide services (as opposed to weapons systems) to the Pentagon.”
“For the last few months, beginning with a secret meeting last October, Defense Department officials have been making the rounds of analysts and investors,” Nocera wrote. “Their main message, to put it bluntly, is that even in an era of tighter budgets, the Pentagon is going to make sure the military industry remains profitable. ‘Taxpayers and shareholders are aligned,’ Mr. Carter intoned” in his remarks.
Looks like all that online lobbying from the internet community worked.
