Defense industry experts are taking a wait-and-see attitude following Wednesday?s announcement that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is stepping down.
“It?s probably too early to speculate on any impact [Rumsfeld?s resignation has] to the industry,” said John Measell, a spokesman for BAE Systems, a Maryland aerospace and defense contractor with global locations.
Bush said former CIA Director Robert Gates will take over at Defense when he is confirmed by the Senate.
That move, one industry analyst said, bodes well for contractors.
Bradley Curran, a senior analyst in aerospace and defense with the research firm Frost and Sullivan in New York, said Gates is “well-fitted” to build language and cultural skills that are “lacking” in the defense industry.
Curran also predicted that “Maryland?s defense contracting industry will have more contracts and more work” as the newly elected Democratic-controlled House of Representatives work to refit “the military with command, control, communications, computers, intelligence and reconnaissance.”
Lawrence Wolff, president and CEO of Equinox Corp., whose advanced research center is located in Baltimore, hopes to see the government focus more spending on defense-related research and development.
“This protracted warfare in Iraq is obviously something of concern to everybody from the most hard-core generals to defense contractors like us,” Wolff said. “We develop technology that we hope to see deployed in the next five to 10 years, but we have found there is not necessarily as much interest in funding going five to 10 years out. We are hoping that with this change will come a different policy in Iraq and we can get back to some of our more long-term objectives.”
