Institute for Defense Analyses
American non-profit corporation From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
American non-profit corporation From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA) is an American non-profit corporation that administers three federally funded research and development centers (FFRDCs) – the Systems and Analyses Center (SAC), the Science and Technology Policy Institute (STPI), and the Center for Communications and Computing (C&C) – to assist the United States government in addressing national security issues, particularly those requiring scientific and technical expertise. It is headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia.
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IDA headquarters (lower left) with Reagan National Airport in the background | |
| Company type | Nonprofit |
|---|---|
| Industry | Research |
| Headquarters | , U.S. |
Key people |
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| Revenue |  $270 million (2021)[1] |
| Divisions |
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| Website | www.ida.org |
Two ideas critical to the birth of the Institute for Defense Analyses, also known as IDA,[2] emerged from World War II. The first was the necessity for unifying the several services into a single, coordinated department. The second was the realization of the strength of the relationship between science—and scientists—and national security. The first reached fruition when President Harry Truman signed the National Security Acts of 1947 and 1949, creating the Department of Defense. (In 1947 the Department of War and the Department of the Navy had been combined to create the National Military Establishment. From it the present Defense Department was created in 1949.[3])
To give the nascent Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) the technical expertise and analytic resources to hold its own and to help make unification a reality, James Forrestal, the department's first secretary, established the Weapons Systems Evaluation Group (WSEG)[4] in 1948 to assist OSD and the Organization of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by:
The demands on WSEG were more than its small staff of military and civilian analysts could satisfy, and by the early years of the Dwight Eisenhower administration, there were calls for change.[citation needed] The several options gradually coalesced into one and, in 1955, the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff asked James R. Killian, Jr., then president of MIT, to help form a civilian, nonprofit research institute. The Institute would operate under the auspices of a university consortium to attract highly qualified scientists to assist WSEG in addressing the nation's most challenging security problems. And so, in April 1956, IDA was incorporated as a non-profit organization.[5] In 1958, at the request of the Secretary of Defense, IDA established a division to support the newly created Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), later renamed the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Shortly after its creation, the mandate of this division was broadened to include scientific and technical studies for all offices of the Director of Defense, Research and Engineering (DDR&E).[6]
Universities overseeing IDA expanded from the five initial members in 1956 — Caltech, Case Western Reserve, MIT, Stanford and Tulane — to twelve by 1964 with the addition of California, Chicago, Columbia, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Princeton.[7] University oversight of IDA ended in 1968 in the aftermath of Vietnam War-related demonstrations at Princeton, Columbia, and other member universities.[8]
Subsequent divisions were established under what became IDA's largest research center, the Studies and Analyses Center (now the Systems and Analyses Center), to provide cost analyses, computer software and engineering, strategy and force assessments, and operational test and evaluation. IDA created the Simulation Center in the early 1990s to focus on advanced distributed simulation, and most recently, established the Joint Advanced Warfighting Program to develop new operational concepts.[9]
IDA's support of the National Security Agency began at its request in 1959, when it established the Center for Communications Research in Princeton, New Jersey. Additional requests from NSA in 1984 and 1989 led respectively to what is now called the Center for Computing Sciences in Bowie, Maryland and to a second Center for Communications Research in La Jolla, California. These groups, which conduct research in cryptology and information operations, make up IDA's Communications and Computing FFRDC.
In 2003, IDA assumed responsibility for the Science and Technology Policy Institute, a separate FFRDC providing technical and analytic support to the Office of Science and Technology Policy and other executive branch organizations.[10]
Throughout its history, IDA also has assisted other federal agencies. Recent work includes research performed in support of the Department of Homeland Security, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Director of National Intelligence, and others.
The following have served as president of IDA:[11]
IDA's Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs), work with governmental sponsors and do not work for commercial enterprises or for-profit organizations.[12]
The Systems and Analyses Center's primary sponsor is the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics. SAC assists the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Unified Combatant Commands, and U.S. Department of Defense agencies in addressing national security issues, particularly those requiring scientific and technical expertise. With concurrence from the USD(AT&L), SAC also supports other sponsors – including the Veterans Administration Veteran's Administration; the Intelligence Community; U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Department of Commerce, and U.S. Department of Energy.
The Science and Technology Policy Institute provides analyses for the National Science Foundation as STPI's primary sponsor and the Office of Science and Technology Policy as its primary customer. STPI also provides analysis for the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Aeronautics and Space Agency, and other science-performing Federal agencies.
The Center for Communications and Computing supports the National Security Agency.
The Systems and Analyses Center (SAC)[13] is the largest of IDA's three FFRDCs and is co-located with the IDA headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia. SAC assists the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), the Joint Staff, the Combatant Commands, and Defense Agencies in addressing important national security issues, focusing particularly on those requiring scientific and technical expertise.[14] It includes the following divisions:
The Science and Technology Policy Institute (STPI),[15] is located in Washington, D.C. It provides objective analysis of science and technology (S&T) policy issues for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and other offices and councils within the executive branch of the U.S. government and federal agencies. Since IDA began operating it in 2003, STPI has provided support to OSTP on topics spanning the spectrum from the ethical, legal, and societal implications of nanotechnology research to aeronautics research and development; and from understanding the effects of U.S. visa policies to efforts that facilitate international research collaboration. In carrying out its work, STPI researchers consult widely with representatives from private industry, academia, and nonprofit organizations. STPI's key functions are to:
In 1959, IDA's Center for Communications and Computing[16] was formed (as the Communications Research Division) as a private think tank dedicated to helping the National Security Agency solve advanced cryptology problems.[17] It was headed by Cornell professor of mathematics J. Barkley Rosser (1958–61); University of Chicago mathematics chairman Abraham Adrian Albert (1961–1962); Yale University professor of mathematics Gustav A. Hedlund[18] (1962-1963); University of Illinois/Sandia Corporation mathematician Richard A. Leibler (1963–1977); and Princeton mathematician Lee Paul Neuwirth (1977-unknown).[17][19][20]
More recently, the centers, which now consist of a Center for Computing Sciences in Bowie, Maryland, and two Centers for Communications Research with offices in Princeton, New Jersey, and La Jolla, California, have also worked on network security issues. Within those broad areas, the research portfolio particularly focuses on the creation and analysis of sophisticated encryption methods, high-speed computing technologies, the development of advanced algorithms and their applications, algorithmic and mathematical foundations of cryptology, computer network technologies supporting communications security, information processing technologies supporting cyber security, and analytical applications for large data sets. Although the Centers in Princeton and La Jolla were founded to focus on the mathematics of cryptology, and the center in Bowie was founded to focus on computational science, all three have developed distinctive areas of expertise. Nonetheless, they work closely with each other and share many overlapping research teams.
IDA employs approximately 1,500 research, professional, adjunct, and support staff. Many have attended the nation's military service academies or served in the military. Approximately 56% hold doctoral degrees; 36% hold master's degrees; and 8% hold bachelor's degrees. The staff specializes in the following research disciplines:
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