In his farewell presidential address in 1961, Dwight Eisenhower gave the English language a new phrase - the military-industrial complex.
The former general, who led US troops in Europe during the second world war, was referring to an incestuous relationship between the Pentagon and powerful US defence companies with a mutual interest in spending huge amounts of public money to buy weapons to fight real and imagined enemies.
More than 40 years later, Robert Gates has taken up the baton. The poker-faced US defence secretary wants to shake up the cosy set-up by reshaping spending priorities and reforming the weapons procurement process.
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