This is an

is the Cato Daily Podcast for Friday, January 14th, 2011.

I'm Caleb Brown.

The military industrial complex was identified by President Eisenhower 50 years ago next week.

What has happened since then?

Susan Eisenhower is president of the Eisenhower Group Consulting firm

and an expert on international security.

She is also the granddaughter of President Eisenhower. We spoke

following a Cato Institute event on the Military Industrial Complex held yesterday.

What does it mean to have somebody a general and then president more importantly commander in chief

make this call regarding the military industrial complex 50 years ago?

Well first of all, Eisenhower's farewell address was really his leave taking after more

than 50 years of public service.

And in doing so, I think he picked up many of the themes he had continued to articulate in his eight years as president.

The most important, of course, was the connection between our fiscal and economic health in this country and our

national security and he regarded our fiscal health as being one of the pillars along

with our military capability of national defense.

And so in looking at the Farewell address, he singled out this new and growing trend, that

is the combination of forces that made up a military industrial complex,

and he talked about the potential, whether sought or unsought, of unwarranted influence in the democratic process.

I think he was concerned about this clearly because of the military industry and you know members of the complex lobbying the federal

government for weapon systems and a posture or profile that is, would have been inappropriately

...