BBC Documentary 2015 | America's Top Secret Weapons Lab DARPA | History Military Documentaries HD

BBC DOCUMENTARY 2015 | America’s Top Secret Weapons Lab DARPA | History Military Documentaries HD

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The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is an agency of the U.S. Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military.

DARPA was created in 1958 as the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) by President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Its purpose was to formulate and execute research and development projects to expand the frontiers of technology and science, with the aim to reach beyond immediate military requirements.[3] The administration was responding to the Soviet launching of Sputnik 1 in 1957, and DARPA’s mission was to ensure U.S. military technology be more sophisticated than that of the nation’s potential enemies.

ARPA was renamed to “DARPA” in March 1972, then renamed “ARPA” in February 1993, and then renamed “DARPA” again in March 1996.

DARPA is independent from other military research and development and reports directly to senior Department of Defense management. DARPA has ca. 240 personnel (13 in management, close to 140 technical) directly managing a $3 billion budget. These figures are “on average” since DARPA focuses on short-term (two to four year) projects run by small, purpose-built teams.

DARPA funded projects have provided significant technologies that influenced many non-military fields, such as computer networking and graphical user interfaces in information technology.

Mission

DARPA characterizes it mission as follows: DARPA’s original mission, established in 1958, was to prevent technological surprise like the launch of Sputnik, which signaled that the Soviets had beaten the U.S. into space. The mission statement has evolved over time. Today, DARPA’s mission is still to prevent technological surprise to the US, but also to create technological surprise for our enemies.