President Trump is moving to freeze billions of dollars in federal grants to top research institutions.
Julian Zelizer : Cutting support does not represent a principled political stance, it is a friendly-fire assault on U.S. national security.
Zelizer says universities have long undergirded national security through defense research.
He says cutting their support is a dangerous misunderstanding of how the United States became militarily dominant.
The U.S. built a decentralized research system anchored in its universities.
This decentralized system accelerated technological progress and helped defense-related innovations flow into private commerce.
The flow of knowledge and expertise from academia into industry is what transforms abstract scientific insights into deployable technologies.
China , in particular, is racing to close the gap by pouring state investment into its universities, authors say.
Ceding independence in exchange for scientific funding would undermine the rigor and openness that has given the U.S. university system its edge for decades .
Cutting off Defense Department funding to universities will not halt defense innovation, but it will help ensure that it moves elsewhere.
