Corps de l'armement


The Corps des ingénieurs de l'armement is a Technical Grand Corps of the French State, aimed at providing the French Armed Forces with all appropriate equipment and supervising the French Aerospace & Defence industry.
The corps members are the ingénieurs de l'armement nicknamed IA in French. They are high level engineers and public servants with military status, originating for most of them from Ecole polytechnique and trained at Institut supérieur de l'aéronautique et de l'espace , ENSTA Paris, or other French or international universities.
The Corps des ingénieurs de l'armement's main employer is the Direction générale de l'armement. The second half are employed in other bodies of the Ministry of Defence, in international Defence organizations, can be detached in French administrative bodies, or the French and European industry.

Prehistory of the Corps des ingénieurs de l'armement

The Corps was created in 1968 as a fusion of previous Corps of military engineers recruiting at Ecole polytechnique.
  • Corps of Aeronautics engineers
  • Corps of naval engineers
  • Corps of Powders and Explosives engineers
  • Corps of Military Telecom engineers
  • Corps of Armament Fabrications engineers
In 1743, the "Ecole des constructeurs de vaisseaux royaux" was created to train Naval engineers. The school is known today as ENSTA ParisTech.

Corps of Armament and high-tech Colbertism

The role played by the Corps of Armament in the development of the French aerospace and defence industry, in particular with the logic of Grands Projets, can be compared with the role of the Corps des télécommunications in the development of the French telecom industry, the role of the Corps des mines, or the Corps des ponts with their respective Grands Projets. They illustrate Colbertism, a French version of mercantilism.
Colbertism dates back to the 17th century, influenced at that time by the Chinese system. French high public servants are nicknamed "mandarins", referring to their Chinese counterparts.
The French economist Elie Cohen described the effects of French Colbertism in the field of High tech in a book entitled "High tech Colbertism - Economics of the Grand Projet".
High tech Colbertism can be characterized by a prevalent role played in France by the Administration and the Grand Corps. A typical Colbertist mechanism is the "pantouflage" where top civil servants become Heads of French public companies. The word "pantouflage" cannot be directly translated in English nor in any Western language but can be translated in Japanese where a comparable mechanism exists. The Japanese word is "amakudari".

Notable members of the Corps des ingénieurs de l'armement

Heads of the [Direction générale de l'armement]