Veteran experience and procurement bias

Personal combat experience could skew defence policy in opposite directions. One leader might treat a wartime role as the only valid guide for future procurement and dismiss capabilities that had been irrelevant to that experience. Another might recoil from the horror of the same war and pursue alternatives while disregarding lessons that remained useful. The rare ideal lay between those positions and relied on advisers who could challenge personal bias. Carrier aviation could lose out when ministers judged maritime utility through land-war experience or rejected inherited lessons without a balanced assessment.