You’re assuming we’re still advancing. Our Congress has been killing off and blocking needed upgrades for most of the past two decades. We didn’t build enough F-22s, the LCS is an abject failure, all of our frigates are gone and we have had to buy in a foreign design for an emergency build program, our destroyers are forty year old designs with upgrades strapped onto them and are inferior to counterparts operated by our allies (let alone our enemies), we torpedoed our battlefield laser programs, we went with the cheap-n-cheerful Virginia class submarines instead of the Seawolf “monster in the darkness” attack subs, etc., etc.
If you believe Congress is privy to every bit of research and development my the Pentagon you would be wildly wrong.
The Congress appropriates fund for the military and after the funds are allocated the Congress has little say as to exactly how they are spent.
The Pentagon does NOT report to the Congress when they enter into R&D for a new weapons system. The Congress is told only on a “need to know” basis. If you know Congress critters, you know why it is done this way.