[saalweachter]

It's also worth noting that science funding in the US government is decentralized. Each branch of the military as well as a half dozen "civilian" departments each have their own separate programs for funding basic science research. If I recall correctly, when I was an undergraduate research assistant working for a cognitive psychologist studying how humans solve the traveling salesman problem, that research was funded by the US Navy.

So the DOD funding research could mean it thought the research could mean it had potential as a weapon, or a defense against weapons, or was just a random thing being funded to promote basic science research.

You can't really draw a line from "This was funded by this department, so it had this intent" in US science funding.