Started later there

Worth reading! A detailed history from a former British government official in charge of science grants.

Briefly:

Until 1997, Britain made grants the right way, providing an annual ‘block grant’ to each lab or university to use however they wanted. In 1997 the Major admin adopted the US system of single grants awarded competitively for single projects. The result was the same in both places. All funded research serves the ends of Deepstate. Nobody even bothers to try a project that won’t make Deepstate happy.

We made the change in 1946 after Deepstate bought Truman’s soul. All the agencies started then. NSF, NIH, NSA, CIA, WHO, UN, CDC. All had the mission of total control for ideological purposes.