The design philosophy of the DARPA internet protocols

TLDR

The TCP/IP suite, first proposed fifteen years ago by DARPA and widely adopted in military and commercial systems, remains opaque in its design rationale, especially regarding its connectionless datagram service. This paper aims to capture the early reasoning that shaped the Internet protocols.

Abstract

The Internet protocol suite, TCP/IP, was first proposed fifteen years ago. It was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and has been used widely in military and commercial systems. While there have been papers and specifications that describe how the protocols work, it is sometimes difficult to deduce from these why the protocol is as it is. For example, the Internet protocol is based on a connectionless or datagram mode of service. The motivation for this has been greatly misunderstood. This paper attempts to capture some of the early reasoning which shaped the Internet protocols.