That seems misleading. The DOD was the reason inasmuch as the budget to pay contractors was slashed, and the alternative was letting the smaller companies go out of business and losing the knowledge and manufacturing capabilities altogether.
Post-USSR, the DoD literally met with defense companies and told them that (a) there was going to be less money so (b) they needed to consolidate to survive.
It was pretty explicit.
That said, I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing.
Everyone forgets that system complexity increases generation by generation: an F-35 is not an F-111 is not an F-86 is not a P-51.
The unconsolidated, smaller defense companies of yore likely couldn't have managed a project of F-35 A+B+C complexity.
It's actually exactly correct. That comment is referring to 1993's "last supper" in which the SECDEF gathered the defense CEOs at the time and literally did tell them to consolidate/merge.
