By Ann Roosevelt
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va.–Fixing defense acquisition is vital for joint and coalition forces to be dominant, relevant and ready to face the challenges of the 21st century, officials said.
“What we should be doing is emphasizing system of systems…for 21st century missions,” said Jacques Gansler, former DoD acquisition chief now at the University of Maryland School of Public Affairs.
Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Sorenson, Army Chief Information Officer (CIO)/G6, agreed and said to take advantage of information technology (IT) over time, DoD must “mandate the system of systems architecture in acquisition.”
Gansler offered six solutions to start fixing defense acquisition during a panel at a symposium sponsored by the Armed Forces Communications Electronics Association International and the U.S. Naval Institute in coordination with U.S. Joint Forces Command here.
Defense acquisition is “absolutely” broken and systems take too long to field and cost too much, Gansler said on June 17. The F-22 aircraft took years to develop, and “is not responsive” to new technology at a time when electronics changes every nine to 18 months. Meanwhile, adversaries rapidly apply equipment from the commercial market.
Other impediments to better defense acquisition include an impending financial crunch when supplemental funding dries up and defense budgets shrink.
The panel used IT as a case study to discuss how to improve defense acquisition because it is key to joint and coalition operations. However, he said, major DoD weapon systems can’t talk to each other, yet services talk about every soldier a sensor, every Marine a collector, and where operations depend on each system and warfighter a node on a network to improve efficient and effective operations.
Robert Carey, Navy CIO, agreed. “IT provides the platform to do things faster.”
In the commercial world, companies such as FEDEX consider themselves as in the information business. DoD does not. DoD has 4,700 business systems that are not interoperable today, and that causes a huge overhead cost.
Carey said there is a need to synchronize–across the board– requirements, policy and acquisition.
“When we develop new systems, command and control is one of the things we must do well and consistently,” he said. One way to do this is to have a common set of standards.
James Craft, senior executive, deputy director C4 & deputy CIO for the Marines, said, “IT provides the tools to handle complexity, because complexity is increasing exponentially.”
IT can be used to measure the results of acquisition, he said, to find out what works or not, to capture better practices, even to show when people need more training or need a break.
Gansler offered specific areas to start the work of fixing defense acquisition, starting with thinking in terms of system of systems. However, acquisition is not organized to do that, it’s not in requirements, budgets or management. The focus is still on service platforms.
DoD must demand and implement proven technology, whether it comes from the commercial world or a foreign country. There are huge barriers to both, he said, which means changes in regulation and law. This is something defense acquisition officials have sought for some time, with some small successes, though “buy America” requirements remain.
“The world is integrated and linked except for DoD, which is is still isolated,” he said.
Sorenson said one trend is that there is about a five-year lag in the service between what’s going on in the IT world and what is adopted. DoD also needs to look at where industry is putting their research and development dollars and where technology is going to consider how to integrate these moves with what the service is doing.
Part of the problem is how long acquisition takes, he said. Yet systems are fielded in Iraq and Afghanistan such as the Joint Network Node, the Command Post of the Future and have in common that they have no official Joint Capabilities Integration Development System approved requirements for them. A flexible budget process for IT is necessary.
For Gansler, other starting points to fix acquisition could be making cost and schedule part of the requirement process, ensuring that competitive processes promote competition, and offer incentives so industry can share in the benefits of lower cost systems.
Sorenson said fixing acquisition also means considering what’s good enough in terms of risk and what’s acceptable in the field. One example is using spiral development–as the Future Combat System does–to have an incremental fielding schedule, in which systems are improved over time, while warfighters have an early benefit.
Gansler said of “huge” importance is to regain the focus on experienced acquisition personnel. Huge acquisition personnel cuts after the Cold War were not reversed as budgets grew after 9/11. With some 190,000 contractors in Iraq, and billions spent on contracting, it’s vital to reconstitute this force.
Sorenson said change is necessary to take advantage of IT over time.
For Craft, “the biggest solution is people.” Users need to be trained to describe their requirements better, and officers and Senior Executive Service personnel need such training as well. The Marines are implementing such courses.
However, Craft said, there is no silver bullet. As in game theory, with more plays in the playbook and more technology at your disposal, you can outplay your opponent.
Sorenson said, “We don’t have an enterprise perspective…we’re not structured from a budget standpoint to do that.” Additionally, holding people accountable for how money is spent is important.