Many service chiefs are frustrated with the acquisition system, telling the Government Accountability Office that the current process takes too long, results in cost overruns and often produces weapons that do not deliver the promised operational capabilities.
But most of those officials said they did not think there needs to be a change in the acquisition process’ chain of command, even as they acknowledged the need for greater involvement of the service chiefs, according to a GAO report published earlier this month.
The release of the report comes as Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz) and House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) begin work on a final defense bill that includes sweeping acquisition reforms. McCain’s bill contained more drastic changes to the current system than Thornberry’s, including taking responsibility from the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) and placing it in the hands of the services. Thornberry has indicated he could be receptive to adopting some of that language.
Under the current process, service chiefs are responsible for formulating the requirements of a weapon system. After those requirements are approved, acquisition officials take the reins of the program and are responsible for executing it.
“Most service chiefs told GAO they were concerned that after weapon system requirements are handed to the acquisition process, requirements are changed or added by the acquisition community (sometimes referred to as “creep”), increasing the capabilities and cost of the system,” the report stated. The agency based its report on interviews with current service chiefs and vice chiefs in September 2014 as well as those with acquisition officials and former service chiefs.
After studying 78 major defense acquisition programs, GAO found that changes to high level requirements—which are usually defined by the services chiefs—are rare. Much more common, however, are changes to technical requirements that occur after the program is controlled by acquisition authorities, which lead to schedule slips and cost growth.
“Too often, programs run into problems during system development because requirements are unrealistic, technologies are immature, cost and schedule are underestimated, and design and production risks are high,” the report said. Because the chiefs often do not have clear visibility into what’s going on in a program, they are not given the opportunity to manage tradeoffs and thus “are frequently caught by surprise when cost, schedule, and performance problems emerge in programs.”
Current and former service chiefs disagreed as to how best to reform the system. Most current chiefs said that there was no need to hand service chiefs more power over weapons acquisition. Some indicated that they already have the opportunity to be more involved in the process, such as by attending service and DoD level program reviews.
“Some chiefs indicated that involvement in acquisition programs, in general, varies by service chief based on their priorities and the other personalities involved,” the report said. “Several current and former service chiefs agreed that they have been involved in the oversight of some programs, but their level of involvement is dependent on the importance of the program and established working relationships with the service acquisition executive.”
Former service chiefs were more likely to recommend a formal expansion of the chiefs’ roles, such as requiring them to sign off on key acquisition documents or making them co-chair for the service-level acquisition review board. However, they also acknowledged that increasing the responsibility of the chiefs could slow down the process even further.
Part of the problem is that acquisition personnel rarely have a lot of experience on the operational side, and vice versa, said one service chief. Another issue is that the many stakeholders influencing the acquisition process make it difficult to hold anyone accountable, and that the high turnover rate of program managers every two to three years compounds that problem.
Furthermore “these chiefs said that program managers and other acquisition officials often lack experience and expertise to manage requirements and acquisitions, are incentivized to meet internal milestones and not raise issues, and rely too much on contractors to figure out what is needed to develop a weapon system,” the report said.
Instead of issuing a recommendation on whether to increase the formal authorities of the chiefs, GAO called on the department to ensure requirements are well defined before a program is approved. It instructed service chiefs and acquisition executives to work together to make sure system engineering is conducted during the requirements process, which would give service chiefs the information necessary to refine requirements and make tradeoffs as needed.