The Pentagon has launched a restructuring of its acquisition leadership that decouples research and engineering responsibilities from acquisition and fielding of new weapons in an effort to match speed with modernizing adversaries.
Detailed in a report sent to Congress on Aug. 2 is the division of responsibilities previously held by the undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics (USD AT&L) into two new positions and the reorganization of the Pentagon’s acquisition structure under those two new officers. The restructuring was mandated by Congress.
“The split was … we’re spending too much time on the here and now [and] if we don’t better concentrate on creating technology – and not just so much the development but the deployment of it, we’re going to fall behind,” Deputy Secretary of Defense Pat Shanahan told reporters Aug. 2 during a roundtable interview at the Pentagon.
The newly created USD for research and engineering (R&E) will oversee the creation of new capabilities while a USD for acquisition and sustainment (A&S) is responsible for transitioning new weapons and gear to the field, then managing the program lifecycle.
“This new organization refocuses the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s (OSD) principal role from program oversight to that of directing major Department investments to ensure integrated, technically superior capability that consistently outpaces the threat,” the report says.
Shanahan said the restructuring will position the Pentagon’s weapon-buying system to move at “the speed of relevance. He likened the new organization to the farm-team system employed by Major League Baseball where players are cultivated and talent developed in the minor leagues before outstanding players are elevated to prime time.
“It’s really like the farm system for baseball,” Shanahan said. “You take a certain talent and how quickly can you get it to the Big Leagues and win.”
Following Shanahan’s baseball analogy, the undersecretary for research and engineering acts as the farm-team manager. He or she will focus on closing capability gaps by developing capabilities to meet current and emerging threats and preparing those technologies for use by deployed military forces.
The reorganization includes moving several R&D entities under the authority of USD R&E, including the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Defense Innovation Unit- Experimental, or DIUx, and the Strategic Capabilities Office. The Defense Science Board also will report to the USD for research and engineering.
The undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment will act as the Major League manager by receiving developed technologies, fielding them and preparing for maintenance of those systems over their lifecycles.
“USD (A&S) will focus on major defense program performance and on reducing life cycle costs to free up resources for further investment,” the report says. “In both cases, the new organization should achieve its objective by breaking down barriers to execution and reducing layers of oversight and unnecessary process imposed upon the Services which are executing acquisition programs.”
A primary objective of the reorganization is to increase the speed at which the Pentagon fields new capabilities. Congress gave the Defense Department broad authority to restructure its acquisition arm because of a consensus that the previous USD AT&L was bloated by accrued repsonsibilities, layers of legislation and the difficulties of overseeing the development, testing, acquisition and fielding of increasingly complex weapon systems.
“The current pace at which we develop advanced warfighting capability is being eclipsed by those nations that pose the greatest threat to our security,” the report says. “The increasing cost of our major weapon systems has placed at risk our ability to acquire and sustain these systems at sufficient levels.”
The changes are scheduled to take effect Feb. 1, 2018, but Shanahan said details would be available far in advance of that deadline. The deputy secretary of defense office is whittling down a list of candidates eager to assume both new undersecretary positions, Shanahan said. He would not specify a timeline for nominating people to fill those positions.