The Pentagon has begun a three-month long review of the Defense Department meant to measure the efficacy of Goldwater-Nichols reforms, as well as identify potential areas where the organization needs updates to make it more agile and efficient.
In a Jan. 4 memo obtained by Defense Daily, Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work directed the Deputy Chief Management Officer and Joint Staff/J7 to answer a variety of questions about whether the department—including the Office of Secretary of Defense, Joint Staff, combatant commands, subordinate military commands and task forces —has the structure, staffing, authorities and responsibilities needed to meet national security demands.
“The objective of this review is to make recommendations for updates or adjustments to organizational relationships and authorities, based on the Department’s 30 years of experience under the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986,” the memo states. The review is due March 1, and findings will be provided to Work and Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Air Force Gen. Paul Selva.
Among the questions posed in the memo is if the department is organized in a way that meets current and future challenges. One of the goals of the Goldwater-Nichols Act was to improve joint operations and diminish rivalries among the services. The legislation took away operational control of the military from the service chiefs and gave it to regional combatant commanders, who now report directly to the Defense Secretary. It also increased the authorities of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The review could give the Pentagon a head start on making institutional changes before Congress has a chance to propose its own legislation. Last fall, the congressional armed services committees, led by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas), began a series of hearings examining the effects of the Goldwater-Nichols Act.
During those hearings, experts have testified that Goldwater-Nichols has had unintended consequences, such as the growth of duplicative bureaucratic staffs, and that it no longer structures the military in a way that makes sense given the way warfighting is conducted today.
In his memo, Work directed the review team to make recommendations that would improve the effectiveness of OSD and the Joint Staff, “recognizing that any modifications must preserve civilian control over the military and the ability of the chairman and the other [service] chiefs to provide independent military advice to the Secretary of Defense, the National Security Council and the president.”
The review also will tackle whether changes should be made to the Unified Command Plan, which set up six regional combatant commands and two functional commands— U.S. Transportation Command and U.S. Special Operations Command.
“The question of whether the Department should stand up a Cyber Command as a full combatant command should be a key part of this review,” the memo states.
Work also told the team to look at how reorganizing the department could impact on the weapons buying process, including potential steps that could streamline the acquisition reporting chain, simplify the decision-making process, improve transparency or reduce bureaucratic burdens on program managers.
Finally, the memo directs the military staffs and service secretariats proceed with their own reviews and keep the DCMO and Joint Staff/J7 up to date on their progress.
Many of the questions raised by Work’s memo are similar to those raised during congressional hearings. For instance, experts and former military officials have recommended modifying the roles of the combatant commands, expanding the responsibilities and authorities of task forces and making drastic cuts to headquarters staff.
On today’s battlefield, joint task forces are the primary organizations responsible for waging war, while the combatant commands have taken more of a secondary role, said John Hamre, one of the original architects of Goldwater-Nichols and currently the president and chief executive officer of the Center For Strategic And International Studies.
“I still think we need those unified commands very much because they do strategic engagement with our partners…But we don’t need the J4…or a J6 or a J2,” he said, referencing three of the joint staff directorates, during a November Senate Armed Services hearing (Defense Daily, Nov. 12, 2015). “What we really need to do is we really need to redefine those commands so that they are streamlined and they’re doing the strategic role.”
In a December Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, Adm. James Stavridis, former commander of U.S. European Command and U.S. Southern Command, and retired Gen. Norton Schwartz, the former Air Force chief of staff, recommended the consolidation of U.S. Northern Command and U.S. Southern Command. U.S. Africa Command and U.S. European Command should also be combined, they said, noting that the former is based in Germany.