Plodding Procurement vs. Speeding Technology

Two mammoth Defense Department programs-the Army's $125 billion Future Combat Systems and the $300 billion triservice Joint Strike Fighter-typify the challenges facing Pentagon acquisitions.

Only three years into the FCS, the Army already has increased its development cost estimate by $8.9 billion, or 48 percent, and delayed its delivery by four years, according to the Government Accountability Office. Production quantities of the Joint Strike Fighter continue to be reduced, sending the cost of each aircraft soaring during the past five years, from $66 million to $84 million, a 27 percent increase.

Networks and communications systems, which consume $30 billion a year, also have spotty records. Procurement experts and industry analysts point out the obvious disconnect between the fast and furious evolution of technology and a plodding Pentagon procurement system that historically has taken 12 to 15 years to move a weapon system from design to production.

For example, a Pentagon effort to develop a "global information grid" that connects all military services and Defense Department agencies could fail as a result of current procurement and funding policies, according to GAO. Defense plans to spend up to $34 billion through 2011 on the global information grid. The GIG is intended to provide Internet-like capabilities to Defense users worldwide. But the program is not well managed, says Michael Sullivan, an acquisition analyst at GAO. "No one entity is clearly in charge of the GIG or equipped with the requisite authority, and no one entity is accountable for results." The budgeting process, "is not flexible enough to accommodate . . . the rapidly advancing information technologies that are characteristic of command, control and communications systems," Sullivan wrote in a January report (GAO-06-211).

Two efforts considered vital to providing next-generation networking capabilities-a $20 billion "transformation" satellite constellation and the $24 billion Joint Tactical Radio System-have become cautionary tales of ineffective Defense procurement. "Our reputation is going to hell in a handbasket" because of these programs, says John G. Grimes, the Pentagon's chief information officer. Additionally, he is contending with at least 13 space programs that are over budget.

Other programs to provide network enterprise services for Defense civilians and military organizations also have hit serious bumps. Not only are these technically challenging, says Grimes, but they are attracting additional oversight from the Defense inspector general. He worries that the increased scrutiny could further delay delivery of these technologies.

JTRS faced cancellation a year ago, but survived only because Pentagon officials believe strongly that this technology will enable the department to keep up with the rapid advances in information systems. JTRS, which consists of a family of software-based radios linked in high-speed network, now is viewed as a test case for Defense's ability to streamline the acquisition process, says Dennis Bauman, program executive officer.

JTRS also is pioneering the procurement of joint systems as opposed to the traditional practice of each military service buying technologies separately and then kludging them together after the fact. Bauman boasts that he is the first truly joint program executive officer. "I'd like to establish a model useful for joint PEOs," he says.