DoD official calls for faster acquisition, more engineers and IT innovation domestically

Even as the Defense Department implements major legislative changes such as the Weapons Systems Acquisition Reform Act of 2009, acquisition practices remain a challenge, said a top DoD official.

"Everybody always asks why we can't fix our acquisition systems," said Jaymie Durnan, senior advisor to the principal deputy director, Defense Research and Engineering, Pentagon, in an address at the Coalition Warrior Interoperability Demonstration Industry Day on August 17, in Linthicum Heights, Md.

"Its one thing to pull or push something from that enterprise, but something gives somewhere else. So, unless you really thought it through, the law of unintended consequences sometimes gets ahead of you. But that's not saying we shouldn't think it through, and that's where [Defense Secretary Robert Gates] is."

Not only does DDR&E need to make sure it's building a better mousetrap, it needs to be building a better mousetrap while it's building a better mousetrap, said Durnan. The timeline to bring new capabilities to the warfighter has completely collapsed, he said. During the Cold War, or during times when conventional war theory applies, response could be measured in years.

But, "counterinsurgency warfare has just collapsed those timelines. We're measuring response times in months or weeks. Recently, in the case of one thing I can't talk about, we had to get something out in a matter of days--which we were able to do, but that's also because somebody had been thinking about it beforehand," said Durnan.

Referring to this instance of rapid acquisition, Durnan explained that DoD still "went through the wickets but we got waivers very quickly." Durnan said the department is looking at how this can be done more frequently, in non-emergency cases.

"There are a lot of processes that probably should be done in a lot of programs and there are probably some that you don't necessarily need. You have to have a program manager that can make the case that they can get waivers on them."

Durnan also expressed concern about the quality of technology and shortage of engineers domestically. He said the United States is being rapidly outpaced in the growth of engineering professionals and technological innovation, especially by China. It's going to be difficult to get better, more adaptive systems to the warfighter if there are shortages in these areas.

There have been many problems with major Defense programs, through the years, said Durnan, because the development testing wasn't done properly or wasn't done at all. DDR&E's job is to reduce surprise, he added, but considering it's only comprised of 35 people, and it's facing a shortage of systems engineers, they can only assist the services so much with development and testing.

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