Department Of Defense Strategy Essay

operational risk in near term irregular and COIN fights. The U.S. Strategic Environment made the F22’s opportunity cost too high. With this shift in orientation, Gates assumed greater risk for the most dangerous scenario, a war with a near peer competitor. It is important to note, he did not completely ignore the possibility of a future near-peer fight. He does invest heavily in the F35, joint strike fighter, which may indicate the core reason he ended the production of the F22 was not strategic or security environments, but the F22 ROI and procurement

- Function: Speaking notes on Advocate Brief for YF-23 vs. F-22 and why the Air Force should have chosen the YF-23 to be its 5th Generation Stealth Fighter.

With Trump’s election this year, his rhetoric of “Making America Great Again” and therefore revitalizing our military will soon become a reality. Trump has formally requested a reappropriation of funds; around $54 Billion, towards the US military. Part of Trump’s campaign promises had to do with making the military more robust; ensuring America’s title of militarily strongest in the world. In order to achieve this goal. Trump’s federal government has the option of many different aspects of the military to focus on. Of these, funding weapons of mass destruction, cyber security, and further military research and development prove themselves as most relevant in the contemporary military.

Observers do not need to look far for the signs of a military-industrial complex that has become too powerful and involved in politics. The Army has repeatedly attempted to halt the production and spending on new tanks. The Air Force has spent almost $400 billion on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, nearly double the initial estimate. If the relationship between civilian and military leaders is to be mended, leadership decisions must not be influenced by the military-industrial

The third issue that was discussed in these articles is a strong disconnect between what is being planned vs reality. Following 9/11, Pentagon budget went up significantly to justify the ongoing fight against global terrorism. However, if we look carefully, it is obvious that a higher percentage of the defense budget is going to fund Cold war era programs and may reduce readiness for Asymmetric warfare we are currently experiencing or may experience more in future. Additionally, unreliable information coming from DOD’s accounting system makes it extremely difficult to generate future force projections and cost estimates based on past and present status of expenditures. Overall, it creates an unrealistic ballooning defense budget that is not economically sustainable.

The GNA passed in 1986 to reform a parochial defense department in a cold war era was somewhat successful in attaining goals sought at the time. Unfortunately, the GNA lacks sustainability in today’s VUCA environment. The absence of total force requirements coupled with convoluted rules and

There are many arguments for and against the reliability of military deterrence. The simplest definition of military deterrence is threatening to use force to discourage another state or country from doing something that is not in your favour. One main example of this in history is the Cold War commencing 1947 – 1991. During the cold war both the United States and the Soviet Union accumulated a large supply of nuclear weapons. It was in the Soviet Union’s interest that they would use the nuclear weapons thus creating a nuclear war and that that it was likely they would fight and win. On the other hand the United States has adopted the theory of nuclear/ military deterrence threatening the Soviet Union with retaliation and punishment if they

The F-35 Program meets this criteria and it is one of the reasons that it enjoys bipartisan support of its continuance. Many congress members are reluctant to suggest cancelling the program, despite its underwhelming performance, because of its widespread economic impact. Political engineering has resulted in an iron triangle among Congress, Lockheed Martin lobbyists, and Department of Defense bureaucrats whom seek to prioritize their interests ahead of the nation’s interest. This has led to a lack of fiscal and program accountability within the F-35 program.

9/11 changed all that. At a time when the nation was in turmoil, the government immediately began to raise the military budget. The Budget rose by 5% in 2005 for the invasion of Iraq and again to 5.7% in 2011 for the stepped up efforts in Afghanistan. With this inflation of funds allotted to the Department of Defense, it opened up more funding for projects that were not able to acquire funding in the past. As the money was shoveled into these technologically advancing projects, as with many projects, failure happened regularly; causing a large portion of the newly acquired budget to be squandered. Just a few years ago in 2011 Defense Secretary Robert M. Dates made this statement to

A goal is defined as the desired result a person anticipates and plans to accomplish. For example the ultimate goal in college is to graduate. It is the big idea of any mission. A company may have a goal to be the best pizza service in the state. So, for Amazon, it could be reduce the cost of books, or it could be drive profit by increasing the cost of shipping. Goals can be long or short term goals. For example, a short term goal could be drink water all week. A long-term goal could be set freshman year of college which is to graduate on time. A goal is anything that an individual, company, school, or organization set to be achieved.

I agree wholeheartedly with both you and James….and so does the Army Chief of Staff, the Army’s acquisition program and processes must become more flexible, expedited and innovative keep up with the ever changing security environment facing the U.S. and for the troops on the ground executing the mission.

The United States spends roughly $600 billion a year on defense, more than the rest of the other great powers combined. More impressive is that this massive expenditure is still essentially being done on the relative cheap. Defense spending today is at a rate of approximately 4% of GDP annually, a percentage that, while higher than those of other great powers, is lower than the rate of 10% of GDP spent in the mid-1950s and the 7% spent in the late 1980s . This is a fact that is overlooked by proponents of retrenchment. For example, Eugene Gholz, Daryl Press and Harvey Sapolsky’s “Come Home, America,” an article advancing retrenchment was published in 1997, a point where U.S. defense spending was near a fifty-year low at 3% of GDP . Military spending, however, is not the best device through which to frame capacity as it is ultimately a voluntary action on the part of the state, and as such is inherently variable. But, taken over time, it reveals something integral: long-term investment in the capacity to generate military power. Indeed, the United States over the span of decades has accumulated military capabilities nearly impossible for any state to match. This is especially the case in the modern world given the increased complexity of weapons systems and their long-term development process. If anything, simply using defense spending numbers underestimates the global military gap . By using Barry Posen’s “command of the commons” as a framework for an analysis of comparative power potential, it becomes clear that the capacity of the United States military remains unmatched. For Posen, command of the global commons-the sea, space, and air- is “the key military enabler of the US global power position” allowing the United States to project its power far from its border. In his analysis of each “common” Posen uses multiple indicators, such as number aircraft carriers and

The Department of Defense policy which covers all military branches states “Unless it could have an adverse impact on military readiness, unit cohesion, and good order and discipline, the Military Departments will accommodate individual’s expressions of sincerely held beliefs (conscience, moral principles, or religious beliefs) of Service members in accordance with the policies and procedures in this instruction.” Even though there are polices out there for military personnel to abide by, there are always a few bad apples in every bunch. Interpersonal conflicts and favoritism always happens and will never end but they will be punished if ever caught. In the military, every year we are graded and rated on our performance for that year.

This chapter mainly focuses on one account with a U-2 plane but there is surrounding history that plays a role in this. This began with the president’s discovery of offensive missile sites in Cuba that were found by U-2 planes. This discovery was shocking because it showed just how simply the Soviets

Normally, before any new equipment can be purchased, the need must be proven and prioritized (MRAPs, Irregular Warfare, and Pentagon Reform, 20). The Pentagon uses the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS) to determine requirements and only select projects are important enough to be considered by the Joint Requirements Oversight Council (JROC) and the others are passed down to lower levels (Ibid.). JROC and JCIDS assist the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff counsel the Secretary of Defense on the military capabilities (Ibid.). The process of determining requirements is laborious due to the number of compromises and concerns that need to be considered before making a decision to spend billions of dollars. Key issues for consideration include the importance of the requirement to mission success and determining the best resources required to satisfy the need (Ibid.). Other considerations include impacts to training, tactics, doctrine, organizations, leader development, personnel, and facilities (Ibid.). The requirements process is purposely designed to be strenuous since its goal is to decrease waste and take full advantage of benefits (Ibid.). The main point is that is not possible to acquire military equipment without a validated requirement or without considering if other less costly solutions might address the problem. Although the normal acquisition process focuses primarily on future requirements, it does permit a review of urgent needs from field commanders (Ibid.). Finally, the normal acquisition process requires a sequential phasing process characterized by developmental testing, operational testing, production, integration, fielding, disposal and requirements refining (Dikici,