“Unfortunately, after years of misplaced priorities and poor management, our defense acquisition system does not provide the speed and flexibility our Armed Forces need to have decisive advantages in the future. In order to strengthen our military edge, America must deliver state‐of‐the‐art capabilities at speed and scale through a comprehensive overhaul of this system,” Trump stated in the directive.

The EO on “Modernizing Defense Acquisition and Spurring Innovation in the Defense Industrial Base,” directs Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Pentagon leadership to complete a comprehensive review of all major defense acquisition programs (MDAPs) within 90 days.

Any program more than 15 percent behind schedule, 15 percent over cost, unable to meet any key performance parameters, or “unaligned” with the SecDef’s mission priorities, could get the axe.

“The Secretary of Defense shall submit the potential cancellation list to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for future budget determinations,” Trump wrote.

After that review is completed, the Pentagon chief must provide the director of the Office of Management and Budget with a plan for reviewing all other “major systems” that aren’t categorized as major defense acquisition programs.

“It is the policy of the United States Government to accelerate defense procurement and revitalize the defense industrial base to restore peace through strength. To achieve this, the United States will rapidly reform our antiquated defense acquisition processes with an emphasis on speed, flexibility, and execution,” per the EO.

The directive also tasks Hegseth to submit a plan within 60 days to reform the Pentagon’s acquisition processes, including a preference for commercial solutions, other transaction authority, application of Rapid Capabilities Office policies, and other pathways to encourage streamlined acquisitions.

“Starting upon issuance of this order, and during the formation of the plan, the Secretary of Defense shall prioritize use of these authorities in all pending Department of Defense contracting actions and require their application, where appropriate and consistent with applicable law, for all Department of Defense contracting actions pursued while the plan directed by this section is under consideration,” Trump stated.

Trump also wants to update the “duties and composition” of DOD’s acquisition workforce.

Within 120 days, Hegseth — in coordination with the secretaries of the Army, Navy and Air Force, and component acquisition executives — must submit a plan to “reform, right-size, and train the acquisition workforce.”

The plan should include “restructuring of performance evaluation metrics for acquisition workforce members to include the ability to demonstrate and apply a first consideration of commercial solutions, adaptive acquisition pathways through the Adaptive Acquisition Framework, and iterative requirements based on the perspective of the end user,” as well as an analysis of acquisition workforce staff levels required to “develop, deliver, and sustain warfighting capabilities,” per the EO.

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The top-down requirements process Ukraine’s military inherited from Moscow in the 1990s kept headquarters analysts employed but left 87 percent of needs unfulfilled. Today, warfighters get the final say in what gets built. Drones that once relied on GPS and luck now use automated navigation and targeting algorithms to overcome operator error and Russian jamming, raising success rates from 20 percent to 70 percent. The newest generation uses fiber-optic cable for communication to eliminate the threat of electronic interference.

The Pentagon’s approach to weapon development looks more like the one used by Soviet apparatchiks. Requirements officers in the Joint Staff and military services try to guess capability gaps and potential solutions years in advance. By the time these analyses emerge from the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS) two years later, the threat has changed, technology has marched on, and a different solution is likely needed.

By definition, predictive planning systems such as JCIDS cannot work in a dynamic environment. They define performance metrics before testing a single prototype because they assume cutting-edge defense systems can only arise from dedicated government-led research and development. That approach is now obsolete thanks to the rapid advance and broad availability of militarily-relevant commercial technology.

Ukraine’s successes show how the U.S. Department of Defense could unlock the potential of private-sector innovation through collaborative experimentation between engineers and operators. Instead of funneling their needs through a multi-year staffing process, Ukrainian commanders talk with local drone pilots and data scientists to identify problems and reach out to government offices that can pay for solutions.

Under Kyiv’s innovation model, a new uncrewed system concept can reach the battlefield in months, drawing on commercial AI to quickly adapt flight paths or identify targets in thousands of video streams. For example, a volunteer-driven missile team eschewed extensive predictive analysis and prototyped a new cruise missile in a year and a half — an unthinkable timeline under Ukraine’s previous Soviet-model bureaucracy.

Real-time operator feedback is essential to this approach. It defines what is “good enough” and helps program managers cut through the competing equities that often prevent a system from reaching the field. In less than a year, Ukraine’s military created Delta, a situational awareness system like the elusive Joint All-Domain Command and Control concept that the Pentagon has chased for nearly a decade. Coders started Delta with a single battlefield map and added new modules when soldiers asked for them. Now the system ties together thousands of drones, cameras, satellite feeds, and Western cannon and rocket artillery systems.

Instead of waiting for a glacial interagency process to dictate universal interoperability requirements, Delta’s developers iteratively add new elements and test them in the real fight. During NATO interoperability exercises in 2023, Delta proved the value of this bottom-up approach by sharing data via Link 16 with F-16 jets and integrating with Poland’s TOPAZ artillery fire control software. Delta reflects genuine cross-domain synergy, born out of emergent needs and continuous iteration, not years of staff approvals.

Ukraine’s success is not simply a fluke born out of existential desperation; it’s the logical consequence of removing unnecessary processes and letting warfighters shape the pipeline. While we in the United States prioritize box-checking staffing for documents that meet formatting guidelines and have all the right system views and appendices, Ukraine lets demand drive immediate action. This shift from central planning to distributed innovation has not only kept Ukraine in the fight but also opened the door to realizing advanced integrations like real-time targeting.

The Pentagon should take Ukraine’s combat lessons to heart and fund the work to find solutions for today’s problems. Requirements officers should stop trying to predict the future and begin collecting and refining operational challenges to drive experimentation. And acquisition executives should give innovative program managers and their industry partners the decision space to quickly develop systems that deliver relevant capability, use existing components, and can respond to future enemy countermeasures.

The DOD has experimented with new acquisition pathways and innovation initiatives that have these attributes. But “Band-Aid” solutions that speed up paperwork or create more prototypes don’t address the core problem: a requirements system that prioritizes predictive planning over operational results.

The Pentagon should retire centralized requirements processes such as JCIDS. In their place, the U.S. military services should fund focused campaigns of experimentation that test multiple solutions against clear operational problems, enable rapid learning from failure, and scale what actually works in realistic conditions. Until the DOD abandons its Soviet-style faith in headquarters apparatchiks and embraces structured experimentation driven by warfighters, it will continue to fall behind adversaries who are willing to adapt and learn.

Bryan Clark is a senior fellow and director of the Center for Defense Concepts and Technology at the Hudson Institute, and an expert in naval operations, electronic warfare, autonomous systems, military competitions and wargaming. Previously, he served as special assistant to the chief of naval operations and director of the CNO’s Commander’s Action Group, led studies on the Navy headquarters staff, and was an enlisted and officer submariner in the Navy.

Dan Patt is a senior fellow with the Hudson Institute’s Center for Defense Concepts and Technology, where he focuses on the role of information and innovation in national security. Patt also supports strategy at national security technology company STR and supports Thomas H. Lee Partners’ automation and technology investment practice. Previously, he co-founded and was CEO of Vecna Robotics and served as deputy director for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA) Strategic Technology Office.

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A commission on reforming defense planning, programming, budgeting and execution recently delivered its final report to Congress, a nearly 400-page document that recommends a slew of changes in these areas.

“We are thinking … very seriously about that. The PPBE panel was extremely well done, the report was excellent,” Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., told reporters Monday during a Defense Writers Group meeting. “Frankly, we have been trying to reform the acquisition and budget system of the Department of Defense since I got here, and we make incremental progress. But we’re recognizing now that time is really not on our side, that we have to move much more aggressively. We have to be more responsive and flexible. And so … you’ll see a much more keener interest in trying to streamline how DOD develops and acquires equipment, how they deal with these new emerging technologies, which are changing so quickly. So we’re really interested in moving forward with significant reforms.”

On Wednesday, the Senate Armed Services Committee will be holding a hearing with leaders of the PPBE commission to discuss their findings and recommendations.

“The U.S. risks losing more of its already diminishing technological edge without immediate transformational changes in resourcing, especially in the year of execution. The Commission’s recommendations include much-needed changes to the period of availability of funds, account structures, reprogramming processes, and data sharing with Congress. These reforms also leverage modern business systems and data analytics to better manage resourcing and communications,” the report stated.

“One of the most consistent concerns the Commission heard over the past two years is that the current PPBE process lacks agility, limiting the Department’s ability to respond quickly and effectively to evolving threats, unanticipated events, and emerging technological opportunities,” it noted.

The panel’s recommendations for changes to help foster innovation and adaptability include allowing new-start programs and increased program quantities in certain cases when the Pentagon is operating continuing resolutions.

“The CRs generally include a provision prohibiting new start activities, which can slow efforts to insert innovative technology in both new and current programs,” the report noted.

The commission also called for increasing the availability of operating funds and raising dollar amount thresholds for so-called below threshold reprogramming (BTR), among other recommendations.

“Ultimately the Commission proposes eliminating BTRs and allowing a small percentage of an entire appropriation to be realigned with appropriate congressional briefings and oversight,” per the report.

Reed did not identify which of the recommended reforms he wants to implement, but he said including some of them will be a top priority when his committee takes up work on drafting the fiscal 2025 National Defense Authorization Act.  

The SASC wants to move forward in its quest to streamline the acquisition process and enable promising capabilities and technologies to cross the so-called “valley of death” between research and development and large-scale production, he said.

Reed noted that he’s visited Ukraine and seen how Ukrainian forces have been able to quickly adapt commercial, dual-use technologies for military purposes in their fight against Russian invaders.

“We have to have the same type of resiliency. So that’s one thing we want,” he said.

Tech from the commercial sector, such as artificial intelligence and cyber capabilities, can help fuel military modernization in areas such as robotics. However, current budgeting and execution processes don’t give the Pentagon sufficient agility in adopting them, the PPBE commission said.

Meanwhile, the department last week submitted its fiscal 2025 budget request to Congress, which lays out plans for its modernization programs.

On Monday, Reed was asked to comment on the budget submission.

“Every budget is a work in progress. And we’re going to look very carefully at what the services need. We’re particularly waiting for their unfunded priority list so we can take a look at them. And then we’re going to make judgments, some of them independent of the administration’s proposal. But generally, I believe the … proposal sent out was thoughtful. It emphasized the need for innovation and it put pressure on the Congress to retire some systems that are no longer as functional as necessary. And we have to take our [legislative] responsibility too. And so I think we’re in a good position to begin this debate and get it done — hopefully this year, not next year,” he said.

Pentagon officials suggested that the DOD trimmed some of its requests for research, development, test and evaluation efforts — such as the Rapid Defense Experimentation Reserve — due to budget caps stemming from the 2023 Fiscal Responsibility Act.

“The Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) caps are mandatory and, if disregarded or exceeded, would be enforced by sequestration. Understanding those fiscal constraints, the Department made responsible choices to prioritize readiness and take care of people but make targeted reductions to programs that will not deliver capability to the force until the 2030s, preserving and enhancing the Joint Force’s ability to fight and win in the near term,” a DOD spokesperson said in an email to DefenseScoop.

Reed was asked how politically feasible it would be to lift the FRA caps, which set limits for defense and non-defense discretionary spending that vary depending on whether Congress passes full-year appropriations bills or CRs.

“We’re stuck with them right now. And it was really a quid pro quo for saving the country from an economic collapse if we hadn’t increased the debt ceiling. And now, it’s somewhat ironic that many of the folks that were insisting on that are now saying that the ceiling is terrible,” Reed said.

He noted that funding for border security has been one of the major sticking points in recent budget negotiations.

However, Reed suggested that he sees a potential opportunity to reach a deal on increasing spending for the Pentagon and other agencies in the future.

“I think what could drive an increase is recognizing that our national security is not simply the DOD budget, that there are other aspects [such as] our research in the sciences, our education activity, or health care activities,” he said.

“To me, one of the recruiting problems we’ve had in the military is because some young people would like to serve, but their education is such they can’t pass this very straightforward test to get in. That’s the reflection of our education system, not the military. We have a problem with obesity in our country that reflects on our public health care system. But if we had more fit young people, we’d have more recruits. So this is all one effort,” he added. “If there is a breakthrough, I think we would have to recognize, too, both sides of the agenda — both the defense and also domestic.”

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Pentagon Chief Information Officer John Sherman formally approved the new requirements on Thursday by canceling the 2020 version of DOD Instruction 5000.82 — then titled “Acquisition of Information Technology” — and issuing its latest iteration, deemed “Acquisition of Digital Capabilities.”

“Use of the term ‘digital’ is a recognition that IT is not just a back-office function. It is critical and increasingly integrated across all capabilities,” Pentagon spokesperson Lt. Cmdr. Tim Gorman told DefenseScoop in an email on Friday.

The title change and reformed inclusions, he noted, are meant to reflect the CIO’s recognition that “IT policies apply not just to the traditional notion of networks and computers, but to business and weapons capabilities that must consider aspects like their need for spectrum, their use of cloud services, and their ability to manage software.”

DOD Instruction 5000.82 is one element of the department’s Adaptive Acquisition Framework. 

Broadly, this new document sets the policies and requirements for DOD entities’ procurement of digital assets. 

“It consolidates IT policy requirements for the acquisition community not just for compliance purposes but to help the community ensure that they consider all IT-related aspects of their digital capability acquisition,” Gorman said.

Roots of this revamp “stem from reorganization of policy in support of the Adaptive Acquisition Framework and ensuring that IT policy was appropriately consolidated under the correct functional instruction,” he also noted.

The latest version of this guidance is roughly a dozen pages longer than the 2020 publication. 

Among new additions are sections specifically related to software and cloud infrastructure acquisitions.  

“Software and cloud content is not new, but existed primarily as guidance through memorandums. This instruction codifies that guidance for the acquisition community through a policy issuance,” Gorman said.

New responsibilities, including for DOD’s Research and Engineering directorate, were a result of realigning policy content to organizational charter updates, he confirmed.

“The major updates in this version include alignment with updates to existing policy and codification of guidance that existed as memorandums. For example, this policy codifies the data degrees identified in the Deputy Secretary of Defense Memo, Creating Data Advantage,” Gorman told DefenseScoop.

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The Defense Department submitted a “Rapid Response to Emergent Technology Advancement or Threats” proposal to Congress on April 12 that would give the services the ability to begin development of new-start programs up to their preliminary design review level of maturity. The authority is intended to help circumvent delays that often occur during the traditional two-year budget cycles.

The request was announced April 19 by Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall, who told reporters during a media roundtable at the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs that waiting on Congress to pass a budget each year has delayed kick-starting a number of key programs for the Air and Space Forces.

The proposal would allow the Air Force and other services to get around issues that occur when Congress fails to pass appropriations bills on time, said Bill Greenwalt, a former senior staffer on the Senate Armed Services Committee and a former deputy undersecretary of defense for industrial policy.

When this happens, the Defense Department and other federal agencies must operate under continuing resolutions (CR) once the next fiscal year begins Oct. 1. Under a CR, the Pentagon generally cannot begin development of new-start programs that have likely already gone through a lengthy planning, programming, budgeting and execution process.

“What he’s basically saying is, ‘I’ve gone through all this time, I don’t want the Congress to stop me for six months on a CR — or what could be even worse, a full-year CR,’” Greenwalt, who is now a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute think tank, told DefenseScoop.

The authority would allocate money from coffers first created by Congress in 2003 to quickly buy and deploy capabilities needed during the post-9/11 wars, Greenwalt explained. The section has been amended since, and the current fiscal 2023 National Defense Authorization Act states that it is reserved for “urgent acquisition and deployment of capabilities needed in response to urgent operational needs for vital national security interests.”

According to the proposal being pushed by Kendall, R&D initiatives initiated under the newly sought authority would not exceed more than $300 million each fiscal year, and efforts that begin under the new authority would transition to an acquisition pathway after preliminary design review.

“What they’re allowing the department to do is to move money around without requiring congressional approval,” Mark Cancian, senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), told DefenseScoop.

The Department of the Air Force is requesting $55.4 billion in fiscal 2024 for research, development, test and evaluation efforts, including the creation of 12 new-start programs. The time it takes to stand up these programs can be lengthy and poses a risk for the Air Force as it addresses threats from adversaries, said Cynthia Cook, senior fellow and director of the defense-industrial initiatives group at CSIS.

“This length of time is not a weakness in the system per se — it represents the opportunity for the elected representatives of the United States to review programs and how taxpayer dollars are being spent,” Cook said in an email to DefenseScoop. “However, the threat does not stand still during the necessary bureaucratic funding processes, and by the time services get the funds, their needs may actually change. A two-year delay is a long time.”

Cancian said that Kendall makes a strong argument that the authority could speed up the budgeting process, but that he and the Pentagon will still likely face apprehension from lawmakers.

“The pushback from Congress is going to be concerned that DOD will start a program that will then build momentum so that it cannot be stopped,” he said. “One of the great concerns about programs is that DOD gets them started before really appreciating what the long-term cost is going to be before doing an analysis of alternatives. And then the program gathers momentum, and even if it turns out to not be a promising approach, you’re sort of committed.”

The $300 million cap does limit how much the services could invest in these types of efforts in a fiscal year, mitigating the sudden creation of multi-billion-dollar programs, Cancian noted. Still, there is a risk that down the line the authority could be abused, he added.

“​​With new authorities, the Air Force could move more quickly to counter the threat,” Cook said. “The question is whether the Air Force would be able to offer sufficient communication and transparency to Congress about how they perceive the threat and the nature of their decision-making to rapidly counter the threat, to satisfy Congress in its oversight role.”

At the same time, Greenwalt said that the Air Force may be able to begin the development with existing acquisition tricks that either circumvent CR-related delays or are better suited for the programs it’s concerned about.

In the event of a continuing resolution, the Defense Department can request so-called anomalies attached to the CR that act almost like “mini-appropriations” and grant the department funding for programs like new starts, Greenwalt explained.

The Pentagon could also use a Middle Tier of Acquisition authority to rapidly prototype and test within three to five years, he said. Given the capabilities the Department of the Air Force seems most concerned about being delayed, Greenwalt said this existing authority would be more appropriate to quickly develop these programs.

“They asked for programs that need to mature to [preliminary design review]. Significant data point in the requirement there, because what it states is the department is thinking about traditional defense acquisition … because PDR is a gate that you use to go into engineering and manufacturing and development in that larger 15- to 20-year timeframe,” he said. “If that’s what they’re looking for, six months worrying about the appropriators isn’t going to matter.”

Greenwalt described the proposed authority as “using a sledgehammer to kill a mosquito,” and said that while some lawmakers will initially consider it, Congress will most likely reject the proposal in the end.

“Believe me, the appropriations committees and staff deserve to be raked over the coals for not supporting speed and agility in acquisition,” he said. “But this provision is not the way to engender the type of reaction that’s necessary.”

DefenseScoop has reached out to the House Armed Services Committee and the Senate Armed Services Committee for comment on the DOD proposal. This story will be updated when responses are received.

Kendall, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles “CQ” Brown and Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman are scheduled to testify before the HASC on Thursday, where they may face lawmakers’ questions about the proposal.

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Douglas Bush, who was sworn into the top Army acquisition job Feb. 11, said that increasing the speed and agility of how the Army buys software is a top priority. Achieving that will depend heavily on using recent authorities granted by Congress, including one that allows the Army to pilot a new way to purchase software outside of standard acquisitions practices.

“I believe we have the authorities we need — it’s a question of using them well,” Bush said Thursday during a call with reporters.

Bush said the main issue when buying software is the lack of flexibility in the way the Army is allowed to spend money. Traditionally, the Army is authorized to use specific types of funding — also known as a “color of money” — for certain types of programs, like research and development or production procurement.

The rigidity in that construction often slows down programs that cut across those areas, especially software-based tech, Bush added.

“I don’t believe the private sector distinguishes between [research and development] and the procurement of software, but we do,” he said. “Does that make sense anymore? I’m not so sure.”

Congress allowed the Pentagon and military services to test a new budget activity specifically for software called Budget Activity 8 in the fiscal 2021 National Defense Authorization Act. That’s a new lever Bush says he wants to pull, and he hinted that he hopes the flexibility it offers might increase.

“The funding might have to be more flexible,” he said.

Bush used to work in Congress, most recently as a senior staff member of the House Armed Services Committee. He stressed that he plans to include Congress in key decisions he makes and will consult with members closely on budgetary matters. His plan for boosting software acquisition agility has yet to be finalized, he said.

“I can’t say I’ve got a master plan, but I want to develop a plan … to get us better than we are,” he said.

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Shah and other appointees have been critical of the military’s two-year budgeting cycle, which can delay innovative startups from entering the defense market. Shah’s background, as a startup founder and Air National Guard F-16 pilot, bridges both Silicon Valley and national security.

“Now is the time to supercharge DOD access to innovation,” Shah told law makers in 2020. Nearly two years later to the day, he will have the opportunity to express his opinion again to lawmakers on how to reform the Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) process.

The Commission on PPBE Reform’s charter tasks it with submitting a report to Congress by September 2023 “assessing the effectiveness” of the current process, which requires the department to plan out budgets at least two years in advance — a timeline that often results in money arriving too late to buy the latest tech. The commission also will develop policy recommendations on how to “rapidly field operational capabilities and outpace America’s near-peer competitors.”

Shah joins other former DOD officials on the commission including Ellen Lord, former undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment; Eric Fanning, former secretary of the Army; and Robert Hale, former DOD comptroller.

Shah was chosen by Rep. Mike Rogers of Alabama, the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee.  The commission will eventually have 14 members and include selections from the secretary of Defense and other congressional leaders that have yet to be announced.

Shah was tapped by then-Defense Secretary Ash Carter in 2016 to be the second leader of the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental (DIUx) and the first to report directly to the secretary. The unit has since dropped the “experimental” moniker and has gone on to issue billions of dollars in prototype contracts to tech-focused start ups.

Resilience Insurance, a cybersecurity company Shah chairs, was also selected as a part of the White House’s ransomware task force.

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