Read the Report – In June 2014, the Center for a New American Security released “Creative Disruption: Technology, Strategy and the Future of the Global Defense Industry.” The paper argued that the United States military risks losing its technological advantage if the Department of Defense and its industry partners do not adapt to widely recognized strategic, technological, and business trends.
In the two years following that paper’s release, senior leaders in the DoD have sought to arrest the decline of U.S. technological superiority. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter has launched high-profile innovation efforts, reaching out to Silicon Valley and creating the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental (DIUx) and Defense Innovation Advisory Board. Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work has championed the Third Offset Strategy, which seeks to maintain the United States’ ability to project power against adversaries armed with significant precision munitions capabilities. It is apparent that senior leaders understand the challenges facing the DoD, but their efforts have yet to address the systemic issues outlined in “Creative Disruption.” Empowering new organizations such as the DIUx and the Strategic Capabilities Office (SCO) is a positive step, but it is ultimately insufficient for the DoD to innovate exclusively outside its core bureaucracy or attempt to force new technology efforts through an outdated system.
The Department of Defense must recognize that its military-technical challenges are a matter of strategy – the fundamental approach the department takes to generating technological advantage – not simply of acquisition policy. The DoD’s acquisition system requires constant improvement but functions reasonably well for its intended purpose and has improved in recent years, as reported by Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Frank Kendall in October 2016.
