UNLEASHING U.S. POWER— Building Lethal, Accountable, and Overmatching Capabilities by DR. SEAN CASSIDY A ccording to President Trump, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and like- minded strategic scholars and practitioners, the DoD is at a breaking point. Decades of bloated spending, slow procurement, and bureaucratic delays have eroded our ability to rapidly field the technologies and capabilities necessary to outmatch our adversaries.
America can no longer afford an acquisition system that prioritizes process over results. The future of war demands speed, adaptability, and financial discipline. To maintain dominance in an era of Great Power Competition, the Pentagon should break from bureaucratic inertia and embrace a more aggressive, results- driven approach to acquisition. The Trump administration has sounded the alarm, demanding a streamlined, cost-effective, and le- thal force posture that cuts through inefficiency and prioritizes Warfighter readiness. The Defense Acquisition System (DAS) should follow suit by slashing inefficiencies, accelerating procurement timelines, and ensur- ing that every dollar spent enhances
Warfighter effectiveness. I advocate for an uncompromising commitment to efficiency, lethality, and strategic dominance through Organizational
lion. No other agency or department even comes close to the Pentagon’s budget, yet oversight and efficiency remain afterthoughts. America’s military is the best in the world. But waste, bureaucracy, and a lack of accountability threaten that superiority just as much as any foreign adversary. Of the Pentagon’s massive budget, $96.1 billion is allo- cated to 69 Major Defense Acquisi- tion Programs—the big-ticket weap- ons systems that attract the most attention. But behind the scenes, the real issue is the thousands of smaller programs consuming the bulk of de- fense dollars with minimal oversight. These Acquisition Category II and III programs, while individually less ex- pensive, collectively absorb the ma-
Ambidexterity (OA). DoD’s Dilemma
The DoD requested $310.7 billion in Fiscal Year 2025 for weapons pro- curement and research—an amount larger than the Gross Domestic Prod- uct of most countries. Yet for all this spending, accountability remains elu- sive. How does this compare to other federal departments? The numbers are staggering. The Department of Education discretionary budget is just $82 billion; the Department of Trans- portation, $104 billion; the Depart- ment of Homeland Security, $60 bil-
24 | DEFENSE ACQUISITION | May-June 2025
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