Ash Carter must make every defense dollar count

If the Pentagon ever needed a miracle worker in charge, now would be the time. 

Radical terror groups have waged war on America since Sept. 11, with no end in sight. Iran, Russia, China and North Korea all pose serious threats.  Yet despite the grave danger facing Americans, defense spending is being slashed by $1 trillion this decade.  

{mosads}As the likely successor to Secretary Chuck Hagel, Ash Carter will need every bit of expertise and experience to help keep America safe.  And one thing is for sure, he’ll need to make every defense dollar count. 

As the former Deputy Secretary of Defense and former Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisitions, Technology and Logistics in the Obama administration, and former Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy during the Clinton years, it’s safe to say that Carter knows the Pentagon inside and out — even though he’s never served in the military. 

Though $1 trillion in defense cuts seems severe, sadly it is today’s fiscal reality.  After all, runaway entitlement programs and interest on the national debt will consume all federal spending by 2025, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO). 

However, unlike the White House which continually pushes for higher national debt ceilings, the Defense Department must live within its means.  That means getting by on whatever the President and Congress allocate each year.  While millions of patriotic and well-intentioned defense sector workers are doing their best to defend the nation, there’s still plenty of room for improvement in saving taxpayer dollars. 

One way the Pentagon can trim costs is reforming the broken acquisition process and getting rid of bloated, expensive weapons platforms which have been beset by technical problems, countless delays and endless cost over-runs. 

Perhaps the poster-child program that should be axed today is the LRASM, a.k.a. Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile. 

It’s a Frankenstein-like version of a cruise missile, comprising a series of alterations and modifications to existing systems dating back to the 1990s based on the JASSM, a.k.a. Joint Air-to-Surface Stand-Off Missile, which was originally the stealthier replacement to the long-scrapped Tri-Service Stand-Off Attack Missile, or TSSAM for short.    

Brought back to life in 2009 by DoD’s acquisition arm, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), not surprisingly the LRASM is years behind schedule and more than quadrupled in cost.  Originally a two-track program estimated to cost $90 million, LRASM-A has been a money pit just to keep it alive, while LRASM-B was a hopeless case, scrapped altogether in 2012. Now, $400 million later, LRASM is not expected to be operational until the 2018-2019 timeframe.  Who knows if it will be delayed even further? 

Americans simply can’t afford such wasteful and inefficient programs anymore. 

At least some in Congress are paying attention. 

In the mark-up of the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the Senate Armed Services Committee noted displeasure with LRASM, writing “the budget request and the future years defense program (FYDP) envision spending $1.5 billion to acquire roughly 110 missiles. The committee is concerned that this program was created to respond to an urgent combatant commander need, but was done so with insufficient analyses of other available alternatives and with insufficient regard for the costs of locking-in a commitment under a non-competitive program.” 

Hmm. Non-competitive.  That says a lot right there. 

Whether in the defense sector or any other business, any enterprise without competition and little to no accountability will likely take the maximum time possible, and produce the least satisfactory results — as long as the checks keep coming in.  And when it comes to Uncle Sam, since winning World War II and becoming the world’s Superpower, he sure can dole out checks. 

Yet times are changing. It’s no longer business as usual.  Federal spending on defense is tighter every year — yet threats to Americans at home and abroad are even more today, not less. 

In addition to some in Congress, many in civil society understand this too.  An impressive coalition of eight government spending watchdog groups including Americans for Tax Reform, Campaign for Liberty, and the Coalition to Reduce Spending wrote an open letter to Congress urging reduced funds for LRASM. 

As dollars for defense are continually shrinking, Americans would be better served by maintaining tried and true systems we already have; funding operations, training and maintenance to continue our ability to project power overseas in defense of freedom; and taking better care of our men and women in uniform. 

Wasteful projects that are going nowhere fast should be scrapped or scaled back before we waste another cent.  The good old days of the bottomless well for defense spending are over, the Pentagon must make every dollar count. 

Gordon is a retired Navy Commander and former Pentagon spokesman who served in the Office of the Secretary of Defense from 2005-2009. He is a senior adviser to several think tanks based in Washington, DC.