With the presidential election happening today, the big question (for this blog) is how defense acquisition policy will differ based on the outcomes. My view is that neither party has a particularly sophisticated view on it, perhaps because the issue simply seems irrelevant to the average voter. In any case, it’s hard to think about the differences historically. Was the Weapon Systems Acquisition Reform Act of 2009 a particularly Democratic initiative, and was the Goldwater-Nichols Act 1986 particularly Republican? Maybe you’d think the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act of 1994 would be particularly Republican, but it happened during Clinton.
While status quo programs, budgets, and processes should be expected to continue under most circumstances, a Democratic sweep could usher in some changes. So what might that be?
The official Democratic platform has some vague language. First, end the “forever wars.” But it also reaffirmed support to Afghanistan and combating ISIS. The Democrats definitely put Yemen that’s on the chopping block, but not much else.
Second, a long standing position has been de-militarizing foreign policy, and cutting defense spending. Again, numbers are hard to come by. I think more conservative elements in the Democratic party like HASC chairman Adam Smith and ranking member of the SASC Jack Reed might prefer a flat budget or cuts in the range of $20 or so billion. Then there’s another element of mainline Democrats that will put the figure at “hundreds of billions” over five or ten years, so that could be a lot of numbers but more likely the higher-end of Smith/Reed. Progressives have formed a caucus on defense cuts, and are asking for 10% cuts (closer to $70 billion a year). Some progressives would push harder, following something closer to the Poor People’s Campaign for a Moral Budget at $350 billion a year.
Defense stalwarts will often bring out the McNamara adage that budgets and military strategy must be connected. If hundreds of billions will be nixed from the budget, then there must be realignment of strategy. Even though Democrats speak of ending forever wars, their rhetoric often does not align. In the last presidential debate, Biden overtly threatened Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran — all of them by name — saying no less than five times that they will pay a “price” for interfering with elections and not playing by the rules. It’s not clear what price they will pay, whether that’s economic or otherwise. But here’s a hint that force may come into it:
When I met with Xi, and when I was still vice president, he said ‘we’re setting up air identification zones in the South China Sea, you can’t fly through them.’ I said, ‘we’re gonna fly through them. We just flew B52/B1 bombers through it. We’re not going to pay attention.’
More than likely, Biden’s actual policies will represent a continuation of Great Power Competition which will manifest through proxy wars, constant cyber attacks, and a technological arms race. Far from ending “forever wars,” Biden’s own rhetoric suggests a continuation of forever wars, just with a new flavor to them.
In other words, it’s unlikely that Democrats will actually make dramatic changes to the National Defense Strategy such that it enables significant cuts to the defense budget — not to mention the political challenge involved with putting contractor labor out of work.
However, the Democrats could come up with a very thoughtful approach to the force structure that allows the DoD to essentially do-more-with-less. Here’s the Democratic platform again:
We will invest in technology and forces that meet the threats of the future—from cyber to space, and artificial intelligence to unmanned systems—and reinforce the alliances and partnerships that enhance our collective security. Rather than continuing to rely on legacy platforms that are increasingly exposed and vulnerable, Democrats support funding a more cost-effective, agile, flexible, and resilient force with modern transportation and logistics capabilities that can operate in more contested environments.
OK, that’s super vague again. For many in the DoD, “legacy” systems are like the A-10 and F-16. For others, “legacy” systems are manned aircraft, aircraft carriers, and conventional strike missiles.
I think Hillary Clinton put out something like a Democratic manifesto on defense programs in her Foreign Affairs article, A National Security Reckoning. She wants only a “handful” of aircraft carriers. She wants to cut F-35s, but then increase B-21s to defeat Chinese A2/AD. She would cut Army armored combat brigade teams and soldier end strength. Also on the chopping block is the Air Force’s Ground Based Strategic Deterrent ICBM. Conspicuously left out are hypersonic vehicles, potentially a point of contention for the Democrats. I think Space Force is another target of the Democrats, who view it suspiciously if only because it was a Trump initiative.
There’s potentially tens of billions per year in there. But then Clinton also wants to invest in AI/ML, in advanced manufacturing, microelectronics, cyber, and 5G networks. The whole point is that the Democrats want to sound like they are forward thinking, embracing emerging tech to create a stronger force for less cost. That takes dedicated investment without immediate payoffs. So the “legacy” force structure will have to stick around unless the Democrats pull back very much harder and focus solely on high-intensity conflict.
Perhaps most important to the Democratic paradox of defense cuts is their simultaneous position in favor of Buy American policies and bringing supply chains back to the US. That will cost money — a lot of money, or show up as lost productivity. Buy American policies coupled with budget cuts would be a double whammy for the DoD.
All this, of course, is speculative. But it will be an increasingly important topic if the Democrats sweep the election. Even if they just win the House and Senate, Bernie Sanders will be chairman of the budget committee, giving the progressives a strong ally for defense cuts. All this remains to be seen.
I think a lot of this is standard defense policy talk. It’s not my preferred way of thinking about it. I’d come at it orthogonally. I think there’s a non-zero chance that the government could actually cut a hundred billion a year from the Pentagon and end up with a better force structure.
Don’t play the game of force structure tradeoffs like Hillary Clinton tried to play. You’ll always lose to the military insiders with better information — especially when you personally want more foreign engagement. Don’t try to fix contracting or acquisition processes, it won’t get you there. Instead, make a political decision: This much is available for defense. Then, untie the hands of defense decision-makers to make tradeoffs in real time to that constraint.
First, it allows politicians to avoid their conflict of interest: keeping legacy programs in place because of the jobs argument. They won’t have to pick specific programs to be cut, and instead will pass a package. Second, it forces the DoD to make hard choices and experiment at scale. John Kuehn made a convincing argument about how major cuts to capital ship construction in the interwar years allowed the Navy to move from battleships to carriers, putting it in a good position to fight WWII. Indeed, the complete disarmament of Germany after WWI is what set it up in the 1930s for combined arms (e.g., tank, radio, air support) and blitzkrieg.
I guess my preference is flat budgets and transformative experimentation. But I think if forced to choose, I’d take a DoD forced to do experimentation at scale with a lower budget rather than flat/growing budgets with complacent DoD leadership. Again, the problem is the oversight complex and Congress, because even if DoD leaders wanted to experiment at scale (e.g., NGAD, ABMS, Project Convergence, Hypersonics, JAIC, UUVs and USVs) they couldn’t do it effectively. It’s not just oversight demands for “predict-and-control” processes, it is Congress who plussed up F-35s, legacy shipbuilding, MQ-9s, P-8s, and so forth, rather than decrementing them for major innovation fund for autonomy, 5G, blockchain, advanced manufacturing, battle networks, etc.
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