One of the truisms of defense management is that strategy and budgets must be connected. A “wish list” strategy that results in endless unfunded requirements will not result in the same outcomes as a strategy that considers fiscal realities. Today’s requirements-pull process has strategy defined separately from budgetary considerations, which reflects the DoD’s resource allocation system. If everything is important, then nothing is. That allows the DoD’s baseline plan in the Future Years Defense Program to continue on cruise control.
The FY 2021 outyear plan, however, presumed budgets would steadily rise from $712 billion in FY 2020 to over $779 billion in FY 2025. If that plan proves optimistic, then it is likely the recent forays into emerging technology will suffer the consequences. If gearing up for great power competition is the preeminent priority, then it is time for strategy to protect and grow its modernization programs. If they are cut, leaving a new generation of defense entrepreneurs to fail, then it will be another generation before the DoD can credibly build an innovation ecosystem.
That was the conclusion from a recent Defense One article I wrote with the excellent Stephen Rodriguez, How to Reconnect the Pentagon’s Strategy to its Budget. Read the whole thing.
Not sure what the right mechanism is. Today’s defense system is stuck in the middle between two preferable states: one where DoD budgets and strategies are linked from the very start, and one where they are divorced.
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