their forces. There must be shorter and more effective lines of command for forces in the field. The Unified Command Plan must be revised, and a new Unified Command must be established for better management of military transport on land and sea and in the air. ACQUISITION ORGANIZATION AND PROCEDURES We recommend an organization and a process for defense acquisition that will result in better decisions, made early and with more resolve. The problems of spare parts, detailed widely in the press, are symptomatic of deeper, structural inefficiencies that our recommendations address. Only if we make the right decisions in the first place can we reasonably expect to have an efficient acquisition system. To encourage the right decisions, we recommend a streamlined acquisition organization, headed by a full-time Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition on the same level as the Service Secretaries. He would: Establish policy for all DoD acquisition. Co-chair the Joint Requirements Management Board with the Vice Chairman of the JCS. Oversee the research, development, and production of all weapons programs. We also recommend that the Army, Navy, and Air Force designate Service Acquisition Executives because the Services will continue to have an important role in the acquisition process. They would establish short, clear lines of authority to responsible program managers. We recommend a process with greater emphasis on the early stages of weapons development, that picks the right system first and then uses more prototypes for adequate testing. We recommend that significant improvements be made in the way the Department attracts, retains, and motivates both seniorlevel appointees and career employees. We recommend a process that emulates successful governmental and commercial practices and will: Reduce the time required to deliver weapons to our forces. Provide greater assurance that new weapons will perform as expected. More accurately estimate the cost of new programs before full-scale development. GOVERNMENT-INDUSTRY ACCOUNTABILITY The American public deserves better guarantees that defense contracting is both an honest and a productive partnership between industry and government. There is no way public confidence in this partnership can be restored unless both the Department and private business demonstrate by their actual performance that such confidence is truly deserved. We recommend specific improvements in federal laws governing defense acquisition, and we urge that the law continue to be aggressively enforced. We recommend that both defense contractors and the Department of Defense take steps to apply the highest standards of ethics and conduct. To do this, contractors need to improve their own self-governance and uncover and promptly remedy all instances of misconduct, and the Department needs to administer existing ethics regulations far better. In conclusion, let me make a few final observations. First, the present structure of the Department of Defense was established under President Eisenhower in 1958. His legislative and administrative proposals had one overriding purpose: to improve the efficiency and unity of our defense We have studied President Eisenhower 1958 establishment. reforms, as well as the Department's performance since his time. Our recommendations are aimed at better achieving what Ike intended. Second, our findings and recommendations emphasize the critical role of Congress. We have looked at the budget process and congressional oversight not only because we were specifically directed to do so by the President, but also because we are convinced that any substantial improvement of defense management will require Congress itself to perform better in both these critical areas. Third, as I noted in my covering letter to the President, the Commission recognized from the outset of its work that substantial progress has been made in the last five years to improve the nation's defense. The Department already has introduced a number of the management improvements we're recommending to the President. that our ideas are sound. Its success to date convinces us Finally, the Interim Report has the unanimous support of the Commission. It represents a lot of hard work, and an honest effort to take into account the wide diversity of opinion on these important subjects. I want to thank all members of the Commission for their outstanding efforts. |