For the long-range plan to be carried out, the first step is executing the FYDP plan through fiscal 2029, per the president’s budget request, which provides plenty of insight into the expectation for ship construction timelines and statuses.

These ship-by-ship details provide insight into recent performance, the changing of expectations and the difficult road ahead for the long-range plan.

The plan outlines an ambitious increase in the number of active battle force ships to meet the goal of an eventual 381 ships (plus 134 unmanned vessels). It shows increasing deliveries effectively across all ship categories through the late 2030s in a baseline plan, and provides an alternative with fewer procurements, but both begin with the assumption that FY25-FY29 FYDP expectations will be met.

Navy leaders recently executed a 45-day review of shipbuilding performance, which highlighted several delays to big-ticket programs. Our analysis of some of these major programs, including the outcome of the 45-day review, shows that the steadily increasing construction spans, paired with an outlook of increasing demand on shipbuilders, will not aid improvement.

Submarines

The Columbia-class submarine is the highest-priority shipbuilding program, and building it according to plan is required for the Navy to stay at the threshold of 10 ballistic missile submarines. Columbia construction has been historically prioritized to the detriment of the Virginia class so that Columbia can use more attention and resources from the shared shipbuilder (ideally to shield Columbia from delays).

According to the recent shipbuilding review, the first boat, SSBN-826, is now 12 to 14 months behind schedule.

While the second boat is not yet officially delayed, it is hard to imagine the construction spans dropping from what is now nearly 100 months for the first boat down into the 70s for SSBN-827 and all subsequent units. Given the second boat is only scheduled to begin construction in FY24, it is too early to see the extent to which SSBN-826 issues will impact SSBN-827 and beyond. One would expect delays for SSBN-827 and onward, especially considering the two boats being built in FY24 are planned to grow to six by FY28.

The Virginia-class program has experienced large delays over recent years as production has ramped up. But for what it’s worth, the Navy has begun incorporating more realistic expectations in its plans.

Since 2019, the months required to build each ship has risen from 68 months per boat to 85 months for the four most recently delivered boats, and is planned to be 95 months on average for all boats currently under construction.

This increase in construction months has been in line with a ramp-up in production as the number of ships being built has risen from 12 in 2019 to 15 in 2024, and is expected to climb to 18 by the end of the decade. Per the FYDP, planned boats are expected to remain around 95 months on average, which appears to be reasonable given recent history.

With the higher-priority Columbia program now officially experiencing delays — which may become more severe — and with Virginia construction ramping up to 18 boats at a time, maintaining the same level of efficiency will be a victory in itself.

Destroyers

Procurement of the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer is planned to continue until FY32, when procurement for the next-generation destroyer DDG(X) should begin.

Between those boats recently delivered and those that have already begun construction, the average actual or planned construction is roughly 70 months per boat and has been trending upward.

The nuance is that the performance is largely unique to the shipyards. DDG-51s are split between General Dynamics’ Bath Iron Works and HII. Those ships under construction or completed by HII average 62 months per boat, while those by General Dynamics average over 75 months per boat.

This disparity in performance is also reflected in the Navy’s forecast, where HII is expected to drive improvement to the program with constructions spans eventually dipping below 50 months, while General Dynamics boats are never expected to break 70.

Whether the issues at Bath Iron Works are due to the beleaguered DDG-1000 program still being wrapped up there or other causes, naval planning is clearly not expecting much to change in terms of DDG-51 construction, besides allocating fewer boats to build going forward.

Meanwhile, HII will be expected to improve construction time by a double-digit percentage while taking on the lion’s share of the work, going from six ships under construction in 2024 to at least nine by the end of the decade.

Aircraft carriers

CVN-79 and CVN-80 are each delayed by more than two years compared to original delivery plans, while CVN-81 is still on schedule. This is largely attributed to CVN-81 being procured in a two-carrier contract, which allowed for procurement efforts to be spread over a much longer period since contract signing.

This gives CVN-81 a longer planned construction span and means less work has been completed, even though construction has technically been ongoing for a few years.

It is still yet to be known if CVN-81 will really be built to schedule, given the keel laying is still a few years away.

Frigates

It’s early days for the Constellation-class guided-missile frigates, but the program is already looking at delivery delays.

Coming out of the recent shipbuilding review, it has been reported that the lead ship, FFG-62, is now expected to be delivered 36 months late. This puts the total construction time for the boat at more than seven years, nearing double the original estimate of four years.

Issues have been attributed to shipbuilder Marinette Marine now managing three programs, including the Littoral Combat Ship program and the Saudi Multi-Mission Surface Combatant. The Navy has stated that it’s taking steps to improve the process.

Given the second ship was only slated to begin the construction process in December 2023, it’s too soon to identify the extent to which these issues will continue — not only for the lead ship, but spread to the next ships beginning construction.

According to the latest plans, the shipbuilder is expected to go from potentially three ships underway in 2024 to more than 10 of the class under construction by 2028, while simultaneously bringing construction spans back down to planned levels. Assuming some level of delay continues for even just the first few hulls, the profile of small surface combatant deliveries and fleet size outlined in the 30-year plan has the potential to shift.

The problems plaguing U.S. shipbuilding have been attributed to multiple factors, from the cutting down of the industrial base in the 1990s to the impacts of COVID-19 on the supply chain in recent years.

Whichever issues can be argued for recent performance on these specific programs, construction performance has not been trending in the right direction, and much of the plan for the upcoming years looks ambitious given where things stand.

For industry to execute the plans in the FYDP, and therefore follow the path that provides the Navy with the capability it needs, major improvements will have to be made.

The shipbuilding community has its work cut out for it.

Theo Egan is a co-founder of Tamarack Defense, a data analytics and advisory firm.

Although many NATO member countries’ militaries need work, obsession with the 2% of GDP metric belies a fundamental misunderstanding of military capabilities and national preparedness for conflict. Spending is important, but there is much more that matters.

Rather than serving as a long-standing foundation of the NATO alliance, after years of serving as an unofficial benchmark, the metric that 2% of each member country’s GDP should be dedicated to military spending was only officially agreed upon by NATO members at a summit in 2014 – and it was a target that was to be met “within a decade,” or by 2024. At the time of the summit, in the wake of Russia’s occupation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula, NATO leaders were worried about their militaries’ readiness, and several NATO countries reported having low – even negative for Croatia and Italy – defense expenditures as a percent of GDP.

Many politicians and analysts have used continued low levels of defense spending in Europe as a cudgel against NATO “free-riders.” And while free-riding in NATO is certainly a problem for some countries, military spending as a percent of GDP is a poor metric of which countries are the free-riders. With U.S. defense spending hovering around 4% of GDP in recent years, it would appear that the U.S. is contributing more than twice as much to NATO’s defense as, say, Denmark with defense spending at 1.4% of GDP as of 2022. But this fails to account for the geographic distribution of such spending. In one analysis, about 25% of U.S. military spending goes toward Europe, with a much smaller share going toward U.S. homeland and North American security. From this perspective, there is not much daylight between the U.S. and Danish contributions to NATO as a share of their respective GDPs.

Moreover, spending does not necessarily equal capabilities. It depends on how that money is spent. Among the top defense spenders in NATO in relative terms, Greece spent 3% of its GDP on its military in 2023, and yet arguably much of that spending has been focused on countering Turkey – a NATO ally. Meanwhile, the Netherlands, with 2023 defense spending at 1.7%, has played a leading role in providing support to Ukraine as it fights back against aggression from NATO’s main adversary, Russia.

In some respects, European NATO member countries are far ahead of the U.S. in terms of contributions to national and international security, assuming we take a broader perspective than military spending alone. If we have a narrow interpretation of what type of spending contributions toward national and international security, there is much we will fail to consider, including spending that improves human capital and supports the creation of unique technological advantages. While the U.S. spends extraordinary amounts on health care, it does so inefficiently, leading to much poorer health outcomes – and thus degraded human capital – relative to several European NATO member countries like Germany. Another example involves the opportunity cost born by high-tech manufacturing company ASML in the Netherlands, which – for reasons important to NATO’s security – will not sell to China its extreme ultraviolet lithography equipment for advanced semiconductor manufacturing despite substantial Chinese demand.

This is not to give Europeans a free pass. Continent-wide, there has been a substantial underproduction of artillery shells and other munitions across Europe, whether countries have met the 2% target or not. While it is true that Poland, for example, is beginning to step up in this respect, it is doing so nearly two years after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine when the threat that Russia poses to Europe became blindingly obvious.

Several European militaries still need to substantially improve their readiness, including Germany. By its own defense minister’s admission, the German military “will not be able to hold its own in high-intensity combat and will also be able to fulfill its obligations to NATO to a limited extent,” projecting that the Bundeswehr will “not be sufficiently equipped with large-scale equipment in 2027.” But whether Germany or any other NATO member’s military spending is adequate must be measured by outputs – or capabilities – rather than inputs – or spending as a percentage of GDP. Otherwise, NATO’s 2% target may become a fig leaf rather than an indicator of sufficient preparation.

Collin Meisel is the associate director of geopolitical analysis at the University of Denver’s Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures, a geopolitics and modeling expert at The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, and a nonresident fellow at The Henry L. Stimson Center.

It also requires submission of the often-misunderstood unfunded priorities lists, or UPL.

As detailed in our newly published analysis, the 12 unfunded priorities lists that have been made public to date this year total $28.7 billion in funding shortfalls and represent the best professional military judgement of our nation’s most senior uniformed leaders.

These unfunded priorities equate to about 3.4% of the $850 billion budget request. Given that inflation remains at about 3.2% and the pay raise for military members is 4.5%, the 1% topline increase in the budget request, when combined with the 3.4% in additional funding within the UPLs, would keep the Pentagon at a roughly zero real growth rate.

As there are two major wars ongoing, several shadow wars and the potential for a major conflict with China, we can expect the Pentagon may also have a fiscal 2025 emergency supplemental in the works. Even with this context, the UPLs contained several interesting surprises.

The first surprise is that, though China is the stated strategic pacing threat, the UPLs are filled with shortfalls in capabilities related to this challenge. In fact, the commander of Indo-Pacific Command monopolizes the list in asking for $11 billion, which is 38% of the entire UPL requests, and tops its own previous-year needs by more than $7.5 billion.

Research and development UPLs related to the Pacific and space make up 83% of shortfalls. Similarly, military construction gaps are up $4 billion over last year, an increase that is almost entirely for INDOPACOM needs. High-dollar requirements listed include facilities in Guam; harbor improvements in Palau; runways, wharfs and harbor projects in Micronesia; and water treatment and hangar projects in Hawaii.

Large shortfalls to counter China signal what we already know: The defense budget is too small. But it also may indicate priority disagreements during program and budget decisions, or that INDOPACOM has a more unrestrained view of the process than the service chiefs, or that Congress tends to support INDOPACOM UPLs in how it rescues the Pentagon budget. It likely means all of these things.

The second surprise is that within the investment accounts, there is a very notable shift in the UPLs away from procurement and into military construction as well as research and development. In FY23, procurement made up 53% of the UPLs. In FY25, that is down to 30%, with well over half (54%) not even submitted by the military departments but instead coming from INDOPACOM and the National Guard Bureau.

With procurement the known bill-payer for this year’s stated budget focus on readiness and the near-term fight, the UPLs were expected to make up for the lack of funding to actually buy the ships, planes, ground vehicles and space systems we know we need to remain competitive and to sustain our industrial base and supply chains struggling under uncertain and insufficient budgets.

The third surprise is in the readiness category, which includes appropriations for operations and maintenance as well as military personnel, along with targeted partner efforts funded through the Defense Security Cooperation Agency. Despite the FY25 budget request’s stated focus on readiness, the Air Force puts forth a single $1.5 billion request for spares, noting a one-time need for aircraft readiness that it could not fully fund in the budget due to fiscal constraints.

In addition, INDOPACOM lists a $581 million gap, which essentially means that the day-to-day operating forces and contracted logistics support functions of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps components in the Pacific are underfunded, at least in the view of the INDOPACOM commander.

In conclusion, three key points stand out. The FY25 defense budget request is too low to meet even those readiness requirements it says it prioritizes, and it loses ground on crucial strategic innovation, posture and procurement efforts necessary for U.S. national security and military competitiveness.

UPLs are important tools in determining where to apply missing resources, but they also signal consequences to budget uncertainty and the resulting disjointed approach to supporting strategic priorities.

And third, as Congress examines the unfunded priorities and the capability gaps they represent to increase the defense budget to minimally required levels, it should also prioritize on-time enactment of annual appropriations as equally important to promoting our national security.

Elaine McCusker is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute think tank. She previously served as the Pentagon’s acting undersecretary of defense (comptroller). Retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. John G. Ferrari is a senior nonresident fellow at AEI. Ferrari previously served as a director of program analysis and evaluation for the service.

The secretary is rightly focused on the need for increased investment to facilitate greater innovation and production capacity for strategic competition with China. The management teams of some large defense primes, on the other hand, buy back shares as an efficient way to return value to shareholders after considering the attractiveness of investment opportunities available to the company.

Changing this situation and spurring increased investment in the defense market requires addressing the incentive structures that guide market behavior, including stock buybacks.

Before examining market incentives, it is worth noting that the U.S. government decided many decades ago to largely privatize the defense-industrial base. While the DOD retains a modest number of government-owned arsenals, shipyards and depots, the vast majority of the systems developed and services conducted for the DOD are performed by for-profit companies. These companies have developed the innovations and capabilities that have made U.S. forces the best in the world.

This industrial base includes approximately 200,000 small, medium and large companies, the vast majority of which are privately held. Including those traded on foreign exchanges, there are only about 100 companies that are publicly traded. And only a very small fraction of those companies use share buybacks consistently as a strategic management tool.

Secretary del Toro captures the essence of the anti-buyback argument, which has been articulated by Pentagon leaders for years: “You can’t be asking the American taxpayer to make even greater public investments while you continue, in some cases, to goose your stock prices through stock buybacks, deferring promised capital investments, and other accounting maneuvers.”

Why do defense companies continue to pursue stock buybacks? It is principally the large mature defense primes such as Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and HII that buy back stock. These firms are profitable, generate significant cash flow, have a relatively low cost of capital and are not highly leveraged.

Lack of capital is not a problem hindering investment at the largest defense primes. The issue revolves around the capital allocation decision. If large defense primes are not making significant investments, it is because they believe that this incremental dollar is unlikely to materialize into a profitable contract in the future. For that to change, these primes need to see a better return for the earnings they intend to retain and reinvest. Those returns could come through an increased number of growth opportunities, a greater frequency and volume of competitions, or margin improvement.

In contrast to the large mature primes, smaller publicly traded companies such as AeroVironment and Kratos do not typically buy back shares. They are instead investing in growth, as they see significant opportunities in their own market segments and beyond as the DOD spends heavily in unmanned systems, advanced electronics, autonomy and other areas central to the National Defense Strategy. If similar, larger incentives existed for the larger primes, then that is where capital would be allocated.

Bigger budgets obviously help incentivize investment, but changing how the DOD buys through practices such as open architectures, multiyear contracts and multiple production lines will likewise create more contract opportunities and therefore that stronger demand signal that industry needs to invest.

The DOD is heading in that direction in several important ways, and more emphasis there would be productive. Adopting some of the recent recommendations of the congressional commission on defense planning, programming, budgeting and execution reform, for example, could substantially contribute toward improving incentive structures.

Another promising avenue the DOD can use to incentivize investment by the larger primes revolves around program performance. Secretary del Toro has justly emphasized in his recent remarks that “industry must deliver platforms and capabilities on time and on budget for the sake of our warfighters who are in harm’s way.”

How about, for example, rewarding contractors with substantial profit-margin expansion opportunities for delivering ahead of terms, and punishing them more severely for missing the mark? The beauty of a commercially viable defense industry is that its participants are responsive to incentives.

Ultimately, management at for-profit companies are stewards of others’ capital. Browbeating the financial practices of industry alienates firms large and small. Let’s work instead to change some of the incentive structures in the defense market. Addressing these will help foster the innovation and investment we need in our industrial base as well as reducing stock buybacks along the way. And it is ultimately that vibrant public-private partnership we need to confront today’s daunting national security challenges.

Jerry McGinn is the executive director of the Greg and Camille Baroni Center for Government Contracting at George Mason University and a former senior U.S. Defense Department acquisition official. Mikhail Grinberg is a partner at Renaissance Strategic Advisors and a member of the center’s advisory board. Lloyd Everhart is a research manager at the center.

As a top Pentagon official noted recently, “our competitors know ... how much the American way of life and the American ways of war depend on space power.” And it is not just Russia; Iran, too, is increasing its space-based capabilities to threaten the United States.

Iran has claimed a string of achievements in space in recent months. In February, Russia reportedly assisted Iran with launching a satellite into space from a Russian site. Iran claimed in September that it successfully used a space launch vehicle, or SLV, to place a military satellite in space. Iranian officials then asserted in January that it put multiple satellites into orbit in a single launch for the first time.

Iran’s recent SLV launches, and its purported ability to put multiple satellites into space, are troubling for four main reasons.

Firstly, SLVs could provide Iran with a rapid route to an intercontinental ballistic missile. Iran’s SLV advancements, according to an unclassified U.S. intelligence assessment, “shortens the timeline to an ICBM if [Iran] decided to develop one because SLVs and ICBMs use similar technologies.” The editor of Iran’s state-run news agency said in 2022: “The minute we built the first satellite launcher, we obtained the capability to build an intercontinental [missile].” Although Iran would need to master the intermediate step of fitting a heatshield onto a missile warhead to enable atmospheric reentry.

Russia, which possesses a large ICBM arsenal, could provide Iran the know-how to incorporate this technology, perhaps in exchange for the drones and missiles Tehran is supplying Moscow for its war in Ukraine.

Second, Iran’s reported use of a solid-fuel propellant to launch its SLVs is concerning, as this would make detection of imminent missile launches more challenging. Unlike liquid-fuel projectile launches, which take hours to prepare and require conspicuous pre-launch activities, projectiles on a mobile launcher with solid-fuel propellants are quicker to prepare and much harder to detect prior to launch.

Third, Iran’s satellite program could enhance its ability to facilitate proxy attacks against U.S. allies and interests. Russia has reportedly supplied Iran with an advanced satellite system to augment Iran’s intelligence-gathering capabilities. The platform was equipped with a high-resolution camera, allowing monitoring of Israeli military bases, regional bases housing U.S. troops and other sensitive targets.

Finally, Iran could use its satellites to interfere with U.S. or allied military assets. Even a supposed communications satellite, ostensibly used for civilian purposes, could initiate downlink signal jamming of radars and other assets. Iran claimed in 2020 to have conducted “space operations” exercises simulating drone and radar jamming. Launching multiple satellites at once could enable Iran to carry out signal jamming over an even greater surface area, leaving U.S. interests and those of its regional partners vulnerable to attack. GPS jamming and spoofing, seemingly initiated by Iran, are reportedly already impacting civilian airline traffic in the Middle East. Iran could represent another threat to stability in space by developing counterspace programs akin to Russia and China.

The United States must put Iran on notice for its problematic space activities. Sanctions against Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces Logistics agency — responsible for its space activity — and third parties helping the regime evade sanctions, as the United States recently implemented, are a good start. U.S. officials should also encourage allies to sanction banks helping Iran evade sanctions.

India plans to spend $3 billion on space. Can it catch up to China?

The United States should engage the global community to address this threat by imposing the snapback of sanctions at the United Nations Security Council, which would restore prohibitions on Iran’s SLV program that were previously watered down in Resolution 2231. This would reinstate a full-on U.N. ban on Iran’s SLV tests and development, and ban technology transfers to Iran that could enhance its SLV program. The entire free world needs to fully appreciate the potential danger of Iran’s increasing launch capability.

To boost deterrence, the United States should work closely with Middle East partners active in space, like Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Israel — all signatories to the Artemis Accords that commit parties to responsible behavior in space. The United States should increase space-focused collaboration with these partners, including using space assets in bilateral and multilateral drills, as occurred during a bilateral U.S.-Israel drill in January 2023.

Consistent with the U.S. national space policy, the United States should “employ all elements of national power to deter and, if necessary, prevail over hostile activities in, from, and through space.” The United States must convey a strong message to Iran that its current space activity is unacceptable and, if continued, will have further consequences.

Retired U.S. Air Force Gen. William Shelton served as the head of Air Force Space Command and was a participant in the 2017 General and Admirals Program with the Jewish Institute for National Security of America think tank and advocacy group, where Yoni Tobin is a policy analyst for its Gemunder Center for Defense and Strategy.

That reinvention should include thinking smaller and embracing small drones. Other services employ airpower in support of land and sea operations, but it is only the Air Force that is charged with gaining air control as its primary focus. If the service is to accomplish this mission, it will need to operate in the air littoral — the airspace from the Earth’s surface to about 15,000 feet, below the level where high-end fighters and bombers typically operate. Airpower has always had innate strengths — unmatched in its maneuverability, speed, and range. But it has also always faced limitations: air forces, unlike armies, cannot live in their primary domain, and the aircraft they fly are expensive, limiting the size of the fleet even for the wealthiest of nations. As a result, the occupation of the airspace could occur for a time, but it was ultimately ephemeral. Once friendly aircraft left the airspace, any surviving adversary aircraft could return to access and exploit it.

Today, continuing technological advancement and falling costs have opened new possibilities for occupying the air domain. Air forces can now operate large numbers of small, relatively cheap drones in the air littoral. A single system cannot persist indefinitely in this airspace, but large numbers of them can achieve persistence indirectly, by continually rotating in and out of the air littoral. To date, however, the Air Force has focused mainly on countering the small drone threat to its air bases, both at home and overseas. But this approach misses the broader point: the air littoral is becoming increasingly central to air warfare, and if the Air Force fails to prepare for this future, other services may fill the gap, but they lack what General Henry H. “Hap” Arnold called “airmindedness” — the specialist expertise and distinct perspective of airmen — to employ it to maximum effect.

Take the contest to control the air littoral in East Asia: China recognizes that air superiority is essential to a successful amphibious invasion. Saturating the air littoral over landing beaches and nearby waters with continuous waves of small sensing, decoy, and weaponized drones would deny China control of the air littoral and create numerous hard-to-solve and time-consuming dilemmas for the People’s Liberation Army. Drones cycled fast enough into the airspace could overwhelm China’s targeting process and in turn inflict significant losses on its invasion forces. Chinese commanders would have to decide how much “clearance” is needed in the air, and for how long, and risk depleting their anti-air missiles in the process. It would also put them on the losing end of the cost curve, as destroying enough of these cheap drones will only grow harder and costlier still as rotational persistence continues to increase in the air littoral.

As Gen. Allvin warns, the U.S. Air Force is not currently structured or equipped to make the air littoral a combat domain, but it should move quickly to close this gap. Both the Ukrainian and Russian military have established specialized drone units, with the Ukrainians even recently unveiling plans to create a separate drone service. Yet the entire Joint Force — including the United States Air Force — is still operating without small-drone units. The US Air Force ought to fill this gap and can bring an air-minded perspective to operating in the air littoral.

To start, the U.S. Air Force should create and incorporate low-end, close-in air occupation elements and capability in its restructuring for great power competition. In designing the Air Force for both deterrence and, if deterrence fails, defense against revisionist powers, the service should simultaneously embrace the concept of air denial, despite the historic cult of the offensive, and the small-drone revolution.

With no significant history of either at-scale, small-drone operations or air-denial tactics, the next critical step will be to cultivate innovation and creative new ideas and tactics. This will likely not come from today’s legacy pilot force — instead, the Air Force needs a fresh dose of airminded thinking from “digitally native” airmen, who are intuitively much more capable than senior pilots of understanding the non-linear, and one-to-many interactions of humans and machines. Development of that airmindedness, then, is the critical foundation, and one which should be laid from the ground up. From basic training onward, airmen should be as familiar with small drones as Marines are with their rifles.

Gen. Allvin is fond of quoting Maj. Gen. Hugh J. Knerr, one of the pioneers of American airpower: “Do not get trapped in paradigms of the past,” Allvin recently reminded his service. “Whatever it is, we need to understand this is a unique capability, unique opportunity for us to understand how to best employ, deploy, and integrate this into the invention of the Air Force,” he added. The US Air Force should take that spirit of invention to the air littoral.

Col. Maximilian K. Bremer, U.S. Air Force, is the director of the Special Programs Division at Air Mobility Command.

Kelly Grieco is a senior fellow with the Reimagining U.S. Grand Strategy Program at the Stimson Center, an adjunct professor of Security Studies at Georgetown University, and a nonresident fellow at the Brute Krulak Center of the Marine Corps University.

This commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of the U.S. Defense Department, the U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Marine Corps, or Marine Corps University.

The VKS has directly lost approximately 16 fighters over the past eight months. However, this does not account for the imputed losses, which arise from an aircraft accruing more flight hours than planned, reducing its overall life. Based on updated information, the VKS is on track to suffer approximately 60 imputed aircraft losses this year from overuse. That is equivalent to losing 26 new airframes. Meanwhile the VKS currently procures only about 20 total Su-30, Su-34 and Su-35 aircraft per year.

The air war has mostly maintained a steady state since mid-2023, with the exception of February 2024, when the VKS flew approximately 150 sorties per day in support of the Avdiivka offensive. Given that Russia also has been using longer-range glide bombs and devoted more aircraft to air-to-ground roles, the average sortie duration has also likely decreased, reducing the accelerated aging. Still, slightly more than half of the VKS’ tactical airframes are more than 30 years old; these have far fewer flight hours left.

The accelerated aging may be shaping Russia’s combat operations. The majority of VKS fighters operating (and lost) over Ukraine are the newer Su-30, Su-34 and Su-35 aircraft with occasional reported sightings of Su-25s.

The older MiG-31s and Su-27s have been relegated to supporting hypersonic Kinzhal strikes and air patrol at a distance. With an estimated average remaining airframe life of less than 20% and 35% respectively, these older aircraft can be used for this war, but likely have insufficient life to support Russia’s potential future invasions.

Russia’s air-to-air warfare MiG-29s are totally absent, even from air-patrol missions. Given their age, these aircraft may be either unserviceable or are being kept in reserve for a final mission. Regardless, whether due to lack of upgrades, survivability or age, these are effectively paper airplanes.

The Su-24s, on the other hand, were used extensively in the invasion of Ukraine. But there have been no reports of Su-24 losses thus far in 2024. How much are they still flying? These aircraft are old; the newest models were manufactured in 1993. The VKS may have chosen not to configure them for their new FAB-1500 glide bombs, which would also hint at the fact that the Su-24s may be reaching the end of their useful lives.

Ukraine, which is short on air defense munitions, has a few options to accelerate Russian air losses. Attacking air bases would likely reduce VKS sortie rates by more than 20% by disrupting operations and forcing the VKS to fly from more distant bases. The greatest opportunity remains the effect of forthcoming F-16 jets (and possible Gripens) to divert VKS sorties from ground-attack to air-to-air efforts.

Which fighter jet is best for Ukraine as it fights off Russia?

Regardless, more air defense munitions and fighters will be critical to Ukrainian success. Russia is relying on only about 300 combined Su-30, Su-34 and Su-35 aircraft for its operations over Ukraine, including delivering the hugely destructive glide bombs. From a strategic perspective, shooting down these newest VKS aircraft imposes a larger cost to Russia and would have the greatest overall impact on the VKS’ ability to perform strikes. It would also improve the odds of survival of the 45 F-16s allies promised to Ukraine.

The VKS has fewer than 650 tactical aircraft when accounting for end-of-life aircraft; it has even less when accounting for accelerated usage. But these numbers are unlikely to change its behavior, based on Russia’s exhibited willingness to accept high losses even for trivial gains.

In comparison, NATO has roughly 800 fifth-generation aircraft, with another 100 or more arriving every year. This is more than sufficient to counter the VKS in the air and conduct targeted ground strikes, especially given the poor performance of Russian surface-to-air missiles in Ukraine.

To be sure, NATO should expand its production of air-to-air and surface-to-air munitions to deter further Russian aggression and support Ukraine. But with the VKS currently shrinking, the alliance can afford to donate more munitions to Ukraine now without worrying about its immediate strategic reserves.

Michael Bohnert is an engineer at the think tank Rand. He previously worked as an engineer for the U.S. Navy and the Naval Nuclear Laboratory.

At the end of last year, the DOD made reliance on digital engineering official, with new guidance that requires the use of “digital engineering methodologies, technologies, and practices across the life cycle of defense acquisition programs, systems, and systems of systems to support research, engineering, and management activities.”

The reason for this guidance is clear, given the increasing demand to acquire weapons systems faster as well as the greater complexity behind current and emerging technologies.

For example, in the latest Block 4 upgrade for the F-35 fighter jet, 80% of the cost came from software changes and 20% from hardware. There is five times more software on the F-35 than on any previous fighter. Just to control the systems and surfaces to fly, the aircraft relies on about 2.5 million lines of code; the engine has nearly 1 million lines. This was a huge leap from previous generations, and future platforms and systems will only be more complex.

The DOD’s instructions also mandate the use of mission engineering, which adds another layer of modeling to get a clearer sense of performance of systems within an environment. For example, you might apply high-fidelity modeling of low Earth orbit, including radiation from the South Atlantic Anomaly, to better predict the true durability of your satellite’s design.

Many departments and organizations are working to respond to the new DOD guidance with various approaches to adopting software or building their own. Yet, satisfying the DOD’s instructions will come down to three steps:

1. Quickly digitalize processes or workflows that have not yet been converted.
2. Adopt mission engineering.
3. Connect models and data across disparate workstreams, tools and teams to create authoritative sources of truth.

Many of the organizations looking to adopt the DOD’s guidance are still in the first phase. How can organizations rapidly adapt to satisfy this guidance in the absence of clear industry standards, and without an expensive restructuring of their current processes and workflows? They should begin by implementing proven commercial software solutions that enable them to create open ecosystems for their nascent digital engineering environments.

Creating an open ecosystem relies on the enterprise-level adoption of software that possesses open application programming interfaces. To benefit from digital artifacts, digital threads, digital twins and other elements that the digital engineering ecosystem may provide, organizations need to ensure that the new can integrate with the old. Open APIs allow for this, with existing infrastructure connecting into a digital engineering environment, not brushed aside by one.

Building a digital engineering environment with an open ecosystem eliminates or substantially reduces reinvention of effective legacy tools and processes. It also enables organizations to adapt workflows in a way that keeps their human expertise fully engaged while making the most of the new technologies.

In the scramble to comply with the DOD’s instructions, defense organizations risk creating a sort of Wild West of digital engineering practices and standards. Instead, if organizations focus on adopting an open-ecosystem approach, the whole industry will be able to rally around specific best practices and standards, and each individual organization will be equipped to implement those practices and standards as they become formalized.

Something similar happened with protocols for routing data on what became the internet, when the open publication of interfaces led to agreed-upon standards.

This will preserve much of the technology that still works while remaining flexible as industry standards evolve and settle. Best of all, building an open ecosystem will achieve the vision the DOD seeks: an industry with the agility to respond to the quickening pace of adversarial competition.

As it has throughout its history, the DOD is challenging the defense community to rise to a new level of innovation and sophistication. The stakes are nothing less than our national security. We must answer the call.

Retired U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. Steve Bleymaier is chief technology officer for aerospace and defense at software firm Ansys, where Kevin Flood is president of government initiatives. Bleymaier previously served as director of logistics, engineering and force protection with the service.

Despite renewed interest in the 2020 National Defense Strategy, irregular warfare often remains focused on ideas linked to legacy Cold War constructs focused on overthrowing regimes using guerilla forces. Too often, analysts make a sharp distinction between conventional and unconventional conflict when in fact all war involves both forms working in tandem.

For Sun Tzu, it was the balance of the orthodox and unorthodox that kept an adversary off balance. Even Hannibal — the archetype at Cannae for conventional maneuver — actually used a mix of sabotage and political intrigue to set conditions for his seminal campaign.

French support to the American revolution involved both front companies supporting pirates attacking British shipping lanes as well as foreign material support.

During the Second World War, the British integrated the Special Operations Executive with its military campaigns while the Office of Strategic Services supported U.S. campaigns with morale operations designed to undermine enemy cohesion.

Faced with resource shortages and the brutal reality of 21st century trench warfare, Ukraine has found new asymmetries by combining elements of conventional and unconventional warfare. First, Ukraine is pioneering long-range, low-cost, one-way attack drones to strike strategic economic targets throughout the depth of Russia. The targets increasingly appear to be linked to critical infrastructure connected to Moscow’s oil and gas transit and processing facilities — a critical requirement for generating revenue for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war.

Over the month of March — and coinciding with the Russian presidential election — the Security Service of Ukraine has reportedly successfully attacked over 10 oil refineries, disrupting as much as 12% of Russia’s oil processing capacity, often using salvos of 35 drones each costing less than $100,000. In other words, Ukraine likely spent only $40 million to damage up to $40 billion worth of Russian critical infrastructure.

These conventional strikes focused on economic centers of gravity most likely to hold the regime at risk. The attacks also forced Russia to pull additional air defenses back to protect its critical infrastructure, setting conditions for front-line air operations by Ukraine as new equipment, like F-16 fighter jets, starts to arrive this summer. Of note, the activities coincide with increased targeting of Russian air defenses since the summer along the front. In other words, attacking Russian critical infrastructure achieves multiple objectives at low costs to Ukraine and sets conditions for future operations.

Second, Ukraine is combining unconventional warfare with these long-range precision strikes. In the lead-up to the election, there was been an increase in proxy raids into Russian border areas, cyberattacks and ballot sabotage, alongside calls for a wider symbolic uprising.

The surge of activity surrounding the election fits with broader trends in the conflict. Over the last two years these measures have included running deepfakes and disrupting Putin’s speeches. This approach reflects time-tested unconventional warfare campaigns that create conditions likely to foster local acts of sabotage, work stoppages and protests.

Ukraine isn’t just attacking the Kremlin’s wallet by hitting its economic center of gravity; Kyiv is attacking the mind of the Russian population and amplifying the stark contrasts between regime rhetoric and reality lived by ordinary people.

Bolster Ukraine’s irregular warfare tactics with Western tech

This approach stands in contrast to U.S. joint and service concepts that preface converging multidomain effects and downplay the role of people and perception. While space and cyber domains play critical roles, there is no discussion about a human domain or the contest of wills at the heart of every conflict. The focus instead is on disrupting enemy battle networks and destroying high-value targets at range, not on how to leverage discontent, compound morale issues or undermine cohesion.

As a result, special forces tends to overemphasize direct action and special reconnaissance. These conventional approaches tend to discount the utility of information warfare and cyber operations capable of setting conditions for protests and social unrest — which are more likely to threaten autocratic regimes than long-range precision strikes.

It is also unclear whether the United States has the necessary capabilities and concepts to defeat a hybrid campaign attacking its critical infrastructure and social cohesion. China has already demonstrated an interest in holding American critical infrastructure at risk through cyber operations.

Furthermore, most U.S. critical infrastructure nodes — from key telecommunications relays connecting sea cables and satellites to oil and gas — are not protected by air defenses capable of defeating a complex drone attack.

Lastly, Russia has shown the world a playbook for how to create discord online through a mix of computational propaganda and cyber operations. The United States still hasn’t found a sufficient defense against these influence operations.

As a result, the United States needs to revisit key military concepts — including future iterations of the joint warfighting concept — with an eye toward combining conventional and unconventional approaches to competitive strategy. The concepts should provide a blueprint for future campaigns, including defense operations, defending U.S. critical infrastructure and countering foreign influence operations. These concepts should think as much about will and perception as they do exquisite battle networks while keeping an eye on cost curves. The next war will not be won by a salvo of hypersonic missiles alone.

Benjamin Jensen is a senior fellow in the Futures Lab at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. He is also a professor of strategic studies at the Marine Corps University’s School of Advanced Warfighting. The views expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect an official position of the U.S. government.

This run of prosperity, however, cannot lead us to complacency. The past two years of heightened global unrest are evidence that the end of the Cold War did not mark the end of great power competition. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, global aggression by the People’s Republic of China, the brutality of Hamas and other Iranian proxies, and the unending antagonism of North Korea are reminders of this sobering truth.

In the face of these challenges, American military strength is needed now more than ever. But we cannot rely on our legacy arsenal to retain military advantage and deter these threats. We must prepare for a modern fight to preserve America’s superiority. The fiscal 2024 Defense Appropriations Act funds these preparations.

The approximately $824.5 billion provided in the bill, which accounts for a $27 billion increase over the FY23 enacted level, is directed to the highest national defense priorities, in particular countering the People’s Republic of China, prioritizing innovation at the Pentagon, and investing in quality-of-life initiatives for service members and their families.

To deter Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific region, the bill maxes out the production of critical munitions, doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan, and prioritizes the delivery of defense articles and services to Taiwan. It rejects the Biden administration’s inadequate procurement and divestment suggestions, and instead funds eight battle ships while retaining four others; increases investments in fifth- and sixth-generation aircraft; and provides over $66 billion in Indo-Pacific-relevant capabilities. These decisions demonstrate America’s capacity and intent to stand with Taiwan as well as our allies and partners in the region.

Today’s Department of Defense is an overburdened and antiquated bureaucracy confronted with the realities of the 21st century. The bill recognizes that the military will only achieve the modernization it needs by tapping into America’s entrepreneurial spirit, and it provides an unprecedented investment in innovation.

Included in that investment is $1 billion for the Defense Innovation Unit and military services to accelerate acquisition and fielding as well as $300 million for the successful Accelerate the Procurement and Fielding of Innovative Technologies program, which will work to overcome the infamous valley of death.

The most cutting-edge military technologies still rely on the ingenuity of American service members. At the core of our military might are the men and women who serve the nation so bravely. The bill recognizes that and honors them, funding the largest increase in basic military pay in more than 20 years (5.2%) and providing $123 million for recruiting and retention incentives and service member cost-of-living adjustments.

The bill also resources across-the-board investments in our military families with funding to address out-of-pocket family costs such as child care; to expand spouse employment opportunities; and to conduct medical research on areas of significance to the military community.

Undoubtedly, the bill invests in a more modern, innovative and ready fighting force. In the midst of unparalleled threats to the United States and its interests, this sends a strong message that we are prepared to meet and defeat any adversary.

Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, chairs the House Appropriations Committee, where Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., chairs the Defense Subcommittee.

But rather than looking to invest in American shipbuilding and repair capacity, our military leaders are actively exploring outsourcing the U.S. maritime-industrial base, weakening our nation and undermining American sovereignty.

For years, top executives in the U.S. shipyard-industrial base have repeatedly communicated to Congress and military officials the importance of a comprehensive industrial base policy. Absent a companion maritime strategy, the offshoring of American industries and jobs critical to our national security and readiness will be inevitable.

Meanwhile, China —– our principal maritime adversary — is seeking to overtake the U.S. Navy as the world’s most capable naval superpower. It has aggressively expanded its efforts to dominate global supply chains and increase capacity and capability through commercial markets as a flywheel for military size and ship count.

From 2010 to 2018, China provided $132 billion in direct subsidies for shipbuilders, driving a substantial decrease in the number of shipyards globally. This volume-centered approach, subsidized by the Chinese government, saturated the market and effectively drove out global competitors.

The U.S. maritime strategy should focus on building and maintaining more ships in existing U.S. shipyards. Not only is the U.S. not prioritizing shipyard capacity, but we are also imposing thousands of pages of regulation on shipbuilders that add cost and weigh down the industry while our global competitors play by a far less restrictive set of rules.

The current defense acquisition strategy myopically views competition to be only among U.S. players. These strategies leave excess capacity and capability untapped and pitted against each other as opposed to working together to optimize shipyard throughput. There is more than enough capacity to accomplish all the fleet’s maintenance needs, and yet the Navy is looking abroad for ship maintenance, as well as the capability to build combatant and logistics ships, plus vessels for the Coast Guard and the Army. These efforts are driving layoffs to the very domestic workforce Navy leadership says it wants to preserve.

This shortsighted approach creates market uncertainty and instability, complicating additional investments in the industrial base, and undermines the substantial capital investments the U.S. shipbuilding industry has made in its workforce and facilities.

Japan, Korea and now China all became global shipbuilding leaders, producing for roughly 95% of the worldwide market. Each country recognized its shipbuilding industries as strategic resources and infused hundreds of billions of equivalent dollars into their industries.

Meanwhile, the billions in private capital invested by major U.S. shipyards in recent years to increase efficiency and throughput is met by the U.S. government with inconsistent, multi-tranche shipbuilding plans (or none at all), canceled and deferred programs, myriad change orders, and empty promises of workforce development incentives. Many of the capabilities Navy leaders recently touted during overseas travel can be found right here at home, in American shipyards operated by an American workforce.

A more strategic U.S. approach would put the maximum amount of volume through each shipyard to both build ships faster and repair ships on time. An economies of scale approach applied to the overall shipbuilding and ship repair industrial base would yield many of the results the Navy is looking for, while at the same time building strength in the U.S.’s ability to compete on a global playing field.

Just take the recent delivery of the first in a series of National Security Multi-Mission Vessels being built for U.S. maritime academies to train the next generation of the merchant marine. The U.S. Maritime Administration employed a Vessel Construction Manager program to use commercial ship design and construction best practices.

In her February 2023 remarks to the Navy League, MARAD Administrator Ann Phillips touted the innovative approach, including $428 million in savings per ship.

This program represents a model for the Pentagon. A win for the U.S. government. A win for mariners. A win for industry. And a win for taxpayers.

The shipyard industrial base appreciates the continued dialogue with Navy leadership on what we all want to achieve, which is providing for the most capable, lethal and mission-ready naval fleet in the world.

The time to course correct is now. We should not outsource our national and domestic security and assets. The last thing we should cede is our ability to build our own ships and defend our nation.

Matthew Paxton serves as president of the Shipbuilders Council of America.

Unlike commonly perceived notions, defense spending has been considerably reduced since the 1990s when examined as a percentage of gross domestic product. Nonetheless, it is imperative to consider the strategic importance of sectors drawing attention within these budget allocations, and we must treat cybersecurity in particular with a dedicated and evolving response.

In the grand scheme of the digital battlefield — and amid the emergence of a new type of warfare that blends the spatial and non-spatial worlds — the conversation around security is one fraught with urgency and complexity. The integration of cyber defense systems is no longer a luxury; it is a necessity that directly affects our national security, economy and privacy rights. We need a comprehensive solution — a first-of-its-kind cyber defense integrator.

Our current cybersecurity landscape is dotted with vendors providing proprietary solutions that often don’t play well together. This fragmentation exacerbates the challenge of defending against increasingly sophisticated cyberthreats. Imagine a disjointed army, where soldiers don’t speak the same language or follow the same playbook. It is not hard to see why they would have trouble facing off against a well-coordinated enemy.

Thus, we need to pivot to a model where our cybersecurity resources are not only interoperable but are also constantly evolving to match the rapidly changing threat landscape.

In an ideal world, a cyber defense integrator would create a framework where different cyber defense systems can communicate and coordinate with each other. Interoperability would become the norm, allowing us to harness the combined power of these systems. But this integration is only one part of the equation.

Cyberthreats are an ever-morphing menace. With every firewall built, hackers devise a new way around it. Therefore, this integrator must also be radically nimble, designed to rapidly adapt to new threats, techniques and technologies. This capability would enable us to stay a step ahead of attackers and ensure that our defenses don’t become obsolete as the digital landscape evolves.

Additionally, incorporating the best-of-breed technologies into a unified framework would let us address the ever-morphing menace of cyberthreats effectively and actively. We can achieve this by encouraging big cyber defense contractors to move away from proprietary, siloed solutions and toward a model emphasizing interoperability and adaptability.

It’s essential to remember that the call for an active cyber defense integrator is not a call for the homogenization of solutions, but rather for a coordinated, rapidly adaptable defense strategy. Different vendors bring different strengths to the table, and an integrated approach will allow us to capitalize on these strengths rather than limit them.

Such an initiative requires collective will, both from the government and the private sector. The government must lead by establishing policies that encourage interoperability and adaptation in cybersecurity products. It should provide incentives for vendors to work collaboratively rather than competitively, and legislate, if necessary, to enforce this change.

On the other hand, the private sector should recognize the strategic advantage of a united front against cyberthreats. By working together, they can provide a comprehensive solution that is more effective than any single proprietary system.

The White House’s recent National Cybersecurity Strategy does provide guidance in this direction by encouraging interoperable systems and coordinated assessments (by, for example, a new Cyber Safety Review Board), but these are merely suggestions that won’t hold significant weight in the big business of cyber defense contracting.

Cybersecurity is no longer just a technology issue; it is a matter of national security, economic stability and personal privacy. The need for an active and rapidly adaptable cyber defense integrator, one that emphasizes interoperability and radical nimbleness, is paramount in this digital age. We cannot afford to rest on our laurels and rely on outdated defense models. The time to act is now, and the future of our nation depends on it.

Lisa Donnan is a partner at the cybersecurity private equity firm Option3.

Today, the United States faces the greatest likelihood of high-end conflict in decades, particularly with an increasingly aggressive People’s Republic of China. America has immense potential power to deter China or to win a direct conflict. But its power is just that — potential — if Congress does not act with the seriousness this global environment demands and provide sufficient, on-time funding for the U.S. military’s urgently needed transformation.

Six months into the fiscal year, Congress has not passed the fiscal 2024 defense budget. This has forced the U.S. military to operate under a continuing resolution, stopgap funding that prevents the Department of Defense from starting new modernization programs or modifying procurement priorities to outfit the joint force. Since 2011, the U.S. military has lost almost five cumulative years under continuing resolutions — for which soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines and guardians pay the heaviest price if conflict begins.

The DOD has never been under a full-year continuing resolution but faces this risk today. Insufficient U.S. defense budget growth has compounded the dangers, with each service losing an average of 16.8% in buying power between FY21 and FY24 (equivalent to $30 billion for the Army).

The image of the United States careening from one self-inflicted fiscal crisis to another while failing to provide timely and sufficient funding to its military during a period of unprecedented competition and conflict surely reduces our security and global standing. Our allies and partners are watching, and they are not reassured.

Our adversaries, however, are emboldened by what they see.

As Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks put it, U.S. adversaries are not “slow[ing] down while we get our house in order.” Amid wars in Europe and the Middle East, China has continued modernizing its military at breakneck speed. Beijing has doubled its defense spending since 2015 and announced a 7.2% increase this year. It has the largest armed forces in the world with over 2 million active personnel, is investing in conventionally armed intercontinental missile systems, and is rapidly modernizing its nuclear, space and cyber capabilities.

China’s rhetoric and coercive actions also are escalating. While providing support to Moscow as it attacks Ukraine, Beijing has dropped references to “peaceful” reunification with Taiwan while acting aggressively toward the Philippines in the South China Sea. Unlike the U.S. military, which has significant global commitments, the People’s Liberation Army can focus predominantly on its neighborhood. It is unlikely that an outside observer would conclude that the United States has a clearer focus on the stakes than the People’s Republic of China. This focus must start at home — in Congress.

The funding impasse would imperil U.S. national security in any era but is especially pernicious today, as it holds back a joint force primed to adapt to warfare’s rapidly changing character. Based on insights from the Ukraine war, the U.S. Army is accelerating production of 155mm artillery ammunition from about 14,000 rounds per month in 2022 to 100,000 by 2025. It also has planned increases in precision munitions, like Patriot missiles and Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System munitions, both of which have proved highly effective in Ukraine and would be critical in any high-end U.S. conflict.

Surging and pre-positioning this crucial materiel is an essential insurance policy against the People’s Liberation Army’s advantages in mass and proximity to likely flashpoints, and is also a critical element of reassuring allies and partners. However, the U.S. Army cannot actualize production surges under a continuing resolution or without additional funding.

Production delays are only the tip of the iceberg. The Army buys equipment, but it fights formations. Achieving combat power requires a concert of factors to work in unison. The Army can only maximize the value of the units that are on the front line of strategic competition with China if it has predictable and sufficient funding to give them the best equipment, increase the quality of their training and exercises with joint and coalition partners, and recruit smart, fit soldiers.

Cutting-edge organizations like the Army’s multidomain task forces, which compete with the People’s Liberation Army across land, sea, air, space and cyberspace, or formations like the security force assistance brigades, which are building a network of U.S. allies and partners, defend U.S. interests every day. We cannot ask soldiers to do this job without sufficient support.

Additionally, as the Army works to address its recruiting challenges, what message does a repeated lack of timely funding send to potential recruits, their families or those currently serving?

Then-Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Marshall, shortly before World War II, said: “For almost 20 years we had all of the time and almost none of the money; today we have all of the money and no time.” The United States has a shrinking window to deter strategic conflict. This will require financial costs, but they are small compared to war. Congress must pass the fiscal 2024 defense appropriations and all remaining fiscal 2024 appropriations bills before March 22. Congress also should add additional funding for the Army and the DoD, commensurate with the burdens our service members shoulder across the globe.

Washington must act seriously and decisively for the joint force and the American people. Our soldiers and their families deserve nothing less.

Retired U.S. Army Gen. Robert Brown is president and CEO of the Association of the United States Army. He previously led U.S. Army Pacific.

Using unorthodox and imaginative tactics, Ukraine’s irregular warriors are notching stunning gains. Sea drones sink modern warships in the Black Sea. Aerial drones evade Russia’s best air defenses to strike oil facilities in St. Petersburg. Saboteurs blow up trains and paralyze Russia’s longest rail tunnel in the Far East. Officials and turncoats in Russian-occupied areas are routinely assassinated.

Two years ago, when Ukraine’s military prospects seemed dimmer, Western allies considered helping to sponsor a government in exile and subsequent guerilla operations. There is a Ukrainian precedent: Insurgents fought in World War II and endured for a decade afterward.

In 2022, some in the West worried that backing a Ukrainian insurgency could draw NATO and Russian forces into conflict. These concerns might now be less. Russia has not attacked NATO member states, and Ukraine has not used Western arms to strike ground targets in Russia.

The West has long had experience in aiding resistance movements. In World War II, covert Allied supplies helped Yugoslav Partisans tie down Nazi divisions. In the 1980s, the U.S. helped Afghan insurgents fight Soviet occupiers, and it supported the Solidarity free trade union to oppose Poland’s Soviet-backed regime.

Drawing on this experience and emerging technologies, how might the West further strengthen Ukraine’s irregular warfare campaign as part of an overall strategy to win the war?

First, in a conventional war between industrial powers, irregular warfare operations will be only a supporting element to the main strategy. They can, however, have outsized impact if properly integrated into that strategy. D-Day sabotage by the French resistance is an example.

A common definition of strategy is a method to combine ways and means to accomplish an end. For Ukraine, this is the restoration of territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders. Standing in the way of this, however, is the Russian army. Last year, it blunted Ukraine’s counteroffensive, although Russia’s own offensive also failed.

Despite some recent success, the Russian army has vulnerabilities in logistics, command and control, and morale. Ukraine’s fighting force could further exploit these weaknesses with improved integration of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance assets linked to longer-range fires. The West could help by providing greater support to Ukrainian operations behind Russian lines, and to longer-range fires for strikes deep behind them.

This integrated capability could help Ukraine suppress enemy air defenses. This will be essential if newly arriving F-16 jets are to provide effective close-air support to future Ukrainian offensives. The Russian military failed to do this when increasing air sorties to support its Avdiivka offensive and lost a dozen combat aircraft. Ukrainian forces could not afford a similar mistake.

Longer-range fires would enable Ukraine to seriously disrupt Russian logistics as well as command and control. These fires could destroy or render inoperable the Kerch Bridge and other bridges as well as railyards, warehouses and ammunition depots in occupied Ukraine and over the border in Russia. If Moscow can daily target Ukrainian civilians, Kyiv should have the ability to strike Russian military assets that sow death and destruction on Ukrainian soil.

Dismantling Russian air defenses and logistics requires intelligence gathered behind enemy lines. Ukraine has shown that even with limited resources it can conduct intelligence-based deep strikes in Crimea and elsewhere. The keys to scaling this up are increased on-the-ground human and technical intelligence and secure communications.

Irregular warfare behind Russian lines need not resemble the guerrilla exploits of the French, Polish or Yugoslav resistance movements in World War II. Smart weapons and Russian war crimes against Ukrainian civilians make this unnecessary or unwise. Instead, Ukrainian irregular warfare should resemble stealthy Cold War intelligence and counterintelligence work rather than large-scale paramilitary operations.

The West has been criticized for being overly reluctant to provide Ukraine with some advanced conventional arms. This self-deterrence ought not stay the West’s hand in helping Ukraine with irregular warfare. This is unlikely to pose escalatory risks that worry some in the West.

A strategy to attrit Russian army logistics and undermine morale is optimal for indirect, irregular warfare. It will support the more substantial conventional offensive operations needed to expel Russian forces from Ukraine.

Phillip Wasielewski is a senior fellow in the Eurasia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute think tank. He previously served as a paramilitary case officer with a 31-year career in the CIA’s Directorate of Operations. William Courtney is an adjunct senior fellow at the think tank Rand and a former U.S. ambassador to Kazakhstan and Georgia.

Put simply: Helping free societies build swarms of low-cost drones can play a central role in retooling foreign military assistance for a new era of strategic competition.

In September 2023, Ukraine revealed the Magura V5 unmanned surface vehicle at an international arms expo. Within three months, the swarming attack drone disabled a large Russian landing ship used to transport soldiers and equipment. Two months later, six of the low-cost networked drone boats sank a Russian missile boat in the Black Sea. Each drone can deliver a 320-kilogram explosive within a 450-nautical-mile range. New systems like this are a critical component of what Ukraine needs to win the maritime fight in the Black Sea.

The same story is playing out in the skies above Ukraine and increasingly deep inside Russia. In late 2023, Ukrainian engineers unveiled the mass-produced long-range Cobra drone, which uses riveted steel and salvaged electronics and motors to deliver a 16-kilogram payload to targets as far as 300 kilometers away at a price of only $3,500 per drone.

Just as impressive, the U-26 Bober loitering munition has a range exceeding 700 kilometers and uses a unique duck shape to avoid radar detection. It was produced using crowdsourced funds and has been used to strike targets deep inside Russia. The estimated cost per Bober is $108,000.

There is a critical component linking both the Magura drone boats and long-range attack UAVs like Cobra: the electronic components and software required to build and operate mesh networked attack drones. Unmanned aerial vehicles all require servo motors, flight controllers and increasingly software-defined radios. Payloads can change based on the mission, but these components are a constant. Even the body of the drone itself can change based on what materials are readily available and produce the required performance.

The war in Ukraine has seen variants using everything from wood, carbon fiber and foam to cardboard. Cheap materials and readily available component parts and technical blue prints unleash the power of additive manufacturing and DIY crowdsourcing.

This revolution requires the United States to rethink elements of its legacy approach to security cooperation and foreign military sales. Too often, major weapon systems are either too costly, too few or too escalatory to send to partners. This debate is on display across Europe as countries grabble with what they can and cannot send to Ukraine due to fears about empty bins and inventories required to support future major contingencies. It is even on display with weapons as simple and plentiful as artillery shells. And there are often unnecessary escalation concerns placed on certain systems from MQ-9 drones to Taurus cruise missiles that further complicate political support for military exports.

Instead of just sending weapons, the United States should start stockpiling and sending core component parts its allies can use to assemble their own drone swarms. First, the export restrictions would be easier to overcome, reducing the time it takes to help a friend in need. Second, the costs would be lower and ensure partners are part of the solution. Third, and most important, the approach would build an indigenous cadre of drone experts, thus accelerating military innovation and adaption. This approach could be a test case for recent calls to adapt security cooperation for the 21st century, including updating export policies governing unmanned systems.

This logic extends beyond Ukraine. If the United States is worried about Chinese military action in the near future against Taiwan and the Philippines, then it should unleash this new vision for the arsenal of democracy in support of these front-line democratic countries.

New defense programs could combine what worked in Ukraine with local knowledge networks and readily available materials. It could even include adapting existing initiatives like the Pacific Deterrence Initiative to launch programs for training partners — including the ranks of women increasingly joining the Filipino and Taiwanese militaries — on building and operating drone swarms. China can produce more naval ships than the United States and its partners, but it cannot match a democratic society open to all citizens creating new attack drones. In the 21st century, Rosie the Riveter also knows python coding and 3D-printed attack drones.

The original arsenal of democracy kept allies and partners in the war against authoritarian regimes by supplying military equipment. This model should evolve and unlock more creative, asymmetric approaches to unleash indigenous swarms in defense of front-line democracies. The future is already here. The question is how best to align resources and policies to the new character of war.

Benjamin Jensen is a senior fellow focused on wargaming and strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. His professional experience includes stints with the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory, the U.S. Army and NATO.

There is no more valued attribute, as famed naval tactician Wayne Hughes declared, than “the number of ships ... a fleet can have.” But ships must be sustained — something the naval officer Alfred Thayer Mahan recognized nearly a century earlier when he wrote: “Fuel stands first in importance of the resources necessary to a fleet.”

The U.S. Navy spent nearly $3.9 billion on operational fuel in fiscal 2022 alone, roughly the cost of two Arleigh Burke-class destroyers. In terms of scale, the Department of Defense is the world’s largest institutional user of energy, consuming more than corporations like Amazon or developed nations like Sweden and Portugal.

Energy — specifically fuel — thus becomes a central planning consideration for any globally present maritime strategy. In the words of Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro, refueling options are essential “to keep our ships out of ports and in the fight.” And as Mahan noted: “The distribution and storage of fuel is, therefore, eminently a strategic question.”

A return to nuclear power could address many of these surface combatant endurance challenges. But such an approach is costly and unlikely.

Instead, four programmatic and policy choices can build energy resilience and maximize efficiencies in the fleet, which can yield innumerable benefits as the Navy designs, employs and sustains its force deep into this century.

1. Expand in-theater, at-sea refueling options to increase capacity and accelerate mobilization timelines. Beyond the Navy secretary, senior uniformed leaders at U.S. Transportation Command and in the Pacific have highlighted the need to expand capacity. Military Sealift Command currently operates 32 refueling ships — only a third of the requirement and a number that will remain stubbornly low, even as new oilers replace their aging predecessors. The Maritime Administration’s Tanker Security Program and Voluntary Tanker Agreement provide additional surge capacity in the event of a conflict or national emergency, but these reinforcements can seem like a drop in the proverbial ocean.

Partnering with industry can augment logistics force shortfalls. Military Sealift Command charters some niche support vessels, but identifying and contracting commercial, replenishment-capable ships that are underway could shorten supply lines. A government-developed containerized kit, which allows commercial tankers to pump fuel to Navy oilers in a process known as consolidated cargo replenishment at sea, is a disruptive capability that can rapidly expand at-sea refueling capacity and deserves investment.

Such approaches would require new — but solvable — procedures to vet crews and ships, communicate securely, and integrate these commercial units into existing military logistics constructs.

Additionally, public law mandates all military cargo to be carried aboard U.S.-flagged vessels. Congress should revisit this statutory requirement and authorize the use of tankers registered to treaty allies so we can leverage our trusted partners’ capacity and overcome domestic constraints.

2. Establish a single-fuel standard for ships and aircraft to increase operational flexibility. Combatants carry two different fuels on board in separate fuel systems because while shipboard gas turbine engines are capable of burning multiple types of fuel, their embarked helicopters only use a single high-grade variant called JP5 in the maritime environment.

Complicating matters, the managers who oversee surface and aviation fuel standards, purchasing, and distribution reside in different Navy systems commands and do not always reach consensus when evaluating engineering, supply chain and operational risk.

Economically, the U.S. Navy is one of the few consumers of JP5, which sends a weak demand signal to industry. A single naval fuel — whether JP5 or a different alternative entirely — would increase demand for specialized mixtures and lower artificially high prices through economies of scale. It would also align with the recently released National Defense Industrial Strategy’s priority of resilient supply chains by simplifying purchasing, transportation and distribution logistics.

Technologically, a single-fuel standard for ships would also result in a finer-grade fuel, which could enhance system performance, allow engineers to revisit underway maintenance periodicity assumptions and identify manpower efficiencies.

Thankfully, engineering problems beget solutions — and few fuels are unburnable. Additives can alter fuel properties to make it suitable for shipboard use without damaging tanks or systems. And improved purification methods, gasket materials and engine modifications can safeguard equipment during storage and operation. New mixtures are also becoming more ubiquitous — many with favorable properties — and they should be tested for shipboard use.

In short, we can transform vulnerabilities into strengths while preparing for a transition to biofuels and alternatives, which the International Maritime Organization and experts agree are the energy future — albeit one that will require time and platform design changes.

3. Retrofit energy-efficient systems aboard combatants to maximize operational endurance. To date, many programmatic efforts to field energy-efficient, shipboard systems have been focused on new production and forward fitting. But with a current force of 73 guided-missile destroyers, applying selected hull, mechanical and electrical improvements to today’s force can yield tens of millions of dollars in annual savings that can be redirected toward other priorities.

Apart from upgrades to shipboard generators and electrical distribution systems, additional gains can be realized by replacing large current-drawing appliances like heating, ventilation and air conditioning units — or even the dish-washing scullery. For example, the cruise industry found that a 30% enhancement in air conditioning efficiency leads to 5% annual fuel savings — a staggering $193 million if applied to the Navy. Similarly, the Air Force calculated that a 1% energy efficiency improvement fuels 8,000 additional sorties.

And seemingly insignificant actions can make a sizable and compounding impact: When United Airlines moved to a lighter-weight paper for its inflight magazine, a 1 ounce difference amounted to 170,000 gallons and $290,000 dollars in annual savings.

4. Improve data capture and analysis to guide operations more efficiently. The surface force still relies on manual processes to collect and submit fuel data, interpret predictive graphical curves, and estimate fuel percentages. But reporting methods, proficiency and even units of measurement can vary.

A better option would be to digitize these analog-intensive processes, apply machine-learning algorithms and mirror the Air Force’s Operational Energy Data Collection Strategy that has saved the service $31 million per year. Meanwhile, the Defense Logistics Agency should continue investigating options to securely automate fuel sensing and collection to standardize application across the Department of Defense.

Additionally, while stakeholders across the enterprise incorporate energy data into policies and plans, coordination can be streamlined. For instance, operations researchers at the Naval Postgraduate School have occasionally delved into these issues, and the Navy sends a few supply officers each year to the University of Kansas business school’s petroleum management program. However, no formal link exists between academia and organizations like the Office of Naval Research. Much like the Naval War College’s advanced research programs, such connections could help guide research questions, create unity of effort and align intellectual capital with operational requirements.

In times of strained capacity, and given American supply chains that span the Earth’s surface, new sustainment approaches can extend the surface force’s operational staying power.

As Mahan noted: “Without ammunition, a ship may run away, hoping to fight another day, but without fuel she can neither run, nor reach her station, nor remain on it, if remote, nor fight.”

Cmdr. Douglas Robb commanded the U.S. Navy’s guided-missile destroyer Spruance and is currently a U.S. Navy fellow at the University of Oxford, where Ensign James Potticary earned a Master of Science degree in energy systems and wrote a dissertation exploring the feasibility of alternative fuel sources for U.S. Navy ships. The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the authors and do not reflect the views of the U.S. Defense Department, the Department of the Navy nor the U.S. government.

This is the fifth commentary in a multipart series exploring ways to strengthen the U.S. Navy’s fleet. The first part is here, the second here, the third here and the fourth here.

The state of the defense electronics-industrial base is a particular concern. Additional funding mechanisms exist, and now is the time for Congress to fully fund them. One of those tools is the Defense Production Act account used by the Pentagon to invest in domestic capacity for critical defense technologies. Among the most critical is America’s ability to produce electronics. Modern weapons systems — everything from Javelin missiles to F-35 jets — contain a technology stack consisting of semiconductors, integrated circuit substrates and printed circuit boards.

American companies have proudly and consistently delivered the components our men and women in uniform need to be successful. However, the U.S. share of the printed circuit boards market has dropped since 2000. The U.S. today accounts for 12% of global semiconductor production, but only 4% of the printed circuit board and nearly none of the integrated circuit substrate fabrication.

At the same time that our ability to manufacture electronics was offshored, the armed forces became more technologically sophisticated — and the demand for electronics, including microelectronics, increased. We became reliant on nations on the other side of the world for the supply of some components. This is an unacceptable trend that puts our national security at risk.

Just as the government is underwriting the future of the semiconductor industry in places like Arizona and Ohio through the CHIPS Act, so too must the government commit to making the next generation of printed circuit boards and integrated circuit substrates in the United States. The Defense Department’s Defense Production Act account was created for just this purpose.

Now is the time for Congress to adequately fund this important tool. Last month, 54 electronics executives called on Congress to fully fund the Defense Production Act Purchases account at the House-passed level of about $618 million and $1.08 billion for the Industrial Base Analysis and Sustainment Program. The letter urged this action to address a disconnect between stated national security objectives and funding for the Defense Production Act Purchases account.

The urgency to act today to prevent an emergency tomorrow was underscored in the recent National Defense Industrial Strategy. This first-of-its-kind report named as a top priority the need to “achieve resilient supply chains,” which includes the need to “continue and expand support for domestic production.” The strategy also identified microelectronics as a critical technology needed to outpace the many threats facing our country and our allies around the world.

A renewed focus on global competition, combined with shortages of goods and transportation interruptions, has focused Washington on the synergy between national security and industrial policy. We cannot afford to wait any longer to address our dependency on foreign nations at the end of long and vulnerable supply chains.

As Congress finalizes appropriations for fiscal 2024, we urge it to adopt the House-passed funding level of about $618 million for the Defense Production Act and $1.08 billion for the Industrial Base Analysis and Sustainment Program. Providing such funding levels will be a step in the right direction to strengthen U.S. printed circuit board fabrication and revitalize the greater defense electronics-industrial base at a time of greater geopolitical risk.

John W. Mitchell is the president and CEO of the IPC trade association. Travis Kelly is the chairman of the Printed Circuit Board Association of America. Nathan Edwards is the executive director of the U.S. Partnership for Assured Electronics.

The difficulty is that Replicator requires disruptive innovation — innovation that rapidly introduces new concepts and/or technologies, and significantly changes the operational level of warfare. This is exceptionally hard and should not be confused with the incremental evolutionary innovation that the DOD historically exploits in peacetime. Critically, emerging technology and creative warfighters can rapidly disrupt traditionally dominant forces, such as in the spectacular example playing out in Ukraine.

The good news is the DOD has recent successes.

In 2022, the Navy began a two-year experiment known as the Unmanned Task Force. While much of the UTF effort was classified, it operationalized and fielded multiple disruptive capabilities to the naval and joint forces. This success is being institutionalized as the Navy’s new Disruptive Capabilities Office and will directly support Replicator.

Key to the UTF’s success was unblinking adherence to four principles:

1. Solve problems, don’t meet requirements. Starting with requirements constrains thinking and immediately eliminates options because it begins with a solution rather than trying to solve the problem itself. It also takes many years, involves organizational politics and includes individuals far removed from today’s problems.

The UTF focused on problems identified by four-star combatant commanders and further refined their detail with the operational community. While the warfighters are the experts in the operational problems, they rarely have bandwidth to dive deep into every facet of every problem they face or to optimize their problem articulation for the innovation ecosystem. This was a critical functionality performed by the UTF.

2. Protect, incentivize and embed the innovators. An organization’s primary innovation activities (i.e., its evolutionary innovation activities) will destroy all attempts to innovate disruptively. This isn’t because of stodginess or bad behavior — it’s by design.

Because evolutionary innovation seeks to improve the status quo while disruption seeks to overthrow it, the bulk of an organization will see disruption as misaligned, attempt to kill it and assimilate its resources. A common reaction to this tendency is to isolate the innovation group. This is a mistake. Organizational separation will give the innovation group speed and agility, and build barriers ensuring their fruits are impossible to leverage.

To this end, the UTF did two rare, seemingly counterintuitive things. First, it remained physically located inside the Pentagon and vehemently fought all attempts to relocate to more so-called innovation-friendly settings. Second, it remained administratively located in the Navy’s resourcing and requirements organization. While these choices throttled the UTF’s tactical speed and agility, the strategic gains from always having a seat at the table were a cornerstone of its successes.

3. Experiment early, incrementally and only against actual hypotheses. Experimentation is too often confused with testing. Cost-performance-schedule cultures typically conduct tests (often mistakenly called experiments). In a test, failure is an undesired result, and those championing failure lose credibility and resources. In an experiment, an undesired result is a learning experience, and organizations that learn fastest typically prevail (not those that fail fastest).

A gold standard for early, incremental, hypotheses-based experimentation is the NASA lunar landing program that conducted many launches from 1961 to 1972. All launches were against explicit learning objectives, and many produced arrays of unexpected lessons that shaped the next experiments. The UTF emulated this approach by jumping to experimentation with users, existing technologies and explicit hypotheses before any development was initiated. This was contrary to traditional procedures.

4. Optimize for discovery and speed, not for efficiency or scale. Clayton Christensen defined the difference between crux evolutionary innovation and disruption as seeking to improve the current business model versus searching for a new one. Improving a business model is the realm of process improvement such as Lean Six Sigma or the Toyota Production System where finding and scaling efficiencies is paramount.

Searching for a new business model requires nearly the opposite behavior. The key insight is that disruption has an unknown end state. Thus, it involves an iterative search for true customer pain points and rapidly iterating potential solutions. This requires different processes, risk tolerances, organizational configurations and cultures.

To this end, the UTF rejected a one-size-fits-all innovation approach. In one example, the UTF’s primary contributions were shepherding and funding incremental experimentation to eventually hand off to others. In another, it was distilling insight from an operational problem, finding relevant solutions in other operational communities, and shepherding the matchmaking process. In yet another, it was a year of daily, small-scale skirmishes against political and organizational antibodies to allow the disruption sufficient time to prove itself on its own merits.

While these activities were directly driven by the UTF’s standardized innovation process, the tactical execution was adapted to the unique nature of each operational problem and user base.

Disruptive innovation inside any large organization is extremely hard. Few organizations have shown they can sustain disruptive innovation over time. Most militaries excel at disruption during wartime but struggle in absence of an existential threat.

Nevertheless, the DOD has recent successes to leverage for Replicator. The question remains: Which path will the DOD choose?

Jason Stack is the chief technology officer and co-founder of a dual-use maritime logistics startup and a senior adviser at the consultancy BMNT. He co-founded the U.S. Navy’s Unmanned Task Force and previously served as the deputy director.

These hinge on four related variables:

Who wins the White House? Former President Donald Trump regards increased defense spending as one of his signature achievements. If reelected, he might look to reprise that record. He and President Joe Biden also could take very different approaches to Ukraine financial assistance via supplemental budgets.

Who controls Congress? If one party controls all three branches of government, it will have an easier time enacting its fiscal plans. Given the number of Democratic seats at stake this November, Senate control is likely to shift to Republicans in 2025-2026. The race for control of the House is a toss-up. A divided Congress is a recipe for continued dysfunction over the budget process.

Will there be fiscal constraints? The Fiscal Responsibility Act set caps on all discretionary spending in FY24 and FY25. The law could sequester the FY24 budget to 99% of FY23 enacted levels unless Congress acts by April 30. This would leave the DOD about 4.2% below the FY24 budget request. For FY25 and beyond, Congress could limit federal spending to cope with historic budget deficits and national debt.

What about supplemental budgets? In October, the White House requested $105.1 billion in supplemental funds — which are not constrained by the Fiscal Responsibility Act — to support Ukraine, Israel, U.S. submarine programs and other efforts. House Republicans are divided over Ukraine funding. Whether Congress uses supplementals to aid Ukraine and to skirt caps are critical variables.

There are some outliers who advocate spending outside these scenarios. For example, Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., has called for defense spending equal to 5% of gross domestic product. On the other hand, Reps. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., and Mark Pocan, D-Wis., in February 2023 called for the FY24 defense budget to be $100 billion below the FY22 budget. But neither of these extremes has enough support.

Doug Berenson is a partner in the aerospace and defense practice at the consultancy Oliver Wyman.

The war in Ukraine, the threat of war with China in the Taiwan Strait, and continuing attacks on the American presence in the Middle East all raise questions about whether the United States can meet its defense obligations in one of the most complex geopolitical environments our nation has ever faced.

At the same time, global technological change continues to surge in areas like artificial intelligence, unmanned vehicles, hypersonics, cyber and space. How quickly the Pentagon adjusts to these changes and allocates its $800 billion budget is crucial to addressing national security challenges.

To this end, Congress created the Commission on Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution Reform in the fiscal 2022 National Defense Authorization Act. Congress directed the 14-member bipartisan commission to recommend reforms to the way the Department of Defense sets priorities and allocates resources, using what’s known as the PPBE system.

After two years of research and after hearing from more than 1,100 expert witnesses ranging from congressional members and staff to senior defense officials and industry experts, our final report is now available to the public.

The report lays out five major areas for reform designed to improve the alignment of budgets to strategy, foster innovation and adaptability, strengthen relationships between the DOD and Congress, modernize business systems and data analytics, and strengthen the capability of the resourcing workforce — with 28 actionable recommendations that will better enable our military to achieve its missions today and in the future. A few examples illustrate the scope and nature of our recommended changes:

• Replace the PPBE process with a new Defense Resourcing System

Established in the 1960s, the PBBE process is no longer able to keep up with the pace of innovation and the complexity of growing national defense threats. Therefore, our commissioners reached consensus on a recommendation to create a new and streamlined approach called the Defense Resourcing System, dubbed DRS.

DRS consolidates the existing four-stage process into three interlocking stages: strategy, resource allocation and execution — to better align allocation of the DOD’s resources with strategic goals and to bring about more efficient resource allocation. The DRS provides key strategic and resource-informed direction to drive resource allocation in a more rigorous and analytically informed way. It also provides the agility needed to keep pace with advances in technology, as well as the changing threat environment — and increases transparency and accountability to Congress.

• Transform the budget structure

This recommendation involves changing how appropriations and budgets are presented to Congress and the public and how Congress authorizes and appropriates funding.

The transformed structure focuses less on spending categories (such as procurement and operating costs) and more on major capability areas (examples might include ground maneuver units and tactical aviation).

The new structure creates a smooth, top-down flow from service/component and major capability activity area, to individual systems and programs throughout their life cycle. The transformed budget structure will improve linkages between strategy and budgets and provide a clearer picture to Congress and the public of how DOD money is spent and why.

• Update thresholds for smaller reprogrammings

These smaller reprogrammings (known as below-threshold reprogrammings) are important because they allow the DOD to move money more quickly to meet changing requirements.

However, while the DOD budget has grown significantly over the last two decades, the thresholds for use of these smaller reprogramming actions are, in some cases, lower today than they were back then. The commission recommends revising these thresholds to account for the growth in each of the appropriations.

• Encourage improved in-person communication with Congress

Ensuring Congress has the necessary information to perform its oversight role constitutes a key enabler to successful execution of the DOD mission, as well as implementation of these recommendations.

The Commission recommends a more regularly recurring series of conversations between Pentagon officials and Congress on a range of topics to include challenges and successes with programs or authorities, current financial and programmatic execution, and changes that affect the president’s budget request.

Other recommendations in our final report include standardizing and modernizing DOD business and financial systems, providing the necessary agility to respond to changing threats at speed, improving training and focusing on recruiting and retention of the resourcing workforce.

Taken together, our 28 recommendations will create a better balance between the agility and oversight in meeting our nation’s defense challenges. These changes are significant, and implementation will require time and a strong partnership between the department and Congress.

As we note in our report, “Today, the United States is confronted with the potential for armed conflict in every domain, in every corner of the world and at any given time.”

Now more than ever, our Department of Defense needs a new Defense Resourcing System that provides the processes, authority, and tools to enable our men and women in uniform to meet the threats of today and far into the future.

Robert Hale, chair of the PPBE Reform Commission, was comptroller and chief financial officer at the Department of Defense from 2009 to 2014. Ellen Lord, vice chair, was undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment from 2017 to 2021.

Consider the situation in the Red Sea. For our Navy’s warships engaging the Houthi rebel group, reloading VLS cells would require a transit through the Suez Canal to ports in Greece or Italy, about 2,000 miles or more away. This lost time, under persistent Houthi attacks, proves this ability to reload underway is no longer a luxury — it’s a necessity.

VLS cells carry most of the surface fleet’s firepower onboard destroyers and cruisers. From VLS cells, the Navy employs air and missile defense weapons as well as long-range strike and anti-ship missiles. The Arleigh Burke-class destroyers have the capacity to store 90-96 missiles in VLS cells depending on the variant of warship. Warships are loaded with an assortment of weapons before deploying to meet expected mission needs and ensure the ship’s self-defense.

Reloading the most capable missile defense weapon — the RIM-161, also known as the Standard Missile-3 — into one of these vertical cells is a delicate matter. It requires precisely loading a 1.5-ton, 21.5-foot-long missile into a tube built into the hull of the ship. At sea, the movement caused by even calm seas makes this nearly impossible to do without damaging the missile.

A 2019 Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments study found a VLS reload-at-sea capability could provide the equivalent of an additional 18 destroyers or cruisers in a Pacific war scenario. With China’s modern navy larger than ours and backed by a massive shipbuilding industry, every one of our warships must be kept in the fight. As such, the U.S. Navy can ill afford to lose one warship for weeks to arrive at a safe Pacific harbor to reload weapons.

China’s navy has more ships than the US. Does that matter?

Fortunately, rearming VLS cells at sea is not an impossible engineering problem.

The Navy has explored two options since the mid-1990s. The first uses a conventional approach reminiscent of time-tested underway replenishment at-sea methods: the Transportable Re-Arming Mechanism. The second, more complex approach uses a crane that compensates for wave movements: Large Vessel Interface Lift On/Lift Off.

Between the two approaches, the TRAM system’s simpler approach is closer to an at-sea demonstration. The secretary’s comments at WEST indicate this is coming in the summer. Once completed the next step will be to adapt the method to operational destroyers — a task that the Navy’s recent performance indicates will be too long in coming.

Houthi attacks on shipping in the Red Sea have been going on for months, and the destroyer Carney has been there from the beginning. As of Feb. 3, it had been shooting down Houthi missiles and drones for almost four months. When it must depart the fight for a distant port to load its VLS cells, the lost firepower will have to be made up someway, or operations will be affected.

Calls for developing the capability to reload VLS cells at sea is not new. And the attention of the secretary of the Navy dates back to a major speech given at Columbia University in December 2022. The secretary’s attention clearly underscores the importance placed on developing it. Yet progress seems stalled.

It’s time Congress steps in and gets answers to help the Navy get what it needs to develop this critical capability. Perhaps some of the needed money could be spared from the $114.7 million requested in the current defense budget for diversity, equity and inclusion activities.

The nation cannot afford to learn the importance of having VLS rearming at sea after a major war in Asia begins. As the secretary has stated, “history is forged in the crucible of action, not the comfort of hindsight.”

Brent D. Sadler is a senior research fellow in naval warfare and advanced technologies at The Heritage Foundation think tank.

Faced with an aggressive Russia, a war of attrition in Ukraine and uncertainty about U.S. reliability, anxious European allies are accelerating their defense spending. This year they are to collectively meet NATO’s target of spending 2% of gross domestic product on defense. And they have logged nine consecutive years of growth in their defense budgets.

Spending more, however, doesn’t necessarily mean spending well. NATO’s 2% goal is important as a baseline input metric, but it is unlikely to be enough to ensure that Europe strengthens its defenses before Russia reconstitutes its depleted forces. To assure that defense resources are spent well, some clear output metrics are needed to define what Europe’s military capabilities should be.

As the alliance continues its most urgent task — helping Ukraine win — it must address this important longer-term challenge of rebalancing trans-Atlantic defense. Doing so will mean squaring a triangle: ensuring Europe’s capacity to better defend itself against Russia and manage crises along its southern periphery; addressing European aspirations for greater strategic autonomy; and maintaining confidence that the United States can adequately uphold its commitments in both the North Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific region.

We have called squaring this triangle “achieving European strategic responsibility.”

In the past, Europe has sought “autonomy” without providing adequate defense resources, while the United States has wanted greater European defense contributions without diminishing U.S. influence. These tensions have been exacerbated by inadequate cooperation between U.S. and European defense industries.

NATO’s 75th anniversary summit in Washington this summer provides an opportunity to reconcile these two perspectives and find a new strategic balance. To do so, European allies should focus on achieving two military capability or output goals as quickly as possible.

First, Europe should build its conventional military capabilities to a level that would provide at least half of all the forces and capabilities — including the strategic enablers such as strategic lift, air-to-air refueling and operational intelligence — required to deter and, if needed, to defeat a major-power aggressor.

Should a conflict simultaneously break out with China in Asia and with Russia in Europe, the United States may not be able to deploy adequate reinforcements to Europe. European allies need to be able to pick up the slack.

Second, European allies should develop capabilities to conduct crisis management operations in Europe’s neighborhood without today’s heavy reliance on U.S. enablers. The European Union’s goal to develop the capacity to generate an “intervention force” of 5,000 individuals who could deploy beyond EU boundaries is a small yet useful start. Much more is needed.

Meeting these two output goals would allow Europe to become the first responder to most crises in its neighborhood, acting through NATO, through the EU or through ad hoc coalitions of the willing. It would permit the United States to shift some of its forces and strategic focus to the Indo-Pacific region without significant reduction in the capabilities needed to deter Russia.

To achieve these two output goals, NATO allies could agree at the summit to use NATO’s Defense Planning Process to create a minimum level of military ambition necessary to attain European strategic responsibility. European allies and Canada should firmly commit to investing sufficient resources to ensure that within a few years they can meet 50% of all of NATO’s minimum capability requirements. Similar informal goals already exist; now they should be formalized and implemented at the summit.

Doing half of what’s needed within the alliance is an absolute minimal requirement for Europe to attain strategic responsibility. It assumes the Europeans can still count on the Americans. But if former President Donald Trump wins the November election and reneges on America’s NATO commitments, doing half will not be nearly enough. So Europe should not delay a moment longer. A delay could be fatal, as Russia is on a war footing, has attained significant combat experience and will reconstitute its drained forces as quickly as possible.

Achieving strategic responsibility for Europe will require more — not less — trans-Atlantic consultations. New mechanisms for NATO-EU coordination and industrial cooperation will be needed. Now is the moment for the U.S. and Europe to shed their contending views and to make European strategic responsibility a win-win for both sides of the Atlantic.

Hans Binnendijk, formerly a senior director for defense policy on the U.S. National Security Council, is a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council think tank. Daniel S. Hamilton, formerly a U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state, is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank. Alexander R. Vershbow, formerly a NATO deputy secretary general, is a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council.

There is, however, a way Washington could help hold Ukraine over until Congress gets its act together. While the administration has declared it’s “out of money” for Ukraine aid, it retains the authority to give Kyiv over $4 billion worth of materiel from U.S. stocks. The administration has declined to tap this authority because it’s out of funding to replace the donated equipment. But there are key weapons America could send now without compromising U.S. military readiness.

Ukraine is suffering from a shortage of men and materiel, particularly artillery ammunition. Congress’ monthslong delay in passing supplemental aid funding has exacerbated this challenge. Yet after rejecting an aid bill passed by the Senate earlier this month, House Speaker Mike Johnson appears to be in no rush to tackle the issue. It could be months before a bill reaches the president’s desk. Ukraine can’t afford to wait that long.

Comparing Russian, Ukrainian forces two years into war

Since Russia’s February 2022 invasion, Washington has relied on presidential drawdown authority, or PDA, as its primary vehicle for Ukraine aid. PDA allows the administration to give foreign partners weapons taken from existing U.S. stocks, expediting delivery. Through PDA, the United States has provided Kyiv with regular shipments of artillery ammunition, air defense interceptors and other critical capabilities.

Normally, the Pentagon replaces equipment donated under PDA by procuring new systems or munitions, which the military receives within months or at most a year or two. In 2022 and 2023, Congress provided both additional PDA for Ukraine as well as funding to replace the donated equipment.

However, the PDA packages for Ukraine ground to a halt in late December. The issue isn’t a lack of PDA itself; the administration can still donate around $4.2 billion worth of weapons. Rather, as the Office of Management and Budget’s director explained, the administration made a “very tough decision” to forgo the remaining PDA because the Pentagon has run out of money to buy replacement equipment.

The Defense Department presumably worries, despite its $850 billion-plus annual budgets, that continued donations within this $4 billion limit could jeopardize U.S. military readiness, absent assured replacement funding.

The administration is obviously right to prioritize American warfighters. But the U.S. military’s vast inventories contain plenty of things that wouldn’t be missed by American troops but would be a godsend to Ukraine. The Pentagon could afford to wait to replace these items — if it bothers to replace them at all.

Most notably, the United States could probably spare some more cluster munitions for Ukraine’s Western-made artillery systems. Known as dual-purpose improved conventional munitions, or DPICM, these rounds release dozens of smaller sub-munitions, increasing lethality. The Biden administration first provided 155mm DPICM rounds to Ukraine last summer as Western stocks of standard shells ran low. Ukrainian forces have since employed these munitions to great effect.

While it’s unclear how many DPICM rounds Kyiv has already received, the United States probably has a lot left. America’s DPICM inventory reportedly totaled nearly 3 million rounds as of spring 2023. Some of those munitions may be expired or otherwise unsuitable for Ukraine, but a considerable portion is probably still available.

It’s doubtful sending Ukraine more now would harm U.S. readiness. Pentagon policy discourages U.S. commanders from using DPICMs, particularly those with a dud rate greater than 1%, which are supposed to be retired from service.

In addition to shells, Ukraine needs more protected mobility. Even outdated vehicles like the humble M113 armored personnel carrier could offer significant value if provided in sufficient quantities. M113s play a key role in evacuating wounded Ukrainian soldiers and moving forces around the battlefield, but Kyiv needs more of these vehicles. Absent enough armored vehicles, Ukrainian troops must rely on civilian alternatives that provide little protection against Russian artillery and other threats.

The U.S. Army has thousands of M113s in long-term storage and is actively replacing those still in service. Sending a significant number of them to Ukraine would prevent avoidable casualties. That’s especially important at a time when Kyiv needs to husband its scarce manpower.

To be clear, this stopgap solution would not obviate the need for Congress to pass additional security assistance funding. It would merely buy time. U.S. assistance for Ukraine will not be sustainable without that funding, and there’s a limit to what America should provide without assured replacements.

Administration officials may chafe at having to explain how they’re able to resume aid despite being “out of money.” They may also fear weakening — if only slightly — the pressure on House Republicans to pass the supplemental. But those are poor reasons not to take a simple step that would save Ukrainian lives.

Ukrainian troops are fighting not only for their freedom but also vital U.S. interests. America cannot afford to leave them out to dry indefinitely.

John Hardie is deputy director of the Russia Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank, where retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery is a senior fellow.

Four months into an unprecedented and brutal assault on the Gaza Strip following the Oct. 7 massacre carried out by Hamas, Israeli operations have already killed 28,000 Palestinians and brought untold suffering and a humanitarian crisis. About 1.2 million Palestinians have been forced to take refuge in Rafah, where they are bracing for what might come next.

Israel’s planned operation risks becoming the latest in a series of actions that have caused immense harm to civilians. Yet again, the impending attack raises grave concerns about U.S. support for Israel, particularly the arms transfers the Biden administration continues to provide. President Joe Biden’s response — the direct result of pressure from Senate Democrats — is National Security Memorandum-20. NSM-20 is a new policy directive that could create opportunities for the administration and Congress to ensure U.S.-funded arms are not used in violation of international humanitarian and human rights law.

Although NSM-20 does not single out Israel, it is clearly in response to its war in Gaza. The memorandum was issued as part of a collaboration between the White House and Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md. The senator has consistently raised concerns about Israel’s conduct over the past four months and sought to include an amendment to Biden’s requested emergency supplemental, which would provide Israel $14 billion in unconditioned security assistance and has now passed the Senate.

Biden’s new memorandum, which draws from Van Hollen’s amendment, revolves around a requirement that all countries receiving U.S. security assistance provide “credible and reliable written assurances” regarding their compliance with international law. Countries engaged in armed conflict must do so within 45 days.

The memorandum further requires recipients to certify they will comply with Section 620I of the Foreign Assistance Act, a binding provision of law banning security assistance to any country where the foreign government “prohibits or otherwise restricts, directly or indirectly, the transport or delivery of United States humanitarian assistance.”

U.S. law already conditions security assistance on compliance with international and human rights law, and recipients of U.S. arms risk a cut-off of transfers if they violate such laws. There is no evidence to suggest 620I has ever been enforced in its 28-year history. No Israeli unit has ever been barred from receiving U.S. assistance under the Leahy laws, which prohibit assistance to any unit where there is credible information the unit has committed a gross violation of human rights.

Administrations have created mechanisms, such as the Conventional Arms Transfer policies, that make promising commitments on paper but too often result in little actual change in policy — especially for close U.S. allies and partners.

Under NSM-20, all recipients of U.S. taxpayer-funded assistance are now required to commit to using U.S. aid in compliance with international humanitarian and human rights law. In that way, this new memorandum could — and hopefully will — help operationalize important existing law and policy and lead to new points of leverage over Israeli operations.

But absent real political will, it risks being just another policy workaround that allows the Biden administration to claim, as it did to Defense News, despite publicly available evidence: “We have not seen any violations of the standards so have no plans to restrict assistance at this time.” Human rights organizations and media outlets have published ample evidence of Israel’s possible violations of international law, including with weapons from the United States.

Importantly, the memorandum creates a robust congressional reporting regime. The executive branch rarely volunteers to require reporting to Congress. The memorandum’s 90-day timeline for reporting to Congress on partners’ compliance with international law and facilitation of humanitarian aid delivery could draw congressional attention to civilian harm and humanitarian needs and create opportunities for legislators to conduct oversight or restrict assistance as appropriate.

But civilians in Gaza face an impending famine, and Israeli bombardment has decimated their medical system, housing, sanitation, and other civilian infrastructure. The memorandum’s timeline will not provide the immediate change of course necessary today.

Ultimately, the impact of NSM-20 will depend entirely on its implementation, and especially whether Congress pressures the Biden administration to hold the Israeli government accountable for the devastation caused by its operations in Gaza. An administration denial that Israel has violated any of the standards referenced in NSM-20 does not bode well for the seriousness with which the administration will implement its new memorandum and puts the onus on Congress to ensure those standards are upheld.

Seth Binder is director of advocacy at the Middle East Democracy Center, where he focuses on U.S. policy, security assistance, and arms sales to the Middle East and North Africa. John Ramming Chappell is advocacy & legal fellow in the Center for Civilians in Conflict’s U.S. Program. His work focuses on U.S. law and policy related to civilian harm, arms sales and security assistance.

The latest National Security Scorecard from data analytics firm Govini revealed countless China-based firms remain deeply embedded in Defense Department supply chains across 12 critical technologies. Consider as well as that the draft version of the Pentagon’s National Defense Industrial Strategy noted that “today’s [defense-industrial base] would be challenged to provide the required capabilities at the speed and scale necessary for the U.S. military and our allies and partners to engage and prevail in a major conflict.”

This is what happens when just-in-time defense manufacturing meets dependence on Chinese companies, not to mention firms in Taiwan that Beijing could blockade during a crisis on which many, if not all, precision weapons and modern platforms depend.

The recently passed fiscal 2024 National Defense Authorization Act barely affects the timeline for eliminating the Pentagon’s dependence on selected Chinese companies and materials. The narrow scope and lengthy time frames of current government efforts to alleviate our supply chain dependencies send an unspoken message to Beijing: The DoD does not have, nor will it soon have, the supply base required to prosecute a long war against China. The message to Taiwan is that we can’t build the weapons and platforms needed to defend you in a protracted war without access to these at-risk supply chains.

Thankfully, there are solutions that the Pentagon and the administration can take to armor the Achilles’ heel of our defense supply chains.

First, they can focus on resiliency rather than independence, entailing the pursuit of multiple solutions to ensure the DoD has sufficient stocks — or access to the production — of the products, materials and services required for a long conflict. To build resiliency, the Pentagon can focus on increasing the size of its inventories, cultivating new second and near-shore sources, and redesigning munitions and platforms that are especially critical for an Indo-Pacific fight.

Resiliency requires assessing the true extent of China- and Taiwan-based dependencies, and remediating them.

Second, the Pentagon should ask Congress to invert its approach to how it defines, analyzes and addresses Pentagon supply chain vulnerabilities. To date, the government’s efforts have largely focused on inputs, as well as suppliers based in so-called covered countries like China. But if the government inverts its approach from inputs (e.g., rare earths) to outputs (e.g., an F-35 jet), it will address dependencies in a more holistic manner, forcing a review of the full supply chain.

Requiring the defense-industrial base to quickly conduct a bottom-up analysis by critical munition and platform that identifies each node in its supply chains — something it could readily by law do with commercial software — would establish a baseline for modeling different platform and munition inputs under different scenarios. These models would rapidly identify potential and growing risks as well as assist the DoD in proactively addressing them. They would also help avert a scenario where the DoD has to reactively scramble to address the collapse of a critical node far down in its supply chains.

Lastly, like the U.S. had during World War II with the War Production Board, someone or some organization should be in charge of these efforts. The Federal Acquisition Security Council may be the best organization to fill that role, as it would be well placed to roll up our supply chain dependencies, place them against requirements to create demand signals and determine how best to fill them.

These actions could be included by the Pentagon in its budget for the coming fiscal year — or given their urgency, a single, focused bill, an executive order, or a future emergency supplemental.

No one knows if or when tensions with China could spiral into armed conflict. But there’s no doubt that the world is becoming more dangerous. The U.S. must send a message to Beijing that we are prepared to prosecute a long war if needed. And the U.S. must also send a message to Taiwan that it will be able to support the island in a time of need. Without ending China’s chokehold on our defense supply chains, we will be hard-pressed to send either.

Retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. John G. Ferrari is a senior nonresident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute think tank. Ferrari previously served as a director of program analysis and evaluation for the service. Mark Rosenblatt runs Rationalwave Capital Partners, which invests in public and private technology companies.