100,000 Bayonets Cut to the Core of the Pentagon’s Spending Problem

James Hasik

Defense, United States

What three recent cases tell us about the relative burdens in military procurement. 

Just the other day, I noted how outgoing Air Force procurement chief Bill LaPlante has been insisting that the Pentagon’s business of buying weapons has been improving over the past few years. Not everyone, however, is equally moved. On November 18, at our event on “The Space Race in Business,” Jay Gibson of XCOR told of how he had recently brushed off entreaties from the access-to-space-vexed Pentagon. “I’m not interested in doing business with you,” he told the Building, “but after I’m commercially successful, call me, and I’ll do business on a FAR 12 basis with you.” Gibson was referring to the chapter of the Federal Acquisition Regulations on commercial items, and space flight increasingly qualifies. That got me thinking about three recent cases of procurement and non-procurement of much more quotidian systems—bayonets, pistols, and armored trucks—and what they tell us about the relative burden of administrative overhead for companies big and small in military procurement.