{"id":29308,"date":"2019-08-07T11:00:51","date_gmt":"2019-08-07T11:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2019\/08\/07\/section-804-gives-the-us-an-advantage-in-great-power-competition-with-china-and-russia\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T22:25:40","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T22:25:40","slug":"section-804-gives-the-us-an-advantage-in-great-power-competition-with-china-and-russia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/commentary\/2019\/08\/07\/section-804-gives-the-us-an-advantage-in-great-power-competition-with-china-and-russia\/","title":{"rendered":"Section 804 gives the US an advantage in great power competition with China and Russia"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Military weapons procurement probably doesn\u2019t pop up in casual conversation at your dinner table. Rules governing it are as complicated as the modern war-fighting systems we build, making it a field that literally requires its own university at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. Should you choose to slog through the 5,000-page \u201chow-to\u201d manual for military purchasing, you\u2019d get a close-up look at the sclerotic process used to build supersonic fighters and stealth bombers. It would seem more suited to a Monty Python skit than as a recipe for building a world-class military.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In previous job assignments, the two of us met frequently around a small Senate conference table filled with people devoted to fixing our crippled acquisition process. One of us on staff in a reform-focused Senate Armed Services Committee and the other running the Pentagon\u2019s premier prototyping office, we brought unique perspectives to a team that ultimately gave birth to a new acquisition fast lane<\/a> called Section 804. It\u2019s been a pleasant surprise to find ourselves now responsible for implementing it as senior leaders in the Air Force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The beauty of Section 804 is that you could describe it on a bar napkin. It establishes a series of common-sense reforms: Begin prototyping earlier, nearly a year and half earlier than under the old system; give engineers more time for testing and troubleshooting; and keep flawed concepts from entering production and operations \u2014 a whopping 70 percent of any program\u2019s total cost. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But aside from this fiscal common sense, \u201cflying before buying\u201d is accelerating weapons delivery for the men and women who fight our wars. The old slow-lane buying process demanded a mountain of Pentagon paperwork before the first dollar was spent and the first piece of metal bent. The Section 804 fast lane requires the same paperwork but phases it alongside early design and testing. Hanging up business suits in favor of lab coats and hard hats marks a return to an earlier age when the Air Force streamlined weapons development during the height of the Cold War. And Section 804 is producing results that would make our founders smile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They\u2019d also smile because we\u2019ve delegated unprecedented decision authority over these programs to our officers and their civilian counterparts in the field, putting power at the edge where real work happens. We challenged them to find and trim 100 years of schedule \u201cfat\u201d induced by overthinking processes, unnecessary paperwork and risk aversion to sometimes necessary incremental failures. The schedule fat has been cut in less than a year. According to Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein, running an Air Force program might be the best job in government right now.<\/p>\n\n\n\t