WASHINGTON \u2014 When Raj Iyer took the reins as the first civilian chief information officer for the U.S. military\u2019s largest service, he made a near-instant connection with Army Lt. Gen. John Morrison, his uniformed counterpart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The bond, forged \u201cfrom day one\u201d in late 2020, would prove critical, Iyer said. The Army\u2019s top leaders tasked the pair with bringing to fruition what the non-defense world expects day in and day out: universal connectivity on technology that\u2019s easy to use, no matter the location, distance, weather or information sought.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt has been an exceptional partnership,\u201d Iyer told C4ISRNET and Army Times<\/a> on Feb. 1, roughly one month after he announced, via a lengthy LinkedIn post, he would depart. \u201cWe had a common mission, a common objective.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n That shared thread, he elaborated, was \u201cto fix all the mess that we had in the Army, that we\u2019ve all seen from either inside or from the outside.\u201d While Morrison, a self-described Army brat, sported decades of insider experience, including a stint as the chief of staff at U.S. Cyber Command, Iyer brought recently acquired private-sector panache.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It would prove a heavy lift and one that will likely outlast the tenures of both men. <\/b>Critics and watchdogs, including the Government Accountability Office, have long poked the Pentagon for falling behind the tech implementation curve, and at least one viral letter has accused it of repeatedly failing to \u201cfix our computers.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Army in June 2020 decided to split the duties of the formerly combined position of CIO and G-6, or senior military adviser to the Army chief of staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Leaders chose <\/b>to hire both a <\/b>CIO, who would serve as the lead information-technology adviser to then-Secretary of the Army Ryan McCarthy, and <\/b>a general to oversee <\/b>policy implementation and soldier priorities. The Senate confirmed Morrison to the latter position the following month.<\/p>\n\n\n\t