Study Urges Arms-Buying Reforms : Pentagon System Flawed, Panel of Defense Experts Says

The Pentagon procurement system is deeply flawed and getting worse and must be fundamentally reformed, a panel of defense experts concluded Monday after a yearlong study.

The group, led by two former defense secretaries, assailed Congress for maintaining a cumbersome appropriations process and for excessive interference in military weapons-buying decisions.

2-Year Budgeting Urged

The panel, known as the Project on Monitoring Defense Reorganization, called for a number of changes, including two-year defense budgets, a streamlined weapons acquisition system and greater professionalism among military procurement officers.

“Scandals, cost overruns, mismanagement on a vast scale, inefficiency and incompetence have justifiably and understandably shaken public support for defense spending,” Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), a commission member, said at a press briefing Monday. “Something must be done to get the Pentagon’s house in order.”

The 72-page report is being sent to former Sen. John Tower, whom President-elect George Bush has chosen to be his defense secretary. It calls on Tower and top military officers to make reform of the Pentagon bureaucracy and its procurement system “one of their highest priorities.”

Commitment to Reform Cited

Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Tower’s commitment to procurement reform will be one of the central questions at his confirmation hearings before the committee next month.

“Something is fundamentally wrong with the (procurement) system,” said Nunn, also a member of the study panel. “The system is broke and needs to be fixed.”

The nation’s weapons-buying program has been repeatedly tainted by scandal over the last several years. Military contractors have been found guilty of price-gouging and bribing foreign officials, the Pentagon has been caught cheating on weapons tests and the military has been sold scores of unreliable and overpriced parts.

And, this spring, federal law enforcement officials raided the offices and homes of dozens of military contractors, consultants and Pentagon officials, searching for evidence of what they called widespread fraud and bribery in weapons purchasing. The first indictments in the continuing investigation are expected any day.

Nunn, the most influential member of Congress on defense issues, said Congress shares a great deal of the blame for the problem. He noted that three congressional committees--Budget, Appropriations and Armed Services--all share oversight of the Pentagon’s $300-billion annual budget.

Would Drop One Panel

He said the defense responsibilities of one of those committees ought to be eliminated because they overlap and provide too many opportunities for congressional “micromanagement” of Pentagon programs. But Nunn acknowledged that, because of institutional jealousies--not to mention campaign contributions--none of the panels were likely to volunteer to give up their roles.

The study was conducted by a 41-member panel composed of current and former government officials, lawmakers and active and retired military officers. Former Defense Secretaries Harold Brown and James R. Schlesinger were co-chairmen.

The research, paid for by the Ford Foundation, was conducted under the auspices of the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Johns Hopkins University’s Foreign Policy Institute.

The study generally gave high marks to the planning and conduct of military operations, although it called for greater civilian involvement in drawing up contingency plans for politically sensitive armed intervention.

“I don’t mean nit-picking by weenies” but rather more advice from Pentagon and State Department civilians aware of the repercussions of the use of force, Brown said in presenting the recommendation to a press conference Monday.

Sharing of Weapons Urged

The report urged the military services to share more weapons systems, rather than, for example, each service having its own types of helicopters and radios. It recommended also that the military buy more off-the-shelf civilian products instead of insisting on expensive custom-made military goods.

Finally, the report urged the “professionalization” of Defense Department acquisition officials, providing greater career opportunities and insulating them from pressure from the military services.

The group did not, however, support congressional calls for an independent “procurement corps” outside the Pentagon to dictate weapons purchases.