WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force still hopes lawmakers will approve a proposal allowing armed services to start out work on latest programs before a budget is passed, a move that would ease problems caused by a unbroken resolution.
Andrew Hunter, the Air Force’s assistant secretary for acquisition, technology and logistics, said Tuesday that the so-called quickstart legislative proposal would allow the service to progress with initial contract work and early-stage program activities — even when a budget isn’t yet passed and the military was forced to operate under a unbroken resolution, or CR, limiting its spending to prior yr levels.
In an interview on the Pentagon with Defense News, Hunter described complications that CRs present when the Air Force tries to launch latest programs. Under a CR, he said, the Air Force can hold informal talks with industry. But arranging contracts and establishing vendor pools is trickier if a proper budget isn’t yet passed, he explained.
The quickstart proposal could change that, he argued.
“Attending to the purpose where you possibly can actually get on contract and initiate early-stage programmatic activities, that’s what that legislative proposal is actually optimized for,” Hunter said. “That’s one reason why we’re continuing to aggressively pursue that with Congress.”
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall first described this proposal to reporters in April, noting it could only allow program offices to perform preliminary work, comparable to early requirements studies, risk reduction and design activities.
The unique version of the proposal backed by Kendall would have allowed services to make use of as much as $300 million to start out latest programs before a budget was passed. It was originally in neither versions of the National Defense Authorization Act proposed to Congress. But Sens. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Tom Cotton, R-Ark., brought the proposal up for a floor amendment to the Senate’s NDAA version in July.
The version that ultimately made it into the Senate NDAA was a slimmed-down approach to the primary proposal, allowing to make use of $100 million for new-start funding across the Defense Department. Hunter said the Air Force will proceed talking to lawmakers in the course of the conference process to resolve differences between the 2 NDAA versions in hopes the proposal makes it into the ultimate bill.
Hunter said the inclusion of the proposal within the Senate NDAA was “wonderful, from an Air Force perspective.” And when asked if $100 million was enough, he replied: “It’s a superb start.”
“I might hesitate to say it’s not enough until I’ve [proved] that it’s not enough, by executing as much as the limit,” Hunter explained. “Having said that, the $100 million isn’t only for the Air Force, sadly; it’s for all the services. So we’ll should see how intense the competition is to make use of the authority. And if it’s really intense, we’ll should revisit” the proposal.
Hunter noted this proposal could come in useful to start out up Project Venom, a proposed $50 million program that will allow the service to upgrade six F-16 fighters with autonomous software and experiment with the aircraft’s self-flying capabilities.
If the legislative proposal passes, Hunter said, the Air Force could readjust funding to start out working on modifying those jets before a budget is officially passed. The cash could pay for procuring physical parts for the modified F-16s, he added, in addition to design and software work.
A proposed experimental operations unit, which might help develop the tactics and procedures to fold autonomous drone wingmen — also generally known as collaborative combat aircraft — right into a squadron, could be harder to fund under the quickstart proposal, Hunter said.
“A lot of the work there [in the experimental operations unit] is people, Air Force personnel, and organizational,” Hunter said. “I wouldn’t say there’s not any application to it, nevertheless it’s a bit of more tenuous.”
When using that authority, he added, the Air Force would should be cautious not to start out something it could be unable to complete.
He also said House lawmakers and staffers have expressed concern to the Air Force concerning the potential effect this proposal would have on the budgetary process.
A number of the changes the Senate made to the proposal when including it within the chamber’s NDAA may address concerns within the House, increasing its probabilities for passage, in line with Hunter. He described the opposite changes to the proposal, besides the lowering of the funding limit, as “clarifications” that didn’t differ greatly from what the Air Force intended.
“It’s my hope, and my message to the House folks has been, that we predict loads of the concerns that led to this not being within the House version of the NDAA were addressed in the availability that was adopted” by the Senate, Hunter said. “We expect it’s able to go.”
If the $100 million version of this legislative proposal passes, Hunter declined to say whether the Pentagon is prone to pitch one other version next yr that will expand it beyond the present limit.
“Immediately, my job is to steer them to adopt the authority after which to indicate them what it looks like in execution,” Hunter said. “I’m going to stick to that in the intervening time.”
Stephen Losey is the air warfare reporter for Defense News. He previously covered leadership and personnel issues at Air Force Times, and the Pentagon, special operations and air warfare at Military.com. He has traveled to the Middle East to cover U.S. Air Force operations.