DOGE Needs to Tackle The Department of Defense’s CR Nightmare

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MEMORANDUM

TO: Elon and Vivek, 

FROM: Mackenzie Eaglen, AEI

DATE: ASAP

SUBJECT: Defense DOGE-ing

Scouring the federal budget for efficiencies and smart rightsizing must not overlook the legislative branch of government.

Specifically, that exorbitant taxpayer-funded waste Congress creates when it cannot fund the work of the feds on time through annual appropriations provided by the start of the fiscal year on October 1.  

Spending freezes known as continuing resolutions (CRs) simply kick the can of hard choices and waste money—particularly funds for the U.S. Department of Defense. The Pentagon budget is a beast, but know that just about half of it goes back out the door in contracted goods (equipment), services/labor (think: space launch, for example), and IT/software. Former Secretary of Defense Ash Carter said continuing resolutions act as a “straight-jacket” for the department, forcing it to live in stasis at the previous year’s funding levels.

How Does this Waste Occur?

1) CRs freeze individual appropriations accounts at last year’s levels, causing tens of billions of dollars to be misaligned—and often at a lower level. This misalignment negatively affects all accounts, but particularly creates problems for troop training and maintenance of equipment and facilities: the core of military readiness. 

Near-term readiness is perishable and must be constantly maintained for the “fight tonight” or it is lost. It takes longer and costs far more to rebuild readiness than to maintain it.

2) Continuing resolutions do not allow the military to start new weapons programs or increase the production of existing equipment. This includes hundreds of new programs necessary for regaining the military’s edge against Russia and China that simply stall out unable to advance until the CR is lifted. Examples include hypersonic strike weapons, missile defense, and shipbuilding in particular. 

CRs also delay the progression of established programs. The Pentagon depends on a steady flow of funding for production increases that keep its many weapons, services, and technological programs on track for development and delivery to the warfighter. By willfully injecting uncertainty into that funding profile, spending freezes create inefficiencies and cost overruns, as industry leaders cannot depend on the stability needed to advance. Workforces and vendors cannot adequately staff up when funds do not arrive on time.

3) By injecting uncertainty into every process, Congress generates significant sums of financial and personnel waste through duplication of work, higher prices, and contracting delays. The military awards hundreds of thousands of contracts every year. 

Missed deadlines for contract awards cause negotiations to reopen and contractors to add in a premium for the cost of doing business with such a fickle customer. In 2017, Secretary of the Navy Richard Spencer likened the inefficiencies of CRs to putting billions of dollars of taxpayer money in trash cans and setting it on fire.

Big Ideas—and Consequences—Needed to Change Incentives

Budget stability and predictability of finances through on-time appropriations to the U.S. military would save tens of billions of dollars now. Former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis summarized the result of this self-imposed waste, noting “No enemy in the field has done as much to harm the readiness of the U.S. military than the combined impact of the Budget Control Act’s defense spending caps, worsened by operating for 10 of the last 11 years under continuing resolutions of varied and unpredictable duration.”

The longer a continuing resolution drags on, the higher the likelihood of inadvertent staff reductions, insufficient operating budgets, and underfunded existing programs that the military needs to stay on schedule or accelerate.

M1 Abrams Main Battle Tank. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

In an attempt to both incentivize the passing of appropriations bills on time and punish lawmakers for failing to do so, members of Congress should have their paychecks sequestered until appropriations are passed, starting October 1 every year. This automatic action would be designed to avoid the scores of problems that continuing resolutions cause for the military and industry. 

As continuing resolutions pause spending increases (or decreases) and lock in the previous year’s funding levels, appropriations accounts become skewed, work stalls, readiness takes a hit, and time is wasted waiting on the system to work as intended and, often, for funding increases to arrive for strategic priorities. Garnishing politicians’ pay until they do the basic job of keeping government functioning through on-time funding would help ensure that continuing resolutions are a worst-case solution instead of a tool for Congress to routinely rely on.

About the Author: Mackenzie Eaglen 

Now a 19FortyFive Contributing Editor, Mackenzie Eaglen is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where she works on defense strategy, defense budgets, and military readiness. She is also a regular guest lecturer at universities, a member of the board of advisers of the Alexander Hamilton Society, and a member of the steering committee of the Leadership Council for Women in National Security.