Acquisition Warfare: A Proposal for a Unifying Concept

Abstract

The ongoing debate in the United States over defense acquisition reform highlights the complexity and evolution of the national security ecosystem. That complexity, explored using a first order system dynamic model, indicates that defense acquisition reform may be a so-called “super wicked” problem. Solutions to super wicked problems form a new class of solutions than traditionally found in the literature for defense acquisition reform. This paper asserts that defense acquisition reform is a super wicked problem and that adoption of an ecosystem model from the program office’s perspective will yield new insights into ecosystem dynamics. Additionally, American adversaries, principally China and Russia, have used a variety of tactics and operations in systemic campaigns targeting the liminal space within the defense acquisition ecosystem. This paper proposes the unifying concept of acquisition warfare to better describe the set of adversary actions and how they disrupt the ability of program managers to successfully deliver their programs, not just systems, uncompromised within cost, schedule, and performance constraints.