Member Opinion:

On Defense Budget Waste

by Dr. James L. Farrell

Defense spending advocates and foes can agree on one point: we can’t afford waste and fraud. Poor engineering practices are more insidious, but equally damaging.

Not surprisingly, the situation in which we find ourselves isn't entirely accidental. Business leaders resist changes that don't guarantee favorable and prompt financial return. A strong technical and ethical case does exist, however, to support the need for fundamental change. Ultimately, our defense industry’s top priority has to be to minimize risk to our troops. The real bottom line is not dollars, but human lives.

That often isn’t defense industry’s top priority, however. Years ago, I met a pilot from Navy Strike Rescue. He told me that during Operation Desert Storm, it was a "big relief when the light came on to indicate GPS (global positioning systems) coverage from enough satellites." Typically, troops received no output without full coverage. For centuries, we have combined partial information from multiple sources. Instead of allowing the military to do that with full flexibility, our defense industry adds further risk to those already at risk.

Product improvements call for better sensing and processing while ignoring selection of data to be routed between avionics subsystems. Much of the information available from individual subsystems is urgently needed by others, but rarely gets communicated in needed form. On 10 Sept. 2001, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld gave an ultimatum to the Pentagon — one that, for now, has been understandably forgotten: widespread superficial approaches are no longer acceptable. We hear concurrence from many at all levels — including the higher, “above the battle” levels; many are aware that something is very wrong.

Putting the goal of protecting our troops over career, business and financial goals is so obvious that I wouldn’t mention it here if our defense industry didn’t need the direction. To date, individuals have acknowledged this need, but assemblies have not. Our country would benefit enormously by bringing the collective wisdom found within the IEEE, and among other organizations, together to open this profoundly disturbing topic to broader deliberation within our industry.

The hefty price tag that accompanies changes comes as a result of fundamentally flawed engineering and business practices, all widespread and all unnecessary. Consider the following:

• After decades of digitization, this technology’s vaunted promise remains untapped. We have software programmed without system guidance, and design without regard to implementation or programming ramifications. The result is that we work with software that is bug-infested and/or less flexible than hardware, and designers and programmers who don't understand each other. The solution: retrain so that one individual does both design and programming.

• We often sacrifice insight. As a result, testability becomes more guesswork than science. The solution: let the designers/programmers specify all "hooks," and add test liaison to their list of responsibilities.

• Contract requirements often misrepresent true system needs. The solution: There is no substitute for clear understanding.

• Interfaces conform to yesteryear's expediency, producing outputs of processed data (e.g., transformed, delayed, word-length truncated, filtered, imprecisely timed, massaged). Only suppliers have access to raw data and to proprietary algorithms used for processing. The solution: make raw data availability a contractual requirement and use public domain algorithms.

Better interfacing, seemingly mundane and unspectacular, has the vital potential to break a cycle. The Department of Defense makes a purchase and, painted into a corner, pays repetitively for the same purchase with every change. Taking a common-sense approach to updating antiquated interface standards — which were adopted long before modernization — would help make information available where it is needed and would represent a quantum jump in performance and economy without relying on massive budgets or scientific breakthroughs. By advocating and publishing updated interface standards, the IEEE can do much to implement the change process.

The alternative is to maintain the status quo, in which systems integration remains a misnomer and subsystems aspire to become complete systems. For example, in navigation, each separate sensor offers a full solution for position and velocity despite obvious duplication and known severe solution limitations from individual subsystems. Even where subsystems are integrated, the result is an embedded one, providing only the final solution as output. Only the supplier can make modifications effectively.

Attempts at justification are easily refuted. With access to raw data, we can form integrated solutions with any combination — and provide them all concurrently. Excellent algorithms are already openly available, and will continue to improve with open communication. As the best gain popularity, performance will improve — without the everlasting development costs.

The status quo is patently unacceptable and is not consistent with our more than 200 years history. Our industry must not become a disgrace to every soldier who ever carried a rifle on foreign ground. Straightforward solutions require only the right group of individuals with the will and the clout. When this country sends 20-year-olds halfway across the planet to place their lives on the line, any lack of will on our industry’s part is inexcusable.

Dr. Jim Farrell is an IEEE member and author of Integrated Aircraft Navigation. He writes programs for government, industry and education. Views expressed in this article are the author's and do not necessarily reflect those of IEEE-USA.