Pentagon Efficiency Cuts Are Less Than Meets the Eye

Forbes

20-03-2025

WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 9: White House Senior Advisor Elon Musk walks to the White House after ... [+] landing in Marine One on the South Lawn with U.S. President Donald Trump (not pictured) on March 9, 2025 in Washington, DC. Trump was returning to the White House after spending the weekend at Mar-a-Lago, his private club in Florida. (Photo by)
It's been more than a month since President Trump told the Department on Government Efficiency (DOGE) to take a close look at the Pentagon.
But before we evaluate how the review of the Pentagon has gone thus far, it's important to note that the current efficiency drive is not worthy of the name. It is moving too fast to make thoughtful decisions about what to cut and what to keep. For example, the Agency for International Development suffered deep across-the-board cuts with no apparent attempt to analyze what works and what doesn't, or which programs provide real, life sustaining assistance. A true efficiency drive would require some careful consideration, not quick decisions implemented within a matter of weeks, with little time for reflection.
With that as background, we can look at what has been happening at the Pentagon. The announcement this week that the administration will seek to cut 60,000 civilian employees in the department has persuaded some that the efficiency drive at the Pentagon is real. But as large as it sounds, a 60,000 cut, if it is in fact implemented, represents less than 10% of the more than 700,000 civilians who work in the Department of Defense.
The proposed personnel cuts at the Pentagon are a far cry from what happened to agencies like AID, which had its work force almost completely eliminated, going from 10,000 employees to 300, or the Department of Education, which is slated for closure. And this doesn't even account for the fact that the Pentagon employs over half a million people as contractors. While DOGE is reviewing contractors as well, there is no indication thus far that their numbers will go down significantly.
What is missing from DOGE's recommendations about the Pentagon to date is anything that would significantly reduce the revenue of weapons contractors. This is true despite the fact that a number of the systems they build – from the F-35 to the new ICBM – have had large cost overruns and serious performance problems that should prompt consideration about whether to cancel or scale back the programs. The F-35 is grounded for maintenance almost half the time. Independent analysts like the Project for Government Oversight have suggested that the plane has so many performance issues – including 800 unresolved defects – that it may never be fully ready for combat. The new ICBM – the Sentinel – has had 81% cost growth since the start of the program. In addition, former secretary of defense William Perry has called IBMs 'some of the most dangerous weapons we have' because a president would have only a matter of minutes to decide whether to launch them on warning of an attack, increasing the risk of an accidental nuclear war based on a false alarm.
A New York Times analysis found that only a couple of major contractors have had reductions in contract revenue as a result of actions by the DOGE, with General Dynamics suffering a loss of less than one percent and Leidos suffering a 7% loss.
Even if the Trump administration were engaged in a genuine efficiency drive, it would not be getting to the heart of the matter. America has built a war machine that is hugely expensive, but has not prevailed in a conflict in this century. These failures are not due to any failure on the part of members of the armed forces, but because of unrealistic expectations of what military force can achieve – like regime change that leads to stable democratic allies versus problematic governments. A number of governments that have come to power on the heels of U.S. intervention, like the post-Saddam Hussein leadership in Iraq, did more to sow division and enable extremist groups than they did to provide security and stability in their nations or regions. And in Afghanistan, 20 years of war ended with the Taliban in power, the exact opposite of America's goal. If one takes a broad definition of waste, the $8 trillion that the Costs of War project at Brown University calculates that America has spent on its post-9/11 wars has largely been wasted.
A genuinely efficient military would be more selective about what conflicts to engage in, more realistic about what force can and cannot accomplish. And it would be backed by civilian leadership that is more willing to engage in serious diplomacy before intervening militarily in a conflict overseas. Such a military could be smaller, better trained, and armed with simpler, more reliable weapons that can be more easily maintained and replaced than current high tech systems. By all means let's push the DOGE to cut unnecessary systems within the Pentagon budget, but let's not lose sight of what is really needed – a new, more realistic military strategy paired with an effort to reduce the role of special interests in shaping our budgets and our foreign policy.