Fort Ontario Holocaust Refugee Shelter National Historical Park Establishment Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, last week, I came to the floor to speak about a new acronym that we are becoming more and more familiar with-- DOGE, or the Department of Government Efficiency--that will be led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. One of the priorities I am looking forward to working with DOGE on to accomplish, as a founding member of the caucus, is to reform and, hopefully, revitalize the Pentagon.

As I have said repeatedly, we are living in one of the most dangerous times since World War II. So it is absolutely critical that our systems at the Pentagon are operating in top-notch shape. But as we know, as of now, many of the acquisition processes the Pentagon follows are similar, if not identical, to those followed by the Soviet Union back in the day. If you know your history, the United States beat the Soviet Union when the wall fell and when the Soviet Union collapsed. So it is obvious that their model doesn't work very well, and neither did their system of military procurement.

But, as I mentioned last week, where and how we spend our money is just as important as how much we spend. We seem to be fixated on the ``how much'' but not how and where the money is spent. Preparing for the strategic competition we are in the midst of is not as simple as just increasing the percentage of the spending of GDP. We need to make sure that the money that is spent is spent efficiently and accurately, meeting the needs of the world--the dangerous world--we live in.

The end of the Cold War brought us a peace dividend, but one consequence of that victory was the overwhelming consolidation of the defense industrial base and the weakening of our supply chains. In the early 1990s, we had several hundred companies participating in our national defense industrial base. Today, we have five. The lack of competition in this area, combined with our penchant for requiring unique defense systems, has hampered our bargaining power and led to waste and abuse.

The use of cost-plus contracts shifts the risk of cost overruns to the government. As a result, it is not unusual to find projects delayed by years and running hundreds of millions of dollars over budget. Take, for example, undersea autonomous vehicles. Boeing was contracted to deliver five Orca vehicles for about $379 million in 2022. Yet here we are $620 million later with an anticipated delivery date of 2025. If we keep going at this rate, we simply will not be prepared for the confrontation from the authoritarian axis that is quickly coming our way.

But the good news is this story doesn't have to end the way the Soviet Union did. We are, after all, the United States of America, and I am optimistic we can learn from the mistakes other countries have made in the past to win this strategic competition with the axis of authoritarians. I am hopeful that by implementing reforms, we can pivot from the path we are on to one of peace through strength. Ultimately, the goal should be deterrence, preventing the next war.

The Pentagon should move away from cost-plus contracts toward reliance on fixed-price contracts. Under a fixed-price model, cost overruns are borne by the contractor instead of the buyer, which, in this case, is the Pentagon. This is just a commonsense best practice that should be the standard model to incentivize productivity and efficient operations. Newer, nontraditional defense companies like Anduril and Palantir, as well as Elon Musk's SpaceX in my home State of Texas, have made a strong case for this commonsense business approach.

These companies have leveraged billions of dollars in our capital markets, perhaps our greatest strategic advantage when compared to our adversaries, to produce quality defense items at unmatched scale and speed.

They also provide important and critical jobs across a variety of skill levels, often in a low-cost-of-living, high-growth opportunity area. This helps revitalize our towns and communities in need of new industries to reinvigorate their job markets.

This model underscores the need to transition away from our centralized, Soviet-style acquisition process, first created in the 1960s, to a more agile model which leverages the private sector to strengthen our national defense.

In addition to shifting our model for procurement and acquisition, we need to change the risk-averse culture at the Department of Defense. I don't mean taking unnecessary risks; I mean taking calculated risks where called for and where indicated.

Newer entities, such as the Defense Innovation Unit or the Office of Strategic Capital, are willing to assume greater risks since they understand the need for rapid acquisition. Their ability to identify and adopt commercial technologies, for example, is one area where procurement and contracting offices should be emulating. Rather than having the DOD create elaborate requirements with multiple overlays of bureaucracy and review, our officials should be looking for existing products and technologies that substantially meet the needed requirement.

The Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act of 1994 actually requires these officials to do that. The fact that they are reluctant to do so underscores the need to reform the culture of acquisition and procurement.

While these are all needed updates that must happen, I am optimistic that the Pentagon can and will, with our help and encouragement, make progress in all of these fronts in order to be prepared for the challenges that our country faces ahead.

One reason I am optimistic is because of some of these reforms that are already underway as they have been included in the National Defense Authorization Act. And I am proud to have championed several of them.

Two of my bills included in the NDAA would enhance our procurement capabilities. One is the Capability-Based Trade and Unconventional Resource Engagement--or CAPTURE Act--which will create a pilot project permitting contracting officers to use alternative analyses to better determine the value of products produced by nontraditional defense contractors.

And then there is my Encouraging Qualitative Upgrades and Innovative Procurements--or EQUIP--Act, which will permit combatant commanders to use the defense modernization fund to procure commercial technologies.

Lastly, my Enable IC Partnerships Act will encourage public-private partnerships in acquisition and develop workforce talent. This will help address the lack of competition and innovation within the government and within the country.

These reforms, I believe, are a start, but our work is not yet complete.

I am confident that under new leadership, including that of Secretary-designate Hegseth, in collaboration with people like Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy at the Department of Government Efficiency, we can continue and build on this process and make additional needed reforms at the Pentagon, again, with the goal of preventing the next war or reestablishing deterrence--something we have not done now, as evidenced by all of the hot spots around the world, ranging from the Middle East to North Korea to China to Russia.

I look forward to working with all of my colleagues and with each of these individuals to help them rebuild our military into the powerhouse that has long defined American strength.

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