On DoD
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A two-star Army general blamed for failing to properly investigate sexual assault and other allegations against a colonel on his staff will be retired with one star the Army announced Wednesday. The Associated Press's Robert Burns writes, "The decision by Army Secretary John M. McHugh comes more than a year after Maj. Gen. Michael T. Harrison was suspended from his duties as commander of U.S. Army forces in Japan. His case has been cited as evidence of why sex-crime victims say they don't trust the military to protect them, despite efforts by senior Pentagon officials, including Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, to make commanders accountable."
August 28, 2014 -
The Defense Department has a plan to get its supply chain management issues off of the Government Accountability Office's high risk list, but progress has been very slow. The Army has a plan to speed things up.
August 28, 2014 -
The U.S. Army, like all of the American military services, is dependent on an increasingly complex array of information technology to prosecute its mission. On this edition of AFCEA Answers, our guest is the officer responsible for the Army's IT resources, Lieutenant General Robert Ferrell USA , Chief Information Officer/G-6. He explains how the modernization of the Army's LandWarNet ties in with building the Joint Information Environment, and will result in improved network performance for Army facilities worldwide. The general also offers a progress report on the presidentially-mandated program to reduce the number of Army data centers. And he adds that acquisition modernization is vital to keeping the military's IT resources at the ready in a time of declining budgets and shifting threat priorities.
August 27, 2014 -
More than 15,000 transgender personnel secretly serve in the military. In May, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel agreed to review the rules that prohibit transgender service members from serving openly. Now, three retired General Officers release a road map for a new policy. Maj. Gen. Gale Pollock, former acting Surgeon General of the Army and the Commission report co-chair, joined Tom Temin on the Federal Drive with details.
August 27, 2014 -
If you've been to an air show, you've seen them: The Blue Angels. They're the Navy's flight demonstration squadron zooming in formation in meticulously painted F-18s. Tom Temin caught up with Lt. Cmdr. John Hiltz, number 2 pilot and right wing, on the Federal Drive as the Angels prepare to receive new recruits. He told Tom about the crew of 130 that make the show happen day in and day out.
August 26, 2014 -
Engineer Patrick DeGroodt helps build Army's communications network, Warfighter Information Network-Tactical Increment Two.
August 22, 2014 -
Right now, the Navy has more than 630 network baselines on its ships at sea. A contract the service awarded this week aims to change that. The Navy is committing up to $2.5 billion to five vendors who will replace that IT mishmash with a single, standards based network architecture. Federal News Radio's DoD Reporter Jared Serbu reports. Read Jared's related article.
August 22, 2014 -
The indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity award will converge the heterogeneous IT architectures aboard Navy ships - all 630 of them - into a single, standards based architecture.
August 21, 2014 -
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel says DoD's fleet of A-10 jet fighters can't survive long term budget cuts. But Congress says it doesn't want to write them out of next year's defense budget, so the Pentagon needs to find a different way to pay for the fleet. On In Depth with Francis Rose, Lt. Col. Dan Ward of Hanscom Air Force Base shared a way to save the A-10 using some simple math.
August 20, 2014 -
When the Navy needs to reform a program it sometimes turns to a special test called an Analysis of Alternatives. Right now the Navy's analysts are hard at work on acquisition reform. Ryan Dickover is director of eBusiness Policy and Oversight in the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition. He explained the AoA process on In Depth with Francis Rose.
August 20, 2014 -
The Navy awarded blanket purchase agreements to 17 small businesses, which they hope will take care of most DoD's conference planning needs for the next three years.
August 20, 2014 -
The Navy puts its wounded sailors back to work before they're even discharged from the hospital. The Wounded Warrior Intern Program takes wounded sailors interested in science and engineering careers and puts them to work at Naval Sea Systems Command. Dr. Tom Murphy is the program manager. He explained how the program works on In Depth with Francis Rose.
August 19, 2014 -
Katherine Hammack, assistant secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment, says shrinking forces won't be enough to match sequestration-level budgets.
August 19, 2014 -
Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel called the crew aboard the U.S. ship MV Cape Ray Monday to congratulate the ship's crew on finishing their unprecedented work of neutralizing the most dangerous chemicals in Syria's declared stockpile at sea. The secretary said that by ridding the world of these materials, they - as part of an ongoing international effort to eliminate the Syrian chemical weapons arsenal - have helped make an important and enduring contribution to global security.
August 19, 2014 -
Shrinking force size and changing force structure are two reasons the Defense Department continues to push for another round of base realignment and closure. The Army will likely shrink the most of any of the services, and they are already returning 21 locations to their home countries in Europe. But most members of Congress still oppose another BRAC round in the States. Katherine Hammack is Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy, and Environment. On In Depth with Francis Rose, she said the Pentagon is making some progress.
August 18, 2014