Burchett Leads Roundtable on Saving Taxpayers Money with Military Contracts

WASHINGTON-Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency Chairman Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) delivered opening remarks at today's roundtable on "Getting Taxpayers a Better Bang for Their Buck from Military Contracts." In his opening statement, Subcommittee Chairman Burchett highlighted that the federal government will spend $170 billion or more on weapons acquisitions systems this year and that the cost estimate will only rise. He also urged Congress to do its part to help streamline the Department of War's weapons procurement process and save American taxpayers money.

Below are Subcommittee Chairman Burchett's opening remarks as prepared for delivery:

Good afternoon.

To defend our Nation, our military needs state-of-the-art weaponry. That means planes, ships, missiles, drones and other hardware and software that our warfighters can deploy in pursuit of mission objectives.

But our track record at buying weapons is frankly lousy. The military hardly ever acquires major weapons systems on time or within budget.

It's not from lack of funding. Americans have long paid through the nose to ensure our military is well-armed. For the current fiscal year alone, Congress provided the Department of War roughly one-trillion dollars.

The agency will spend about half that sum on contracts of some sort - including $170 billion or more on weapons systems.

And that's just one year's spending. Our guest today from the Government Accountability Office estimates that the entire portfolio of major military weapons systems now being built will ultimately cost more than $2.4 Trillion dollars to develop and acquire.

That cost estimate keeps going up - in part because the time to completion of these projects keeps getting extended. GAO projects development of each of these weapons systems to take an average of twelve years.

That's twice as long as it took to fight the second World War.

It means that by the time these weapons are in the hands of our warfighters, many will be at least partially obsolete. Most will cost much more than planned and deliver less warfighting capability than anticipated.

We have got to do better.

This Administration is at least embracing the challenge.

First, it's simplifying the more than two-thousand page regulation that governs federal contracting rules and procedures, to do away with unnecessary red tape.

Second, its calling out major defense acquisition programs that are either fifteen percent behind schedule or fifteen percent above cost. The White House budget office will consider such programs for potential termination.

Third, it's taking on the big defense contractors who underpin the entire system. The President issued an executive order in January entitled, "Prioritizing the Warfighter in Defense Contracting." It states in part:

"After years of misplaced priorities, traditional defense contractors have been incentivized to prioritize investor returns over the Nation's warfighters. Many large contractors-while underperforming on existing contracts-pursue newer, more lucrative contracts, stock buy-backs, and excessive dividends to shareholders at the cost of production capacity, innovation, and on-time delivery….Effective immediately, they are not permitted in any way, shape or form to pay dividends or buy back stock, until such time as they are able to produce a superior product, on time and on budget."

Amen to that.

But Congress must also do its part. For too long, we have allowed the status quo to go on.

Last December, I tweeted about a ridiculous provision recently enacted as part of the National Defense Authorization Act that authorizes the Secretary of War to pay the interest on defense contractors' loans.

If Congress is going to be part of the solution here, the least we can do is not make taxpayers foot the bill for debt payments underperforming contractors owe to big banks.

I hope we can all agree on that.