An Allard Commission Postmortem and the Need for a National Space Council
Abstract
Organizationally, however, requirements for space capabilities are not somewhere in the military, but they are everywhere as a function of space hardware providing force enhancement potential. They are also expensive, potentially drawing otherwise available funding away from other more traditional Service capabilities, such as tanks, ships, and planes, and from traditional command, control, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities. Subsequently, while all the Services want input into decisions regarding how and where funding is spent, and full access to its use, there is less enthusiasm for bill-paying. That, added to entrenched bureaucratic acquisition practices and normal organizational politics, has resulted in decades of attempts at various arrangements to add more coherence to military space planning and organizational integration, toward optimizing funds and meeting ever-increasing needs and demands. But, as reflected over a decade ago, "organizational reform can represent a major attempt to introduce change or a mechanism for deflecting real change." Most efforts to date have served as the latter. In 2008, the Allard Commission--a panel named for sponsor Senator Wayne Allard (R?CO) and chaired by retired aerospace executive Tom Young--issued a report entitled Leadership, Organization and Management for National Security Space. It found organizational military space integration fundamentally lacking, and offered a roadmap for change. However, more than 2 years after the Allard Commission Report was issued, military space integration is still limited by organizational gridlock and resistance, with few indications of positive change on the horizon. The answer for how to change that dim future outlook remains within the Allard Report.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2011
- Accession Number
- ADA536665
Entities
People
- Joan Johnson-freese
Organizations
- National Defense University