Overview
- Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered most Pentagon contacts with Congress to get prior approval, covering topics from recent Caribbean strikes to acquisition policy and missile defense, drawing concern about delayed oversight access.
- At a Nov. 4 Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, Republicans and Democrats blasted poor responsiveness, disputing claims they were briefed on a planned brigade withdrawal from Romania and singling out policy chief Elbridge Colby as unresponsive.
- Committee leaders Roger Wicker and Jack Reed said their formal requests for orders and legal justifications for strikes on suspected drug boats have gone unanswered despite statutory timelines.
- A leaked draft memo outlines an acquisition revamp featuring portfolio acquisition executives, commercial-first contracting, schedule-driven scorecards, a new Economic Defense Unit to deploy grants and investments, streamlined testing, and a reported rebrand to a Warfighting Acquisition System, with details expected to feature in Hegseth’s Nov. 7 remarks.
- Reporting also points to organizational shifts, including moving the Defense Security Cooperation Agency under the acquisition chief and uncoordinated job-title changes in the policy shop that senators said were not properly shared with the committee.