The Department of Defense’s (DoD) Inspector General (IG) just dropped a series of upcoming review projects, and it’s gearing up to scrutinize some of the Pentagon’s most buzzworthy initiatives.
Included in the flurry of planned reviews is the military’s strategy for hypersonic threats and the DoD’s progress for a next-gen command system, Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2).
CJADC2 Under the Microscope
The DoD IG on July 15 sent a letter to senior military officials at the Pentagon, military services, and three combatant commands – U.S. European Command, U.S. Central Command, and U.S. IndoPacific Command – informing them the IG will conduct a review of CJADC2 efforts at the DoD this month.
The CJADC2 strategy – initially referred to as the JADC2 Strategy – was published in 2022 and aims to develop new technologies and strategies that provide commanders across every warfighting domain with superior information and decision-making capabilities to deter and, if necessary, defeat global adversaries.
CJADC2 is a big priority for the DoD – earlier this year Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks announced that the Department successfully delivered minimum viable capabilities for CJADC2.
According to the letter, the DoD IG plans to evaluate and assess “the effectiveness with which the DoD developed and implemented the [CJADC2] line of effort to modernize mission partner information sharing.”
“We may revise the objective as the evaluation proceeds, and we will also consider suggestions from management for additional or revised objectives,” the letter reads.
DoD’s Hypersonic Defense Systems Under Review
In a July 8 letter, the DoD IG notified senior Pentagon officials and the director of the Missile Defense Agency that it intends to assess “the DoD’s ability, using existing U.S. weapon systems, to defend against a hypersonic missile attack.”
The letter does not offer any further details on the IG’s review plan. However, in its fiscal year 2024 oversight plan, the IG spotlighted hypersonics as a review topic of interest.
The DoD watchdog explained that the objective of the assessment is to determine whether the Defense Intelligence Enterprise effectively and efficiently coordinated, communicated, and shared intelligence on adversary hypersonic weapons within the defense intelligence community.”
The IG also stated that it plans to evaluate whether the program offices for the Army Long Range Hypersonic Weapon and the Navy Conventional Prompt Strike are meeting their timelines and milestones for weapons systems development and fielding.
It’s unclear if the DoD IG’s plan to evaluate the Army and Navy Program Offices is included in the scope of this upcoming review.
