Defense Secretary To Push Acquisition Reform Defense Secretary Robert Gates is moving acquisition reform to the front burner, but he acknowledges that overcoming “long-standing systemic problems” will not be quick or easy. Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee Jan. 27, Gates said, “Entrenched attitudes throughout the government are particularly pronounced in the area of acquisition: a risk-averse culture, a litigious process, parochial interests, excessive and changing requirements, budget churn and instability, and sometimes adversarial relationships within the Department of Defense and between DOD and other parts of the government.” He acknowledged that the acquisition workforce is understaffed, and said the difficulty of hiring senior acquisition officials is especially acute. During the Bush administration, an average of 43% of those senior jobs were vacant in the Air Force, 13% in the Army. Gates said he will pursue solutions including increased competition, freezing program requirements at the time of contract award, and writing contracts “that incentivize proper behavior.” “I do not believe there is a silver bullet, and I do not think the system can be reformed in a short period of time,” he said. Gates admitted he had not moved on acquisition issues during his first two years as defense secretary under President Bush, as he concentrated on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I ended up punting a number of procurement decisions that I believed would be more appropriately handled by my successor and a new administration,” he said. “Well, as luck would have it, I am now the receiver of those punts – and in this game there are no fair catches.” Gates is the only holdover from the Bush cabinet. Now, he said, he considers acquisition reform “chief among institutional challenges facing the department.”