Having experience in govt. contracting, I can truthfully say that there is no training like on-the-job training. The "CON" classes that are out there are a joke and serve no purpose other than to certify that someone has sat in a one or twoo week class. The govt. needs to focus more on hands-on training even though it may mean someone's workload like become backed up. That's the only way to have well trained contracting folks. As far as hiring, the outstanding scholar program is a joke. Grads come into the contracting shop, find out what govt. contracting is really about, becomes overwhelmed with the regulations, details, and workload, then leaves after about two to three months. In the meantime, there are experienced procurement people already in that contracting shop that cannot be promoted or move ahead due to anal, outdated regulations.

Your commentary today, while spot on, still misses an important point that we, the taxpayers, must all keep in mind as we press Congress for reform.

It is not just the lack of sound procurement professionals that causes so many problems in the acquisition train. It is also the hamstringing, by the acquisition people, of competent program managers (who usually don't have direct acquisition authority - the right to sign checks to contractors), scientists, and the people who perform the analytical work for the government, that contributes most strongly to the problem.

Admittedly, this is self-serving for me to say, because - full disclosure - I used to do this kind of work. But, still, self-serving aside, as Henry Kissinger said, "the argument has the added benefit of being true."

I manage(d) scientific research programs for the government, and I could recognize adequate and appropriate goods and services that were needed to do the job. But my work was frequently shoved aside, and trumped, by the big-name contractor that had bought off the government COTR with the lure of a plush, cushy job offer when his/her Government service was over.

I could, and did, point out the complete inability of some contractors to perform the work the government was giving them, and that needed to be done. But it didn't matter. If the contractor now had on payroll the former boss of the Government acquisition person - or a former big name like the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs - that contractor big-name would simply call up the government acquisition person and tell them "to make sure to do the right thing contract-wise, to show you are a team player for when you come on board". One phone call was always enough to get any other, and contrary, advice about the proper procurement of goods and services turned off. Who's going to argue with the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, even if it is an inappropriate, and probably illegal, phone call?

And stop buying the line from whomever it is that is trying to tell you that this whole problem started because of the Clinton Administration. When will the neo-cons stop blaming Clinton for everything they don't like about the world, and just get a grip on reality?

The consolidation of the defense industry was inevitable after the fall of the Soviet Union. The country just didn't need to buy new planes and missiles at the same rate. And it still doesn't, even to keep pace in the Global War On Terror. In fact, the taxpayers hardly even need such things as the F-22 to fight that war, but it needs a lot of very different things, as the debacle in Iraq is showing. Why, for instance, do we need to pay several hundred million dollars per plane to make it invisible to radar, when the targets it will be bombing, nomadic terrorist camps, don't have any radar to see it with in the first place?

Still, we are treated to ads in the Washington Post at least once a week, (ads paid for by the taxpayers, by the way, as permitted by the Federal Acquisition Regulations) proclaiming that the world, and civilization as we know it, will be destroyed if Lockheed doesn't sell us immediately half as many planes, at twice the price, with half the performance that they originally promised us.

Markets rise and fall. Defense goods and services are a market. That is capitalism. Capitalism is what the neo-cons are supposed to love because it is so efficient. So why are they trying to prop up an ineffective market with hyped threats and intelligence to keep their buggy whip lines in operation?

The World changed when the Soviet Union fell. The defense industry would have had to face consolidation, regardless of who the President was at the time.

Ironically, because the House was in Republican hands then, and held the reins of purchasing power, the Acquisition Committees in Congress are mostly to blame for the mess we are in now, not Clinton. They bought the neo-con spiel, that acquisition rules were for the timid, and that we should keep buying things like Missile Defense the way we did during the Cold War - corruptly.

Bob- It's authorizing language, not appropriations.

@ Che: Defense contracting *was* changing during the 90's as changes were made to the way the government plans for our defense. Unfortunately, we were attacked on 9/11 which radically changed the outlook of the American public and of elected officials. Some elected officials went along with the White House DoD strategy because it brought a lot of money to their state or district. Some went along because they didn't want to appear to be weak on defense. Either way, 9/11 was an incredibly important factor in the current state of military planning and procurement.

Regarding specific systems, most understand that the development contract is let before the production contract. Lack of follow-through for prior funding decisions has hamstrung many programs, most famously the B-2 Stealth bomber. And failure to meet star-wars-like capabilities is a management problem which lies with both the government and the contractors who are all to eager to please. IMHO, ultimate responsibility rests with elected officials, not contractors.

Blaming the contractors themselves is like blaming a corn farmer for trying to get you to eat your veggies.

The real problem is that all of these government contractors are retired civil servants and/or military and/or their family members. The larger problem is that you have contractors overseeing contractors. A real no no. The reason they can't hire the procurement people that they need to ensure we are doing things the right way is because of contracting out. This is the game.....congress mandates a study of a certain function.... before the study is put up for bid, vacant critical positions (like the watchdogs we don't have) and filled by the good ole' boy that MIGHT lose his/her job in the outsourcing effort (private industry wins). Private Industry wins and now you have a bunch of no loads in jobs that they can't possibly do and they just get moved around. Since they are in the billet (vacancy)of the watchdog position they need to oversee the contractor, there is no vacancy, hence, no one gets hired, the contract goes out of control, and nothing happens...........except the contract costs excalate to something unrecognizable. Unless and until someone is willing to take this problem head on, the employees and the taxpayers will forever be penalized.