Acquisition Talk

In this episode, Major General Joseph “Solo” Kunkel, military deputy to the Defense Innovation Unit, discusses how operational problems in the Pacific are driving a new approach to force design and acquisition. He explains the Mission Area 1/2/3 framework (and the emerging “Edge force”), why Collaborative Combat Aircraft are better understood as extensions of the traditional force rather than pure Edge capabilities, and how smaller, posturable systems change basing and partner relationships.

Solo outlines the thinking behind an Autonomous Warfare command focused on rapid adaptation cycles measured in days and weeks rather than years, its nesting relationship with the Direct Reporting Program Manager for Unmanned Systems and DIU, and why decisive mass requires deep integration with the services rather than a pure SOCOM-style model. He also covers DIU’s deliberate shift to carry promising capabilities past the prototype stage into LRIP—until a service can absorb them in its own budget—and the expansion of the successful “gauntlet” competitive testing model from drone dominance to surface vessels, subsurface systems, and longer-range UAVs.

The conversation closes with practical observations on operational-problem-driven requirements, transition paths, Other Transaction authorities, and the industrial-base implications of producing at the rate of expenditure.

NatSec News: Nov 3, 2026 by Eric Lofgren

defense tech and acquisition, discussion of the news and events in defense acquisition for october 26, 2026 including AUTOWARCOM, JIATF-401, F-35, contracting agreements, cislunar space, quantum, small modular reactors, air force, navy, army, unmanned systems, fortress america, reconciliation, defense budget

In this final episode of Programmed to Fail, we explore the true importance of reforming the Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution process in the Department of Defense. Some may say that it is only a poor craftsman who blames his tools, that it is deficiencies in the workforce rather than problems of the acquisition and budgeting systems that are holding weapons innovation back. But certainly, it is not the lack of quality and drive in the people that has held North Korea back relative to their neighbors in South Korea, or that has stymied the growth of nations in the former Soviet Union. It was the ideologies of the political economy thrust upon the people that so devastated their culture.

The PPBE is a similarly radical break from American values and traditions that has left good people burdened by a bad process. No longer can the defense acquisition workforce take joy in their hefty responsibility. No longer can the workforce see themselves in their work. They are tossed about in a system too large for them to affect, and the workforce is expected to be like a caretaker driving a train down pre-set tracks, rather than an explorer, a creator, and a builder with intrinsic value. Fulfilling individual desires to contribute to national security will more rapidly accelerate our common security than any top-down optimization and 30-year lifecycle plan. The problem is how large groups of people can be coordinated to achieve an end that is beyond the comprehension of any small group or plan. That is what we will explore in this final chapter of Programmed to Fail.

This podcast was produced by Eric Lofgren. You can follow me on Twitter @AcqTalk and find more information at https://AcquisitionTalk.com

In this episode of Programmed to Fail, we explore how accounting costs do not reveal the value being generated in the production process and cannot be used, on their own, as a guide for specific choices. Cost is not an objective reality, particularly to those who know the vagaries of cost accounting. Instead, our view of cost depends on subjective use value and is related to the term opportunity cost, or the next-best choice foregone. This chapter reveals that for defense acquisition to truly understand weapons value and leverage the power of commercial markets, it needs to shift away from its obsession with financial metrics.

This podcast was produced by Eric Lofgren. You can follow me on Twitter @AcqTalk and find more information at https://AcquisitionTalk.com