rsonnel in the U.S. military will be cut to less than 2 million persons. This may not seem initially to be a significant number but what this really translates into is the Army losing an armored division, the Navy losing an aircraft carrier battle group and the Air Force shrinking from 24 active fighter wings to 15.
The Army of the future will rely more on reserves and the National Guard which contributed 67,500 troops to Operation Desert Storm. Another outcome of this conflict was the realization that many reservists were ill-prepared to handle the role that was thrust upon them.
Clearly advanced electronics and munitions were the biggest "winners" of this war. Prior to this conflict, many on Capitol Hill attacked high technology systems as over-priced and too complicated to maintain. Because of this success, the military reformers calling for "buy cheap" and "buy low-tech" have been silenced--at least for now.
Moving soldiers, tanks, bombs and other war material will be one of the biggest challenges of the future as well as the ability to rapidly transition technology from the laboratory into the battlefield. In order to successfully address each of these issues, much needs to change in the way of thinking in the military procurement, logistics and acquisition process. Paramount in the process will be the role of the computer and the role of the contractor in providing the support necessary to achieve these tasks.
The recent disaster (Connelly, 1990,p. 3) associated with the U.S. Navy's ADP acquisition, was not the fault of the contractor (IBM), but that of the Navy itself. In this particular situation, there was virtually a total breakdown in the standards of conduct by the Navy's procurement officials.
This situation is not unique to the Navy and is symptomatic of the lack of attention to detail and order which runs rampant in the Defense Department's procurement process. Clearly a simpler methodology mus...