Search

Resources are diminishing. The Department of Defense has been saying it for years... program offices must produce more with less. As a U.S. Army acquisition community, we must stand firm in our charge to provide the soldier with the most lethal and secure warfighting systems while meeting our obligations to the taxpayer. Behind each fielded system, embedded in acquisition requirements, can be found lengthy test programs. To the novice engineer, these tests can be an impressive display of the utilization of his part in an overarching system: a piece of software, a novel sensor, a propulsion system. To the Program Manager, these tests can make or break a program, with the end result leading to a fielded system or a trip back to the drawing board. In the fiscal year 2013 (FY13) Department of Defense President's budget, the President requested a total of $69,408,000,000 to support research, development, test and evaluation (RDT&E) activities across the Department and the Services. While this is down slightly from the $71,375,000,000 received in FY12, it still represents a large budgetary item supporting basic research, applied research, systems development, and test and evaluation of defense systems. Summarizing the resources provided to support the developmental costs associated with test and evaluation of developmental systems is difficult, since these numbers are generally wrapped into the larger program budget. However, it should equal, if not exceed, the $185,268,000 (Budget of the U.S. Government 2012 p. D-16A), which has been requested for defense operational test. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]