The Super Sneaky Way the U.S. Army Is Getting An Almost New Tank

[rangerrebew]

The Super Sneaky Way the U.S. Army Is Getting An Almost New Tank
 

Pentagon leaders find creative ways to avoid oversight.
Dan Grazier [2]

When U.S. Army leaders decided they needed an upgraded version of the M-1 Abrams tank, they wanted to get it without enduring what they consider to be a cumbersome formal acquisition process.

Any program of this scale would ordinarily be classified as a Major Defense Acquisition Program [3] and be subject to the oversight reviews and regulations that status entails. To avoid this, Army leaders claimed a major modernization effort to a weapon central to their very identity was a mere design tweak, and managed the project through the far less rigorous Engineering Change Proposal [4] process.
 
Source URL (retrieved on January 11, 2018): http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/the-super-sneaky-way-the-us-army-getting-almost-new-tank-24016

 

[RetBobbyMI]

More opinions than objective reporting.  I see nothing wrong with ECPs.  It is a much easier process and less time consuming than the full blown acquisition process which was designed for NEW systems, not all upgrades, as long as it doesn't change the basic form and function of the system.

Just saying, with over 30 years of Army acquisition experience.

[SZonian]

Same thing is done with aircraft...not seeing the big deal here.

Major upgrades like the U2 going from steam gauges to glass cockpit.