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    The Department of War just shot the accountants and opted for speed

    (steveblank.com)
    285 points ridruejo | 12 comments | 11 Nov 25 14:34 UTC | HN request time: 0.002s | source | bottom
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    giraffe_lady ◴[11 Nov 25 14:57 UTC] No.45887943[source]▶
    Embarrassing regurgitation of propaganda. This is basically the military DOGE. Are these systems dysfunctional in some ways, could well-intended sweeping reforms improve them? Sure, maybe, I don't know much about it.

    Is that what's happening here? No, this a way to get the existing functions out from under the oversight and constraints of acquisition laws to reduce friction for corruption and war profiteering.

    If you fell for DOGE don't fall for this too.

    replies(2): >>45888186 #>>45888983 #
    1. andrewmutz ◴[11 Nov 25 16:10 UTC] No.45888983[source]▶
    Steven Blank (the author) is a respected member of the startup community and is not partisan. He's been working with the defense department for 10 years (across both administrations) to modernize the way the military buys technology.

    His work to create the "hacking for defense" project to modernize things is not at all like DOGE and preceeds it by many years

    https://www.h4d.us/

    replies(9): >>45890615 #>>45892862 #>>45893115 #>>45893246 #>>45893281 #>>45893678 #>>45893764 #>>45893835 #>>45894119 #
    2. johnbellone ◴[11 Nov 25 21:07 UTC] No.45892862[source]▶
    Steve is great, but everyone is partisan.
    3. enraged_camel ◴[11 Nov 25 21:27 UTC] No.45893115[source]▶
    >> Steven Blank (the author) is a respected member of the startup community and is not partisan.

    Then why is he calling it Department of War when the official name is Department of Defense?

    4. stackskipton ◴[11 Nov 25 21:39 UTC] No.45893246[source]▶
    He's also never worked on any project involving delivering physical goods to DoD.

    It's one thing to chuck software at DoD, it's another to try and put together a new IFV when a bunch of competing interests have their opinions and you are trying to balance it all.

    replies(1): >>45895127 #
    5. lovich ◴[11 Nov 25 21:42 UTC] No.45893281[source]▶
    He’s using partisan terminology like Department of War. Fairly certain he’s a partisan
    replies(1): >>45894205 #
    6. supportengineer ◴[11 Nov 25 22:20 UTC] No.45893678[source]▶
    And he has a huge house which can be seen at the top of each page.

    "Got Mine!"

    7. mindslight ◴[11 Nov 25 22:28 UTC] No.45893764[source]▶
    I think the setup is that our society needs a lot of reforms, and everyone has their pet reforms they've focused on the need for. But rather than have any sort of coherent constructive plan, the fascists will shamelessly say multiple contradictory things that each sound good in isolation. So then people get drawn into playing "4d chess" trying to pick out signal from the noise, assuming that there must be some kind of higher goals in there beyond embezzlement and deprecation of the Constitutional government in favor of some corporate oligarchy.
    8. Hizonner ◴[11 Nov 25 22:36 UTC] No.45893835[source]▶
    1. If you've been in business for 10 years, you're not a "startup". 2. The "startup community", such as it is, is loaded with hucksters and not particularly respectable. 3. What he wrote is partisan. 4. Putting "Department of War" in the title is heavily partisan.
    9. ◴[11 Nov 25 23:03 UTC] No.45894119[source]▶
    10. simonw ◴[11 Nov 25 23:12 UTC] No.45894205[source]▶
    Sadly if he called it the Department of Defense he would also be expressing a partisan preference. Even the name of that arm of the government is "partisan" right now.
    replies(1): >>45894524 #
    11. lovich ◴[11 Nov 25 23:52 UTC] No.45894524{3}[source]▶
    At least that’s the legal name. And yea, kinda hard not to be partisan currently with everything being made partisan
    12. LarsDu88 ◴[12 Nov 25 00:58 UTC] No.45895127[source]▶
    I dislike Hegseth and MAGA as much as anything, but quite honestly what you are describing is just bureacracy, and it doesn't serve a country well in an actual armed conflict.

    In the current Ukraine conflict, the US provided something like 50 M1 abrams tanks all of which have currently been destroyed or out of commission. Russia threw something on the order of 3500 tanks (around the same number Hitler threw at Operation Barbarossa, but with each tank far far more capable) and virtually all of those machines have been destroyed or put out of commission.

    In a real war, you need to come up with new solutions rapidly as the situation changes, and that's a capability the United States seems to have lost. The quality of US tech is fantastic, but the quantity is probably not going to be there when it matters.