Task Force Task Force
July 7th, 2009 | Blogs The deckplates Washington | Posted by Phil Ewing
Members of Task Force Uniform, which helped develop the Navy's PT uniform and others, met in 2005. Blogger Tom Ricks wonders why the Pentagon needs new agencies and task forces to do its job //PH2 Cynthia Z. De Leon/Navy
For a guy who spent his career in dead-tree newspapers, Tom Ricks has quickly mastered how to throw out easy-to-understand and yet controversial points that catch fire online — blognip, as we call it. He’s done it again with this post that quotes an Army Special Forces friend who asks why the regular military can’t accomplish anything. Instead, commanders stand up new groups, new staffs, new task forces for each new problem that comes along.
Why do we have to create new HQ or task forces or agencies for every new problem that we come across? Every time we create a new task force, organization, or agency it is additive to the organizations that already exist and must be manned from the existing personnel strength …
… And once an organization is created it follows the “bureaucratic prime directive” of sustaining its existence; therefore it continues to find more problems to solve and more ways to justify a budget and even increase its manpower. Rarely is there an organization established with a sunset clause.
Even though the quotes come from an Army guy, they’ll sound pretty familiar to Navy readers too.
So how about it? Why can’t the existing agencies in the Pentagon or the Navy solve today’s problems or answer today’s questions – why the need for task forces, centers of excellence, joint panels, etc? Or do they do a good job?
Comments
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Sean Says:
July 7th, 2009 at 11:02 amWhile not a sailor myself I think I know the answer…they want a fall guy in case things aren’t successful. If they outsource it to a new task force they can blame the failure on the task force rather than risking their own neck.