Foreign military sales reform progressing at slow pace.

• Author: Magnuson, Stew

The Defense Security Cooperation Agency in 2013 kicked off an effort to streamline foreign military sales. And at the tail end of 2016, Congress passed legislation mandating that the organization professionalize its workforce.

Both these initiatives are expected to pay dividends, Navy Vice Adm. Joseph Rixey, director of the DSCA, said at a recent presentation.

"For those who think the system is broken, if it's broken, we're doing something right. People still like our products. They still like what we provide," he said at a National Defense Industrial Association talk.

Such sales amounted to $36 billion in fiscal year 2016, he said, and he expected the trend to continue.

"That said, we know that we all need to get better," Rixey said.

The agency is often the target of critics in Congress and overseas, where they would like to see more efficiencies and quicker turnarounds in a system designed to provide U.S. military partners with American-made weapon systems and equipment.

Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, wrote in a letter last year, that "our current [Foreign Military Financing] and FMS processes are not efficient.... I frequently hear from our friends and allies that excessive delays put significant strains on their relationships with the U.S. The damage extends to our industrial base as it is causing many of our partners to seek support elsewhere, including from Russia and China. This has gone on far too long without significant reform. This is unacceptable."

Congress in the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act included language that will call on the agency to professionalize its workforce, something Rixey said he welcomed.

"Language on workforce reform is something I'm really excited about," he said, noting that NDIA and its members were instrumental in helping Congress add the wording to the act. Training and certifying the agency's professionals is vital and will improve the quality and quantity of the enterprise's approximately 10,000 employees, he said.

Other language in the law calls for DSCA to better coordinate its planning with other agencies and to carry out more assessments, by monitoring and evaluating its programs.

Congress is serious about the mission, he said. "And what I think makes this different than anything else, is that it showed up in the law."

As for arguments about foreign competition in the weapons market and boosting the U.S. industrial base, Rixey emphasized that this is not the DSCA's purpose.

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