Autonomous systems within the next two years. Ms. Hicks spoke about the program and other emerging technologies in defense at a National DefenseIndustrial Association conference in washington, dc. [applause] ha thank you. The job of the deputy secretary of defense is widely known to be one of the most difficult in government. It is, after all, the chief operating officer for largest employer in the world. Beginning her Government Service as a president ial management intern and spending time both in and out of government, doctor Kathleen Hicks was quite familiar with the demands of the job before she was sworn in and she was well prepared to take the my. Just prior to her current position, she was the Senior Vice President , Henry Kissinger chair and director of International Security at csi. At least her current title is a little shorter than that. She was sworn in as the 35th deputy secretary of defense february 9, 2021. I think it is interesting that the title of her dissertation at mit was change agents. Who leads and why and the execution of National Security policy. Given the swirl of strategic and technological change all around us, i would say a change agent is exactly what our times call for the. We are indeed fortunate to have doctor hicks lead off our conference. And after her remarks, she has graciously agreed to submit to a rigorous crossexamination by yours truly. Please join me in welcoming the deputy secretary of defense, doctor Kathleen Hicks. [ applause ] good morning. Thank you for the kind introduction and thank you to for the invitation. To both of you thank you for your many years of service and leadership and support for the defense department. Before i go on i want to acknowledge the tragic accident in durban, australia and express my condolences to the families who have lost loved ones. I also want to convey i prayers for the marines were injured for their families and their caregivers. And let me also extend sympathy to the people of hawaii for the deaths of so many in maui and for those who community, livelihood and everything else. For the u. S. Defense community, these are a reminder that just as hundreds of duty personnel have been actively engaged in the ongoing response in hawaii. Right now, as we take respite from late summer heat and humidity, u. S. Sailors and marines are steaming through the western pacific alongside close allies like australia and japan, collectively upholding our commitment to the security and stability that enables a free, open, peaceful and prosperous indo pacific. Today, as we enjoy this air conditioned ballroom on basis from blonde to okinawa to korea to hawaii to alaska, u. S. Airmen and guardians are on watch in the skies and into space, making sure those domains too stay free of conflict, enabling commerce and information to freely flow around the world. Today as speeches and panels give way to networking and receptions, on another pacific shore, american soldiers in Washington State are training to maneuver, and inspire the armys latest longrange hypersonic weapon. As part of a global force with global responsibility, their fellow servicemembers are deployed around the world from natos Eastern Frontier to the strait of to Subsaharan Africa and beyond. There is a reason we call them war fighters. Because for most of the century, many of them have indeed been fighting wars. While i am glad to say they and we are not at work today, we cannot forget that all of them are still counting on all of us to deliver safe and reliable combat credible capabilities. So they can deter aggression and win if call to fight. Those words, war fighter deliver speed and scale are at the courthouse secretary austin and i have sought to drive innovation throughout the defense department. Especially in this era of strategic competition with the prc. While the dod has always had an to innovate, there is no mistaking why that has taken on more urgency in recent years. Because the main strategic competitor we face today is different from the rival we faced during the cold war. A rival who was relatively slow and lumbering compared to the prc of the present. And while america sheds blood and treasure over 20 years of war in iraq and a better scan afghanistan, the prc worked with determination to build a modern military carefully crafting it. The one advantage they can never blunt, steal or copy, no matter how hard they try because it is embedded in our people is american ingenuity. Our ability to innovate, change the game and in the military sphere, to imagine, create and master the future character of warfare. Not only militarily, it is part of what makes our system different. America and our likeminded friends and allies have such vibrant commercial Innovation Ecosystems because we also have free and open societies of an an additive inventors, doers and problem solvers. We do not seek to crush or control innovation to make it toe the party line. Instead, our goal is to sead, spark and stoke the flames of innovation. That is a big reason why the secretary and i bet on our free market system over the prcs status economy any day of the week. We believe in our capacity to innovate and indeed out innovate our competitors because we have seen us do it time and again. The dods past innovation pursuits often have labels specific to their times and origins. The revolution in military affairs, transformation, strategies. The Defense Innovation initiative are just some of the monitors applied to u. S. Defense efforts over the decade. But, no matter the name, they all share a simple and compelling opposition to create and exploit change as a military opportunity. And whether the innovation comes from new technology or new concepts for mature technologies or, new ways to build or buy or use our capabilities, or, new sources of such innovation, whether originating within dod or outside as they increasingly do, today in the face of our pacing challenge, our task is to adopt and integrate innovation wherever they can add the most military value. Easier said than done, of course. I have heard all the criticisms and levied many of them myself from the inside and outside. Edf them myself, from the inside and outside were too risk averse. Cant hire the workforce we need. Cant allocate or expend resources fast enough. Budgeting and bureaucratic processes are slow, cumbersome, and byzantine. Not enough incentive to change culture. Not enough effort to leverage nontraditional suppliers. Startups and commercial companies cant figure out how to work with us. Or that commercial companies cannot figure out how to work with us. O or Congress Wont let us move ge faster. That our system was built for the industrial age, not the information age, let alone, theg age of a. I. That we dont invest enough in r d, art we invest too much in r d. Not a joke. Or the triedandtrue, dod isnt doing enough on innovation. And the mirror that we have done so much to quote in august 7 headline from National Defense magazine, the pentagon ecosystem is getting out of hand. E i agree with almost all of this. As one of the largest organizations in the world, it c is often hard to see ourselves clearly and get out of our own way. I am far from satisfied that everything is working as it should. Honestly, if i could solve all those problems with a snap of my fingers or the sweep of a pen or the shear force of will, i would. And so would secretary austin. Except we are not god, and were old enough to know there is no l santa claus. Because that is now how the e, world works, and it is not how Innovation Works either. There are no silver bullets when it comes to innovation. Of course, silver bullets make for great headlines, but pretendingn they are real helps no one, certainly not war fighters. Here is another secret. When it comes to delivering capabilities to war fighters at speed and scale, just having an office in Silicon Valley wont do it. That is necessary, but not m sufficient. Just being able to do other transaction authorities agreements wont do it. That is necessary, but not sufficient. Even then, just doing ota is isn not enough either. Once you enter a deal, that capability still must be put into the hands of war fighters, integrated into plans, produced at scale and deployed to the field. The reality is that we sface a accumulation of challenges, most adults lend themselves to singular broadbrush fixes. The most obvious ones were oo addressed years ago. The ones left that we can actually solve ourselves tend to be, lets just say, walk a. Not headline grabbing. But if they arent tackled, the gears will lie grind slowly and innovation wont run at the speed and scale we need. We cannot abide that. Lets be clear. We all know the challenges and stakes. This is not about understanding the problems or a lack of leadership focus or ea insufficient resources, this is about systematically tackling the highest barriers to enabling and unleashing the io potential of u. S. And partner innovations, some in dod, or labs or elsewhere in m government, but most of all, outside of it. That means we must first see the entire innovation defense ecosystem that limit. That we must do the hard government work of removing those most damaging obstacles, which is exactly what we have been doingn over the last two and half years, we have been systematically mapping and debugging the dod innovation ecosystem. First, we mapped to the yoentirc ecosystem from whenever a company or operational need needs it through acquisition and sustainment. We then dug deep, working with many of you, to identify nearly 50 of the most critical pain points to companies, universities and innovators of all kinds are experiencing. Each one representing a variety of individual obstructions to innovation. Ou and for almost a year, we have been doing the hard, methodical work of solving those pain points. Because good intentions do not drive outcomes. Putting your nose to the grind stone and demanding accountability does. For instance, we found the need to better align the ow acquisitions processes. That is why we started connecting technology, acquisitions, financial and requirements data systems together to better track where Technology Transitions into the hands of the e weinwar fighter. We also started aligning our modular open systems architecture standards to semper fi how we muupgrade dod Weapons Systems and reduce costs. Candidly, we cant eliminate every point. , like security related roadblocks, which we rk can only alleviate. A capability compromised by thej enemy doesnt hold much value for the war fighter, it puts them at greater risk. But we can do a lot from security to workforce to transition to make this entire ecosystem run faster and in smoother for everyone, even if youre not a major defense contractor or a billionaire start out. For example, we now provide Free Cybersecurity Services to any company with a dod contract or access to nonpublic dod information. Of the dozens of tasks we have set out to tackle, weve completed about 30 , and an another 50 are well on their way. Others will never really end, like sharing insights from quarterly industry roundtables across dod. If you require mua specific helh from congress. Even though were through the punch list, even then, i am sure there will be more pain pints points to address, which we must and will. Just as in any enterprise, our innovation focus has a customer, and hear the Main Customer is the war fighter. We are laser focused from the top on customer needs and clear paths to fulfilling them. That requires resources and it ecosystem innovation that supports scaling fast. We have worked hard on both. This is a complex system of ve systems, a shotgun blast approach will not work, and neither will chipping away one small piece at a time. So our approach is nonlinear, iterative, comprehensive, and purposeful. You can see that and how we have evolved the Defense Innovation unit to the times and strategic imperative. Rs similarly, we have also been rapidly iterating on the Nk Foundation to deliver now a data driven and a. I. Empowered military. We issued data decreased an demanding all dod data be visible, accessible, understandable, linked, trustworthy, interoperable and secure. The eta initiative deployed scientist to every combat and command where they integrate applications, systems and users. We have developed and awarded four joint were fighting cloud capability contracts to leading Edge Commercial cloud providers to ensure we have nccomputing, storage, network infrastructure, and advanced Data Analytics to alscale on demand. Mp we stood up the dod chief digital and Artificial Intelligence office, which is to accelerating adoption of data, analytics and a. I. From the boardroom to the battlefield. The secretary and i i are ensurg cda and oh is the power to leads change with urgency from the evening to the tactical edge. And we have invested steadily and smartly in accompanying technology. All of this, and more, is helping realize combined joint commandandcontrol. This is not a platform or nt single system we are buying, it is a whole set of concepts, technologies, policies and talent advancing a core u. S. Po were fighting function, command andcontrol. We are integrating sensors, infusing data across every domain, while leveraging cuttingedge decisionsupport tools to enable operations. It is making as even better than we already are a joint operations and combat integration. This is not some futuristic dreamhe. Based on multiple glob Information Dominance experiments, trips to joint fires network and exercises se like digital falco oasis, it isd clear these investments are yielding returns much faster than traditional capabilities. Again, dev ops. That is the beauty of what software can do for hard power. It doesnt take several years or a decade, our investment the data, a. I. And computer empowering war fighters in the here and now in matters of months, weeks and even days. They will deliver even more between now and january. An c2 is vital, but it is one of the key elements. We have been extending more bridges and express lanes over the valley of death to increase urgency and speed the transition between r d and production and scale important area so we get the right capabilities to the right people in time for the war fighter. For instance, we started rater, the rapid experimentation reserve to hasten the pathway from concepts to experiments to fielding at scale. One example is systems that fuse sensor data across the battle space, enabling marines doing island maneuvers to ac leverage longrange fire from the army or air force. Where leveraging new pathways for middle tier acquisition and Software Acquisition. By the end of the september, ll over 5. 5 million will have wa gone through the Software Acquisition pathway across the last three fiscal years. We have stood up other ss initiatives like app fit to field advanced and innovative iv technologies and competitive advantage pathfinders or caps to overcome bureaucratic and cultural barriers to delivering capabilities at scale to the e r war fighter. Together these efforts are nd shaving 3 to 6 years off transition and delivery timelines for war fighter priorities. Like expeditionary wideband comms, antijam radio links, multi capabilities and more arriving downrange will before the end of this decisive pu decade. These efforts are already making a difference, and yet, ma we know we must do more. Across the board, the secretary and i are personally and relentlessly focused on outcomes, not inputs. This strategic competition demands our urgency. Tc we have no patience for lip service, foot dragging or innovation feeder. Bumper stickers and brand names dont mean much if you dont di deliver outcomes. As you will hopefully hear from other dod speakers, we are of doing much more to drive s innovation, such as elevating di you to report directly to secretary alston and empowering to deliver strategic impact at scale. Using multiyear procurement to maximize production of tlong range munitions for the indoro pacific and standing up the office of Strategic Capital to selectively find and fill gaps in private investment that could hamper access to critical technologies. Lo the echoes from innovation in the past has shaped innovations in the present from how we stood up cd cdao in less than a year to novel operational concepts we are developing for longrange fires, to how we have bauer wrote pouts thats part of the playbook to support ukraine after the invasion last february. In the 18 months since then, we have sent ukraine over 3. 1 million rockets, missiles, mortars, and artillery rounds. That is only four s of the categories of munitions. We have sent a cocommitted much more, over 43 billion of on military assistance. Working with the private sector, we have also helped ukraine access important commercial Technology Capabilities that have made a real difference to them on the battlefield. Weather in the past and present, innovation has advanced d military invaded when the right ingredients came together. First, and operational problem,n that is a customer need. That a potential solution. With technology that is ready, or ready enough, to scale fast for the war fighter. You need an atmosphere where people can test new things, big things, things that might fail, but that could also succeed in a Game Changing way. And you need people at multiple levels, topdown and bottomup, to see its potential, to bet big on success, and to drive itr over the finish line. Gs if you only have some of those elements if the technology cant get there, if the need is a clear, if there is no risk tolerance, if people arent willing to propel it forward, e you get things that fizzle, arent adopted or never scaled. At those moments when all the ri parts collide, that is when c Game Changing innovation r