{"id":150162,"date":"2025-08-16T09:37:24","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T09:37:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/150162\/"},"modified":"2025-08-16T09:37:24","modified_gmt":"2025-08-16T09:37:24","slug":"feinberg-orders-major-shakeup-in-pentagons-ai-enterprise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/150162\/","title":{"rendered":"Feinberg orders major shakeup in Pentagon\u2019s AI enterprise"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering is taking over the \u201cauthority, direction, and control\u201d of the Pentagon\u2019s Chief Digital and AI Office, according to new guidance issued Thursday by Deputy Secretary of Defense Stephen Feinberg that presents an accelerated plan to disrupt and transform how the emerging technology is adopted across the Defense Department and military.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy aligning the CDAO under the USD(R&E), we create a powerful innovation engine that can deliver Al superiority from laboratory to battlefield,\u201d Feinberg wrote in a memorandum to Pentagon leadership, combatant commanders, and defense agency and DOD field activity directors.<\/p>\n

The CDAO had previously been a direct report to the deputy SecDef.<\/p>\n

DefenseScoop obtained a copy of the directive from a source who requested anonymity to share it on Friday, after others alerted the publication of its creation. A defense official subsequently acknowledged the memo\u2019s existence in an email \u2014 noting that the CDAO will continue to execute all current statutory responsibilities without interruption during this transition.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis realignment is the next step in making a uniform, AI-first push for the [DOD],\u201d the defense official said. \u201c[It] will not create additional review layers or bureaucratic processes.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Multiple predecessor organizations \u2014 including the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC), Defense Digital Service (DDS), Office of the Chief Data Officer, and the Advana<\/a> and Maven<\/a> programs \u2014 were fused to form the CDAO<\/a>, which was announced in late 2021 and reached full operating capability in 2022. The office operated under the direct purview of then-Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, who ultimately steered its launch<\/a> to centralize oversight and expedite the department\u2019s data and AI initiatives.<\/p>\n

Some of its notable early outputs since then include the online \u201cTradewind Solution Marketplace,\u201d the production of the Pentagon\u2019s Data, Analytics, and AI Adoption Strategy, and the military\u2019s highly anticipated minimum viable capability for Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2).<\/p>\n

But that progress has not come without some controversy. For instance, a recent Government Accountability Office report found that the CDAO had not properly worked to define and identify DOD\u2019s AI workforce, and it is also under oversight review<\/a> by the Office of Inspector General. Separately, in May 2023, DefenseScoop obtained internal documents<\/a> that suggested an internal CDAO review had revealed that certain personnel were deeply dissatisfied with how senior leaders were running the office.\u00a0<\/p>\n

More recently, questions and rumors<\/a> have been swirling inside the department and online about what the CDAO\u2019s future could look like<\/a> under the new Trump administration. While AI is a major priority for the U.S. government in President Donald Trump\u2019s second term, the CDAO has seen an exodus of senior leaders and other technical employees in recent months.<\/p>\n

In his guidance, Feinberg said that this new \u201ctransformation directly implements the White House Al Action Plan\u2019s directive to drive Al adoption within the\u201d department unveiled by the administration<\/a> earlier this month.<\/p>\n

\u201cRebuilding our military advantage demands that the [DOD] become an [AI-first] enterprise; one that rapidly adopts cutting-edge commercial Al technologies, exploits data at scale to generate operational advantage, and leads the discovery of new ways to fight and win,\u201d he wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The deputy secretary\u2019s primary objectives with this organizational restructure, as he outlined in the memo, include: unifying Al strategy, development, and implementation under the department\u2019s chief technology officer to accelerate capability delivery; ensuring tighter integration between Al research, engineering, and operational deployment; clarifying long-term stewardship and resourcing for critical enterprise Al platforms; and streamlining management and oversight while preserving statutory responsibilities.<\/p>\n

To implement the reforms, he directed the R&E directorate to prepare and deliver \u201ca comprehensive DOD Al Strategy aligned with the National Al Action Plan that defines measurable outcomes for creating an Al-first Department, launches projects with accountable individuals, and integrates with the requirements and resourcing systems\u201d within 60 days.<\/p>\n

Feinberg also sets a 120-day deadline for R&E to provide recommended updates to the CDAO\u2019s original Chartering Directive \u2014 and, significantly, to supply \u201ca recommended path forward for Advana<\/a> and Maven Smart Systems<\/a> that recommends optimal stewardship models and details platform transition considerations, sustainment costs, required authorities, and full operational capability milestones.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among other tasks, the CDAO will in turn support the office in strategy development and platform transition planning, \u201cproviding all necessary data, cost estimates, and workforce information,\u201d Feinberg noted. Further, he calls on the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment to \u201cprovide acquisition and lifecycle sustainment expertise to support platform transition analysis.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll actions must accelerate, not impede, our ability to field Al capabilities,\u201d Feinberg\u00a0 wrote. \u201cThe USD(R&E) will provide monthly updates to me on implementation progress.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\"Brandi<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWritten by Brandi Vincent
\n\t\t\tBrandi Vincent is DefenseScoop\u2019s Pentagon correspondent. She reports on emerging and disruptive technologies, and associated policies, impacting the Defense Department and its personnel. Prior to joining Scoop News Group, Brandi produced a long-form documentary and worked as a journalist at Nextgov, Snapchat and NBC Network. She grew up in Louisiana and received a master\u2019s degree in journalism from the University of Maryland.\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering is taking over the \u201cauthority, direction,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":150163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[691,738,18073,65273,88315,158,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-150162","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificial-intelligence-ai","11":"tag-cdao","12":"tag-stephen-feinberg","13":"tag-technology","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115037775067081595","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=150162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/150163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=150162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=150162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=150162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}