Additive manufacturing has been a game-changer in helping to create parts and equipment for DOD's industrial base. A naval facility in Washington state has become a leader in implementing additive manufacturing and repair technologies using various processes
The Naval Undersea Warfare Center Division, Keyport, in Washington, has become a leader in implementing additive manufacturing and repair technologies using various processes and materials to quickly create much-needed parts for submarines and ships.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth says that he believes Elon Musk and his so-called government efficiency team can find "billions of dollars" in savings within the military and he is hopeful that the billionaire will come to the Department of Defense.
"We welcome DOGE to the Pentagon, and I hope to welcome Elon to the Pentagon very soon," Hegseth said Tuesday in Germany, raising concerns that Musk's ongoing and potentially illegal effort to slash and burn the federal government is now taking aim at the country's largest agency and the armed services.
Musk's companies earn billions from Pentagon contracts, and his Department of Government Efficiency staffers -- who have been slapped with court orders[1] after breaching the U.S. Treasury Department and dismantling other agencies -- reportedly include young adults with no government experience and histories of racism[2] and data breaches[3]. A federal judge on Saturday warned that the DOGE Treasury operations risk the disclosure of Americans' sensitive and confidential information.
Even Democratic lawmakers who are eager to slash the defense budget are leery of giving Musk's team access to the Pentagon. The effort by Musk, the world's richest man who is attempting to eliminate large swathes of the federal government with President Donald Trump's approval, has raised grave concerns of a constitutional crisis[5].
Speaking to a small group of handpicked reporters on Tuesday while in Germany, Hegseth didn't answer the question of whether he would put any limits or supervision on Musk and his team.
Instead, Hegseth said that he had no doubts that the team would find places to make cuts and, while "there's plenty of places where we want the keen eye of DOGE," the defense secretary noted that "we'll do it in coordination."
"There are waste redundancies and head counts in headquarters that need to be addressed," he said, adding that he thought "a lot of the climate programs that have been pursued at the Defense Department" were also wasteful.
Hegseth's invitation to DOGE comes after staffers for the office have run roughshod over several other government agencies since the start of the Trump administration last month.
DOGE -- a reference to a cryptocurrency Musk supports -- was officially created by an executive order Trump signed on his first day in office. Contrary to the name, it is an office within the White House and not a separate department.
Earlier this month, the Treasury Department gave DOGE staffers access to the system it uses to pay the government's bills, which in turn meant those staffers had access to taxpayer data such as Social Security numbers for nearly every American. The system also includes data on veterans benefits payments[6], such as disability, retirement and education benefits.
On Saturday, a federal judge issued an order to cut off DOGE's access to the Treasury system and limit entry to only career civil servants while courts consider a lawsuit filed by 19 state attorneys general arguing DOGE's access is illegal and creates major cybersecurity risks.
The order prompted Vice President JD Vance, Musk and other Trump allies to openly muse about defying the court, while the Justice Department filed a motion Monday seeking to limit the scope of the order.
In a news conference on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, several progressive Democrats and left-leaning organizations slammed Republicans for proposing a $150 billion increase[9] to the defense budget at the same time that DOGE is unilaterally slashing humanitarian aid, education funding, medical research grants and consumer protections.
But they also expressed little faith that DOGE is the answer to cutting the Pentagon budget.
"It's very clear that all of these weapons systems that have been on the drawing board with blueprints for a generation with defense contractors around the country are going to be given a green light to receive federal funding," Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., told Military.com after the news conference.
Markey also expressed concern about DOGE employees accessing classified information at the Pentagon.
"DOGE should not be given access to our nuclear secrets," he said. "They haven't been vetted, they don't have top secret clearance, and they should just keep their hands off of the nuclear weapons programs."
The prospect of Musk and his team combing through the Pentagon budget will present a new challenge for government officials since this will be the first agency DOGE would be tackling that is explicitly connected to Musk and his companies.
Musk's space launch company has earned more than $5 billion in contracts just from the Defense Department since 2008, with a huge majority being spent by the Air Force[11] on launch services.
In his remarks to reporters, Hegseth seemed unfazed by the criticism of Musk and the fact that his cost-cutting efforts were more akin to a total gutting of agencies like the United States Agency for International Development, or USAID.
"USAID has got a lot of problems that I talked about with the troops -- pursuing globalist agendas that don't have a connection to America first," said Hegseth, citing a slogan used by Trump and his followers. "The Defense Department is not USAID."
The Air Force[1] and Space Force[2] have paused wide-ranging reorganization efforts[3] aimed at becoming more competitive with China, with the delay allowing the next service secretary to weigh in on the plan.
A year ago, the Department of the Air Force unveiled a sweeping plan for the services to prepare for great power competition -- defense-speak for new spending and strategies focused on adversaries such as Russia and China. There were 24 initiatives in total, mostly spearheaded by former Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall, an appointee under former President Joe Biden.
President Donald Trump's new defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, ordered a pause of the reorganization plans last week, a Department of the Air Force spokesperson told Military.com.
"On Feb. 6, the secretary of defense directed the Department of the Air Force to pause all planning actions connected to its Reoptimizing for Great Power Competition efforts," an Air Force spokesperson said. "The planning pause remains in effect until a Senate-confirmed secretary and under secretary of the Air Force are in place and have the opportunity to review the initiatives."
Military.com reported in September[5], prior to Trump's election, that the Air Force efforts would face massive headwinds under the next administration, and researchers within the Government Accountability Office, Congress' watchdog agency, expressed worries about the endeavor's survival.
The pause does not require reversing actions that have already been taken by the Department of the Air Force, such as the service's move to reestablish warrant officers[6] for the first time in more than 60 years.
Experts like Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute focused on defense strategy, budgeting and space policy, told Military.com in an interview Monday that it's not surprising the Air Force is pausing the efforts in the wake of Kendall's departure.
"It means it's unlikely that this reorg would go forward. I think it's the most likely outcome, when you halt it subject to a review and the main proponent of it is someone who left office and was from the previous administration," Harrison said. "I think that just means it's most likely this is going to revert to the way things were."
Many of the efforts that will be paused were focused on acquisitions and reorganizing existing commands. That included the creation of an Integrated Capabilities Command and a Nuclear Systems Center, and elevating Air Forces Cyber to be a stand-alone command.
Harrison said it didn't appear that military leadership had fully bought into those efforts. He added that the Trump administration has worked to rewrite many of the moves made by the previous leadership, including Kendall's bold initiatives.
"I think it's one of the things that the new administration seems to want to do, is to wipe out the legacy of the previous administration," Harrison said. "This may be part of that, that they're trying to kind of erase what [Kendall] did in his almost four years leading the department."
Not all efforts under the reorganization effort will fall to the wayside.
A massive training event scheduled for summer 2025 called Exercise Resolute Force Pacific, or REFORPAC, "is not impacted by the secretary of defense's recent order to temporarily pause planning," Lt. Col. Karl Wiest, a spokesperson for Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin, said in an emailed statement.
"This exercise, a first of its kind since the Cold War, is intended to test the Air Force's ability to move large amounts of people, equipment and resources into the Pacific theater at speed and scale," Wiest said. "REFORPAC is well-aligned with the Department of Defense's priorities of enhancing warrior ethos and credible deterrence."
It's not clear when Trump's pick to lead the Department of the Air Force will be confirmed. Last month, he named Troy Meink, currently the principal director of the National Reconnaissance Office and a former Air Force officer, as his choice.
Last week, Reuters reported[7] that Meink arranged a multibillion-dollar contract award to favor Trump adviser and billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX in 2021.
Additive manufacturing has been a game-changer in helping to create parts and equipment for DOD's industrial base. A naval facility in Washington state has become a leader in implementing additive manufacturing and repair technologies using various processes 
