US halts new army contracts for review

New Defense Secretary is halting all new army contracts, which may indicate a reassessment of the army’s needs and procurement principles.

Bloomberg reported on this, citing an unpublished Pentagon decision.

Pete Hegseth, appointed Secretary of Defense on January 25, halted all new army contracts and requests for defense program openings as one of his first decrees.

The pause could last as little as ten days but could potentially continue for months, the two people said. These people spoke on condition of anonymity because the Pentagon move has not yet been made public.

Previously, in an interview with CBS, Vice President James David Vance said that Hegseth’s appointment would bring “big changes” to the weapons procurement system.

“We’ve got an army with a serious manning crisis, a crisis in the acquisition pricing system that is completely dysfunctional, where we’re buying aircraft for billions and billions of dollars, with horrendous cost overruns and constant delivery delays. That’s why we need serious changes. Of course, there are people who do not like these serious changes, but they are necessary,” he noted.

Vance noted that until recently, the Pentagon did not pay enough attention to the rapid development of technologies.

“If you look at where we are with the rise of artificial intelligence, with the rise of drone technology and drone warfare, we have to really, top to bottom, change the way that we fund the procurement of weapons, the way that we arm our troops,” Vance stated.

A week earlier, on January 23, President Donald Trump’s executive order also suspended all U.S. international support for 90 days.

The Pentagon confirmed to Voice of America that these restrictions would not affect military assistance programs for Ukraine.

“Security assistance to Ukraine is not subject to the restrictions of the recent Foreign Assistance Order, as it applies only to development programs, not military support,” the U.S. Department of Defense said.

This means that the arms contracts for Ukraine under the USAI program issued by the Biden administration remain in effect. The decree also does not affect any residual and previously planned arms deliveries from US warehouses under the PDA program, which Joe Biden announced.