The Pentagon is calling for significant cuts to Rapid Defense Experimentation Reserve (RDER) funding next fiscal year, according to budget documents released Monday.
Established in 2021, RDER is the signature effort of Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Heidi Hsu. Its purpose is to work directly with military personnel, combatant commanders, the Joint Staff, and industry partners to accelerate technology through the development pipeline from prototype to validated military capability.
The program focuses on key capabilities for joint warfare in highly contested environments, including counter-command, control, computing, communications, cyber, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and targeting (counter-C5ISRT). . Contentious logistics. communal fire. Command and control; Shu says there's also an information advantage. By using what she calls “agile development methodologies,” she aims to shave two to four years off the timeline for feature delivery compared to traditional processes.
The Department of Defense is requesting $450 million for RDER in fiscal year 2025, a significant reduction from the $687 million requested for fiscal year 2024. However, it is still higher than the $359 million requested for fiscal year 2023.
Budget documents released Monday do not explain the reason for the 2025 funding cut.
“Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) caps are mandatory and, if ignored or exceeded, will be enforced through foreclosure. Recognizing these fiscal constraints, the Department is prioritizing responsiveness. “While we made the responsible choice to take care of our people, we made targeted cuts to programs that cannot provide capabilities to our forces until the 2030s, preserving and strengthening the joint force's ability to fight and win in the near future.” a Department of Defense spokesperson said in an email to DefenseScoop.
At last year's McAleese Defense Planning Annual Conference, Shu said the increased funding request for 2024 was because the department wanted to conduct multiple technology “sprints” in the same year.
The division typically requires about $300 million to $350 million per sprint, he said at the event.
“The RDER process leverages the strength of repeated feedback loops between warfighters and engineers through the test and experimentation stages,” Shu said in preparation for last week's NDIA Pacific Operational Science and Technology Conference. He explained this in a statement provided to DefenseScoop. “While off-the-shelf components are critical building blocks, these systems often need to be tailored for military applications, demonstrating the value of mission engineering. This is exactly what we learned from his RDER and what we do through a rapid prototyping process.”
As an example of RDER success, Shyu highlighted the demonstration of the Integrated Targeting Cell (FITC) family, which can integrate data from multiple domains into a single mobile system, and the Marine Corps will accelerate the realization of that capability through experimentation. He pointed out that he was looking forward to it. Four years.
Shu said the recent Technology Readiness Experiment, or what the Pentagon calls T-REX, will allow the department to deploy a variety of advanced capabilities, including loitering weapons and drones such as unmanned ground vehicles, resilient communications systems and decoys. It is said that it has been verified. These were utilized for further evaluation and testing by the military during exercises Northern Edge or Valiant Shield.
The acquisition of the three RDER-related capabilities was greenlit late last year by the Deputy Secretary of Defense's Management Action Group, the Pentagon's critical resources decision-making committee, and the agency will consider it later, Shu said. The group plans to bring more RDER capabilities to the group. this year.
“We have materials… that go through a process continuously. Right? I mean, it's like the 30-plus items we tested in Indiana. [at Camp Atterburry], I went to Northern Edge for an experiment. Those that graduate and demonstrate military utility will be submitted to DMAG, where they are ready to accelerate them,” Shu said at the Potomac Officers Club's annual Defense Research and Development Conference in January. He spoke to reporters on the sidelines of the summit.
He noted that the Department of Defense is also planning to conduct a T-REX event in Australia this year and an RDER experiment in Australia next year.
