This week, the Air Force found success twice: first by saving billions of dollars for American taxpayers, and second by implementing new, sex-neutral fitness standards for explosive ordnance disposal technicians.
"The Air Force has saved American taxpayers $10 billion through cutting wasteful contracts," said Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell during the Weekly Sitrep video. "Through the hard work of our Air Force secretary, Dr. Troy Meink, and our [Department of Government Efficiency] team, the Air Force holds the top two spots in total savings and contract cuts governmentwide."
The Air Force, along with DOGE, has been conducting efficiency reviews to accelerate the Defense Department's pivot to a wartime posture and increase readiness. Coming out of those reviews, the Air Force took actions to achieve cost savings or avoidance on various contracts. Following an effort that reviewed over 500 contracts and 50 business systems, some $10.4 billion in savings and cost avoidance were realized.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth thanked Meink for leading the effort to root out inefficiencies and find savings within the Air Force.
"This is huge; this is part of what we were sent here to do — find those dollars to put them toward the president's mission to keep the country safe," Hegseth told Meink. "I appreciate you leading the way. A lot of hard work here, and thank you to DOGE for making it happen."
Savings found resulted, in part, from terminating or downsizing the "Air Force Strategic Transformation Support Contract." That effort yielded approximately $4.8 billion in cost savings or avoidance. The Air Force says the work done under that contract will instead be completed by the DOD workforce.
The Air Force also identified savings by terminating information technology service contracts and by eliminating unused software licenses. The review found, for instance, that the service had been paying for 16,000 licenses with only 300 of those being used. A renegotiation of the contract matched actual usage. The result was more than $19 million in immediate savings as well as long-term cost avoidance.
The Air Force this week also announced it has raised fitness standards for explosive ordnance disposal technicians.
"While we continue to cut spending, we're also raising standards across the board," Parnell said. "The Air Force no longer takes into account age or sex in fitness testing for our EOD techs, which is a great thing, because excellence doesn't care who you are. It demands results, and our standards will be high and unwavering."
Beginning in August, airmen in the EOD career field will take a new fitness assessment that is the same for both sexes and all ages. That assessment includes evaluations of muscular strength and endurance, anaerobic capacity and cardiorespiratory endurance.
This week, the department announced new contracts with four technology companies that are leading the way in the development of artificial intelligence.
"The Department of Defense has ... partnered with the top four leading AI innovators to utilize this new technology to address key challenges our armed forces face today," Parnell said. "We must equip our warfighters with 21st-century technology in order to defeat 21st-century threats."
According to DOD's Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office, the contracts will accelerate the department's adoption of advanced AI capabilities to address critical national security challenges.
"The adoption of AI is transforming the department's ability to support our warfighters and maintain strategic advantage over our adversaries," said DOD Chief Digital and AI Officer Doug Matty. "Leveraging commercially available solutions into an integrated capabilities approach will accelerate the use of advanced AI as part of our joint mission essential tasks in our warfighting domain as well as intelligence, business and enterprise information systems."
In the Pentagon courtyard this week, defense leaders got a look at another kind of technology, autonomous systems, when the department put 18 American-made drone prototypes on display.
"This week, the Pentagon hosted an expo showcasing cutting-edge drone technology that will bring the Department of Defense into the future of warfighting and preparedness," Parnell said.
During the event, Emil Michael, undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, said the prototypes on display went from concept to development in an average of 18 months, a process that typically takes up to six years.
The department will continue to rapidly innovate and scale up production of drones and other systems, using cost, resilience, firepower and range as driving factors — all areas DOD wants to improve upon, Michael said.