WASHINGTON — Relying on who you ask, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has both been a radical effort that has saved taxpayers tens of billions of {dollars}, or a wild goose chase that has crippled the federal government for years to return.
One factor that many can agree on, nonetheless, is uncertainty about precisely how a lot cash has been saved, and the place. That’s true particularly within the Pentagon, the place numbers thrown round by totally different officers don’t appear to line up.
Pentagon Press Secretary Sean Parnell said in June the DoD had saved “over $10 billion.” A month later, the Air Drive mentioned in an announcement that officers “reviewed over 500 contracts and 50 enterprise programs, realizing financial savings and price avoidance of $10.4B.” Then earlier this month the Pentagon launched a price range overview for fiscal 2026 [PDF] that recognized $13.8 billion saved “via the discount of extra bureaucratic prices,” however that was solely a part of “practically $30 billion that was realigned” from some DoD initiatives to “larger precedence applications” following “effectivity critiques.”
Amid all of the figures, one doc quietly supplied some black-and-white readability: the fiscal 2026 defense budget, which listed a whole bunch of circumstances of DOGE-related financial savings — a couple of million {dollars} right here, a couple of thousand {dollars} there, scattered throughout pages and pages.
No whole quantity of financial savings was initially supplied within the price range submission, so at Breaking Protection’s request, the American Enterprise Institute carried out a line-by-line evaluation of the price range to find out DOGE’s influence on the DoD thus far.
AEI’s work concluded that the price range paperwork present roughly $11.1 billion in DOGE-related cuts, largely via workforce reductions throughout numerous Pentagon applications. Finances paperwork additionally mirror different measures to scale back spending like slashing journey.
In some methods, it’s probably the most granular accounting placed on paper for DOGE’s time on the Pentagon, however as with DOGE’s work elsewhere, comes with a number of caveats and no small quantity of confusion.
“What’s a DOGE reduce versus a program discount versus another effectivity initiative that will have been happening,” mentioned AEI’s Todd Harrison, a longtime price range skilled. “So it’s a bit of laborious to outline, however they’re not less than claiming credit score for these cuts that we are able to see within the price range request. There could also be different reductions elsewhere that we are able to’t see.”
What The Finances Evaluation Exhibits
The itemizing of DOGE-led financial savings are considerably distinctive, famous AEI’s Elaine McCusker, a former Pentagon comptroller who served throughout the first Trump administration.
Whereas most administrations of their first 12 months are wanting to get their price range on Capitol Hill — leaving little time to make vital adjustments — the inaugural price range from the second Trump administration mirrored tangible efforts to reshape navy spending. And whereas the financial savings have been troublesome to establish and compile within the price range paperwork, “the truth that they did it in any respect, I believe, is fascinating and commendable,” she mentioned.
McCusker’s AEI colleagues cautioned that the DOGE financial savings information they manually extracted could have some inaccuracies as a result of how they have been written in price range paperwork, which at instances confirmed constructive or detrimental numbers, misspellings and different inconsistencies. (One Democratic lawmaker recently chided the Pentagon for numerous what he known as “massive errors” within the DoD’s price range proposal.)
By service, the Navy, which incorporates the Marine Corps, led the best way in DOGE financial savings with what was recognized as practically $3.7 billion in cuts throughout its spending accounts, in accordance with AEI’s evaluation. Shut behind was the Military with $3.2 billion. The Air Drive, which incorporates the House Drive, adopted with roughly $2.3 billion in price reductions. Protection-wide financial savings additional totaled $1.9 billion.
The AEI evaluation exhibits a transparent pattern towards financial savings discovered primarily by focusing on two sorts of civilian employees: staff who labored straight for DoD and contractors. Pentagon civilians have been focused via varied layoffs and a deferred resignation program encouraging exits. Contractors have been hit with contract cancellations, hitting big-name corporations and federally funded analysis and growth facilities (FFRDCs).
Most of the financial savings mentioned in price range paperwork recycle comparable language, usually pointing to one in all two DOGE-focused government orders — one on “price effectivity” and one other on “workforce optimization” — to justify the reductions.
Take the Air Drive’s KC-46 Pegasus refueler tanker. Procurement paperwork listing a roughly $6.3 million reduce to this system “for Advisory and Help Companies,” which the outline says was carried out “to advertise efficiencies and advance the insurance policies of the Administration in alignment with Govt Order 14222, ‘Implementing the President’s Division of Authorities Effectivity Price Effectivity Initiative.’”
The Navy’s CH-53K King Stallion heavy-lift helicopter procurement equally noticed its personnel funding diminished by way of DOGE, this time by about $3.4 million. The service’s price range paperwork say the reduce was “for civilian personnel to optimize the workforce in compliance with Govt Order 14210, Implementing the President’s Division of Authorities Effectivity Workforce Optimization Initiative.” This system’s advisory and help companies have been diminished by practically $1 million as effectively, in accordance with the paperwork.
Contemplating the cuts to employees positions, it’s maybe no shock that the Pentagon’s operations and upkeep (O&M) account got here in first amongst DOGE cuts, with over $8.1 billion in financial savings. The Pentagon’s analysis and growth account got here in a distant second with over $1.8 billion in spending cuts, adopted by procurement that noticed a lower of practically $1.1 billion. Revolving and administration spending rounded out the DOGE cuts with $11.9 million diminished, in accordance with AEI’s evaluation.
Journey gave the impression to be one other fundamental supply of DOGE financial savings, with no quantity too small. The Military’s O&M price range paperwork, for instance, present that together with workforce cuts, the service trimmed roughly $45,000 from the Industrial Preparedness subactivity group for “discretionary journey funding to align with Govt Order 14222, ‘Implementing the President’s Division of Authorities Effectivity Price Effectivity Initiative.’”
What The Pentagon Says About Its Personal Numbers
Lately, the Pentagon launched an official price range overview detailing adjustments to the DoD’s spending because of administration initiatives, which introduced that “effectivity critiques” yielded “practically $30 billion that was realigned to larger precedence applications” — a quantity that features $12.7 billion in program adjustments just like the cancellation of the E-7 Wedgetail radar airplane, amongst different classes.
That very same overview claims the Pentagon’s FY26 price range cuts $13.8 billion “via the discount of extra bureaucratic prices by reshaping and optimizing the civilian workforce, decreasing contracts for advisory and help companies, and decreasing journey prices.”
Of these claimed figures, $6.8 billion was saved by “workforce optimization/working capital fund efficiencies,” whereas $5.5 billion was reduce from advisory and help service contracts and FFRDCs. Workforce optimization primarily refers to civilian staff, whereas advisory and help companies cowl contracted work. The doc then says $1.1 billion was saved on journey and $400 million from “different reforms.”
The overview doesn’t attribute these personnel financial savings particularly to DOGE, saying solely that the effectivity critiques have been carried out to “implement government orders,” although the price range paperwork present that labor cuts have been justified by the DOGE-related government orders. A piece within the overview that bears the title of DOGE “recognized financial savings” doesn’t listing a greenback worth, however does learn that “390 contracts and grants have been terminated or adjusted by DOGE efforts, and Division-wide critiques are persevering with to scrutinize over 400,000 open contracts and grants for extra financial savings in FY 2026 and past.” DOGE-driven “effectivity efforts,” the doc provides, “are multi-layered and will probably be enacted over a number of price range cycles.”
However these aren’t the one figures the Pentagon has put out. Earlier this 12 months, Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth directed the navy companies to collectively free up $50 billion that may very well be directed to new priorities in FY26, and the traces between DOGE-specific cuts, common precedence critiques and different administration initiatives may be considerably hazy.
It’s additional unclear precisely how these differing figures match up with what’s within the FY26 price range paperwork. A spokesperson for the Pentagon mentioned, “The Secretary continues to actively pursue the President’s agenda by ridding out the waste, fraud, and abuse within the Division and reallocating the financial savings to fund totally different components of the essential conflict combating skill,” however declined to reply on the file to particular questions on DOGE financial savings within the price range request. The Military and Navy didn’t reply to a request for remark.
An Air Drive spokesperson instructed Breaking Protection in July that the Division of the Air Drive “carried out effectivity critiques” which “obtain[d] price financial savings or avoidance on contracts” by “descoping, decreasing the contract ceiling, terminating, or declining to train contract choice intervals.”
As one instance, the spokesperson mentioned officers “terminated or descoped the Air Drive Strategic Transformation Help Contract which yielded roughly $4.8B in price financial savings/avoidance,” noting that duties underneath the contract “will probably be carried out by our extremely expert DoD workforce.” The FY26 price range paperwork “don’t mirror complete DOGE financial savings,” they added.
Contemplating the quantity of cuts touted by the Air Drive, it’s doable that financial savings detailed in price range paperwork overlap. It’s unclear what applications precisely are concerned within the Strategic Transformation Help contract, however government notices say the contract automobile is for “advisory and help companies,” the identical sort of exercise that price range paperwork listing as reduce. Precise figures and their hyperlinks to applications stay troublesome to parse with out additional readability from the Pentagon.
Confusion Stays About DOGE Influence
John Ferrari, a retired two-star Military common and AEI analyst, praised DOGE “for the precise cuts they did,” however cautioned that officers ought to keep away from “overstating” them.
Noting the disparity between the $13.8 billion determine within the overview and the $11.1 billion recognized in AEI’s evaluation, Ferrari remarked the 2 numbers are “remarkably shut,” and that the evaluation gave the impression to be “pretty correct” in consequence. He added that the Trump administration must be “recommended” for the abstract offering DOGE’s influence, however identified that the overview arrived effectively after the price range was unveiled. Moreover, he famous the overview doesn’t observe DOGE’s adjustments to particular person applications — making it harder for some officers, like congressional staffers, to see particular results.
“They should provide you with a greater method for subsequent 12 months” as an example the DOGE cuts, he mentioned.
The questions on what precisely is being “saved” and the place additionally runs into considerations about whether or not the DOGE cuts are serving to the Pentagon’s core mission.
The Trump administration has emphasised the employees reductions carried out throughout the federal authorities have elevated effectivity by merely doing the identical work with fewer employees. However the nature of how these cuts have been carried out raises questions on whether or not that purpose was actually achieved, mentioned AEI’s Harrison.
“I believe the best way you make the discount issues a complete lot,” Harrison mentioned, pointing to DOGE’s aggressive marketing campaign to shrink the federal authorities. “I’ve critical questions and considerations about how they went about making these DOGE reductions, you realize, the ‘Fork in the Road’ email, the bullying techniques,” including these measures “may very well be very counterproductive to effectivity.”
He later added that “it can save you some huge cash by slicing personnel, however in the event you don’t reduce the work that must be carried out, you’re simply gonna find yourself paying these prices otherwise.”
The Pentagon’s price range overview paints a very stark image. In accordance with a desk included within the overview, the FY26 price range cuts over 5 p.c of the division’s civilian workforce, amounting to greater than 40,000 full-time positions.
The Division of the Military led the best way with a deliberate practically 11 p.c discount, whereas the Division of the Air Drive, which incorporates the House Drive, got here in second with over 4 p.c. Protection-wide personnel reductions got here in third at about 3.6 p.c, and the Division of the Navy rounded out the listing at about 3.4 p.c in cuts. (The abstract lists Full-Time Equivalents, or FTEs, which measure the workload of a full-time worker, since many employees could also be part-time or short-term.)
Supply: DoD price range overview
“That a lot of a discount in a single 12 months?” Harrison requested. “That’s extremely uncommon, if not unprecedented.”
Harrison did a deep dive within the FY26 price range paperwork on the impacts on House Drive personnel, calculating that the service axed roughly 400 to 450 civilian employees, an approximate 10 p.c discount in its workforce. One other 1,000 or so contracted personnel have been additionally let go, at a time the House Drive’s obligations are rising and impressive new initiatives just like the Golden Dome missile protection scheme are taking form.
“For the House Drive, that’s fairly vital,” he mentioned.
Some DOGE financial savings could also be considerably illusory. For instance, a contract may very well be canceled effectively in need of its ceiling worth — as was the case within the Air Drive’s Strategic Transformation Help contract — which Harrison famous could by no means be reached anyway. A few of these cuts may very well be higher understood as price avoidance, slightly than a saving. Most of the cuts within the price range paperwork mirror workforce reductions and slashed journey, that means that they might measure as much as true financial savings, although it seems the DoD reinvested these {dollars} as a substitute of pocketing them. Contemplating the DoD is actively culling its workforce, it’s probably many cuts are already being realized.
Regardless of Elon Musk’s unceremonious exit from the Trump administration, officers have mentioned DOGE’s work will proceed. About 154,000 federal employees took the administration’s supply for a deferred resignation, in accordance with the Washington Post, and in July, the Supreme Court docket cleared the best way for more mass layoffs. A government-wide hiring freeze, with some exceptions, means a lot of these vacant positions will not be stuffed any time quickly.
“DOGE’s work because the division just isn’t going to cease, that’s completely for sure. We’re dedicated to slicing authorities waste and forms wherever we are able to,” DoD spokesperson Kingsley Wilson mentioned in a gaggle with reporters on Aug. 7. “On the finish of the day, we need to be sure our warfighters are outfitted to do their jobs, and that depends on a division that’s functioning effectively.”
AEI Analysis Assistant Dillon Prochnicki and interns David Glick and Evangelina Meyer contributed evaluation for this story. Breaking Protection’s Ashley Roque contributed reporting.
