AI & Ethics 2025

This article describes some immediate potential issues with the effort to reduce government-wide contracts, shrink the contract method spread to be more consolidated, and move towards something simple and transparent. In the interim, the swamp Borg may gain more time and more terrain to assimilate and adapt to the new environment. Weeds grow back and sometimes stronger if not pulled from the root. For the new system to replace the old, time is the key variable, even as these large contracts sunset. Traditional firms have time to adapt; given it's adapt or die, they might succeed in survival.

For many years, FEDSIM was the most common contract "shop" of choice for big enterprise tasks for large and impactful organizations, from combatant commands to combat support agencies.

Speakers

Mark Lawson

Business editor reporting on global markets, corporate leadership, and economic trends. Known for in-depth analysis and interviews with key financial decision-makers.

Julia Bennett

Political correspondent with over a decade of experience covering international diplomacy, elections, and policy developments across Europe and the Middle East. Based in London.

Tom Reed

Technology and science reporter exploring AI, cybersecurity, and emerging innovation. Writes with a focus on the impact of technology on global politics and everyday.

But she meant to be kind, I am sure. I never knew why she refused to see any of her family, all of a sudden—some whim, I suppose. She came to be a sort of hermitess after a while.

No one did it better. Protests went to FEDSIM to die. GSA, and especially the FEDSIM team run by Chris Hamm, was, in a few words, known to all insiders. Their contract methods were so robust and repeatable that other related offices would partner with them and foster an intra-government economy through reimbursable billets.

FEDSIM always felt adjacent but was ever-present because the theatre commands and many component headquarters relied on it. It was accepted by their acquisition command counterparts—tied back to the whole-of-government acquisition authority in FEDSIM—you can't shake a stick at it. But that's no more. Not how it was because it was about its team.

So, what are these commands going to do? Some may be in trouble. To be kind, tortoises run the "traditional" process when they need hares. The traditional process creates territorial disputes over who "owns" a contract. Industry consultants can fuel those disputes, stir up issues, and complicate matters for the customer—spoiler: for the worse. The longer the consultancy has to adapt, like the Borg, the more they will evolve. It's not a question of whether they will adapt. Soon, they'll look like a tech startup and be lounging in bean bag chairs, although they once wore cardigans and terrible loafers just a few days ago. You won't see it coming. Now they say AI every seventeen words and lethality every four. It will be impossible for you, the customer, to keep up. You will have to join the Borg; resistance is futile.

If EUCOM needs to get stuff done fast, it'll turn to the Army, which may lose its large vehicles to the same fate. The backlog will stymie progress for services and products off the shelf, forcing everyone to use the GSA schedule or the understaffed Service Contract Command. For better or worse, the respite is in the defense product and capability development business, which will benefit from other transactions and fungible R&D.

It's not that FEDSIM didn't have problems. But the issues I saw were mostly personal preferences, maybe style, and often, those reimbursable types were flies in the ointment; they confused things. FEDSIM always handled big projects. I worked on small research and development efforts in the Pentagon compared to FEDSIM.

Yes, FEDSIM industry consultants in D.C. somehow knew many nuances, and the process didn't seem corrupt. But it was a black box to many. That's why it worked. It was not a total black box for those GSA specialist consultants, but that's their job.

I was in a massive bid for a multi-billion-dollar opportunity to do important work—research and development aimed at potential future U.S. warfronts across domains. The team lost. Because it was FEDSIM, they had no recourse. Usually, government contractors are amateur legal firms and immediately start drafting complaints. But in this case, it was more like—"oh, well—fuck." This prompted us to analyze how we could do better next time and understand how we lost as a team (spoiler: price). Most everyone loses in GovCon for capture efforts like this—that's part of the game. And almost everyone loses on price. That award would've been huge—everyone on the team would have grown, for many of us from zero to hero. That's what FEDSIM provided for defense—big contracts.

Contracts are often misunderstood as not an essential part of defense. But they are mission-essential. Without a contract or agreement, nothing happens. Therefore, the budget and contract professionals and the financial management staff are mission-critical—more so than the program and project managers. It's blunt but true.

And the complex services—ISR, intelligence analysis, open-source research, and other high-tech products—require large, well-structured contracts to unleash their full potential. Many contract and financial personnel struggle with this. The sheer size and scope of FEDSIM contracts made them impossible to ignore, especially for enterprise-level tasks. Because OASIS meets its primary obligation, FEDSIM has maximum flexibility under an ID/IQ, where you can do what you need through task orders—no constraints by prime or "small" companies. You choose who makes sense, and they do the work. Yes, there's paperwork—that's defense. If you can't handle that, chef, stay out of the kitchen. That paperwork through AI could be reduced in time.

When this new administration, with many good reasons, looked at government spending and landed on GSA, I thought, uh-oh, I hope someone there can explain what is and isn't OASIS, FEDSIM, and how much of a defense utility that is. They didn't, and core talents like Angela Donahoo and FEDSIM director Chris Hamm have left. On the outside, their expertise and reach as acquisition commandos are gone. Angela played a key role in getting GSA its CSO authority through direct collaboration with DIU — now CSOs have sprouted all over. Some of you will have very different opinions about that. But regardless, these people made things happen.

New ventures flood D.C. every week. They know neither the players nor the back‑stories—those unwritten rules about culture, authority, funding, and ideas. You can't cram that lore into a Udemy deck. Maybe that lore is part of the problem and makes navigating the department difficult to an unnecessary degree, and is more gatekeeping.

To feel "plugged in," founders cut checks to gatekeeper consultancies. One swipe and they think the job is done. Not entirely right. Deals still hinge on the mid‑grade insiders who grind paperwork; the marquee names can't pull levers for you until much later—if you survive that long. But, fewer large contracts increase the 'swamp', not dry it out.

Start‑ups sprint on scraps of intel, adding noise to an already jammed channel. Tight communications rules—well‑meant—make the maze look darker. GSA can't speak for itself, so rumors fill the vacuum: "SBIR Phase III through FEDSIM is dead." The whisper travels, warps, and soon steers the whole acquisition pipeline with other program managers across the DOD enterprise, whether true or not.

Budget, finance, and contracting people keep the war machine moving. They secure the materiel and services— the "M" in DOTMLPF‑P— that let operators fight. Lose 30 percent of them at GSA, and the shock rolls across the force; a few sister agencies can plug gaps, but not for long. Early buy‑outs lure budget and contract experts into planning their next job instead of the mission. It's human, but it cripples readiness. The Pentagon now faces a paradox: record appropriations on paper, yet fewer contracting officers and less flexible cash in real terms. Squeeze the system in one spot, and the pressure bulges somewhere else. At the same time, all the money, contracts, and focus on a single location would create a singular opportunity for Artificial Intelligence to pick up the slack for the jettisoned contracts & budget staff.

But, until then, and if that's possible, it fuels the old system further. Why? Money hunts the easy route. With fewer finance and contracting crews, that route is the contracts already on the books. GSA can't staff new enterprise IDIQs, so fresh work stalls. They will all sunset and die. Cash piles into today's vehicles, cementing the old guard. Those lines will be rerouted to consolidated contract centers where AI can do the tasks of a sea of contract teams with human maestros. But, in the interim, the Borg is fed and given more time to assimilate.

Result: a last‑supper feast for big consultancies, bolt‑on tech vendors, and the insider class. They look fit, stay "plugged in," and profit from an opaque system that speaks only to itself. Good for secrecy; bad for defense startups shut out at the gate. Strategic giants, cushioned by cost‑plus deals, ride out the storm and win again.

Contractors and agreements support each aspect of a unit's mission. FEDSIM's absence hurts the mission; it doesn't help it. It was about the people, not the paperwork. Defense isn't Jumanji. It's more like Survivor. And it might be that the wrong folks were voted off the island or voluntarily withdrew. Who weren't political, just tired in the initial confusion and blunt force of a new system in its earliest formation.