Air Force Readiness is completely broken. Our force size is a fraction of what it was at the outset of Desert Storm, and our readiness rates are also anemic in comparison. It is not a stretch to say we can field less than a quarter of the aircraft that we could field in 1990.

Lots of technical answers to improve readiness and field more aircraft, but that is not this article.This is a leadership article, and we’ve made successful leadership nearly impossible in the Air Force when it comes to fielding aircraft.I always shy away from re-organizing the deck chairs on the Titanic, but organization and structure is reason #1 why we are broken. Let me break it down:

1. INTEREST. The party that cares the most about something must have a direct link to the solution. They are the ones who are helped or hurt the most if something does not work, does not field in time, or is otherwise unavailable for their needs. Without a direct link and influence over the success or timeliness of a project, the project is “just another timeline” with no tangible need.

2. RESPONSIBILITY. The buck stops here.Responsibility is where the finger is pointed, who is held accountable for any action. Inability to define who is accountable, or situations where responsibility is shared by multiple individuals, offices and points of contact diminishes ownership, accountability and clarity for any task.

3. AUTHORITY. Responsibility without authority is merely a scapegoat, or an institutional attempt to avoid doing anything of value. Like responsibility, authority must be simple, streamlined and easy to follow for an outsider. It must match exactly with responsibility, or you are setting up the responsible person/team to fail.

4. RESOURCES. I’ve long said, “Spend as much as it takes, not a penny more.” For a team to have full responsibility and authority to do what the interested party needs them to do, they need adequate recourses to execute.Without resources, responsibility is a farce, and authority becomes inconsequential.

A breakdown of how the Air Force is organized to manage readiness, and in particular aircraft/equipment readiness, is a recipe for “what not to do” when trying to meet any obligation. Disparate authorities, no clear chain of command and chain of responsibility, stovepipe offices that are force to work with “common part” offices that have no real authority, parts procurement that has zero stake in readiness but a lot of the resources, and so much more.

My recommendation? Re-organize based on these 4 guiding principles/tenets. Simplify responsibility, marry it completely with authority, and provide resources to those holding authority. At the top of the responsibility chain must be the warfighter, the commanders charged with fielding a force. The main interested party. If we don’t do that, all of the cutting-edge technical answers won’t matter. All of the money in the world will not fix disfunction. It is a leadership problem grounded in how we are organized, how we view leadership at its core.