One “unintended consequence” of the 1986 Goldwater-Nichols Act, which set up combatant commanders to carry out missions using joint forces, was described to the committee by Robert Martinage, a former deputy undersecretary of the Navy and currently senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.
He said that Goldwater-Nichols created “acceptance of what is often referred to as ‘Little League rules,’ meaning that every [military] service is entitled to a role in planning and conducting nearly all military operations across the spectrum of conflict regardless of whether or not it makes the most sense operationally or is the best use of available resources.”
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