DOD > Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD)

OSD is responsible for policy development, planning, resource management, and program evaluation. OSD runs several AI and biosecurity-relevant efforts, including investing in research, purchasing equipment, drafting strategies, and more.

DOD > US military departments

The military departments—Army, Navy, and Air Force—organize, train, and equip the US armed forces. They play central roles in AI and biosecurity through large-scale R&D programs, operational testing, and technology adoption for national defense.

Overview

DOD’s mission is to “provide the military forces necessary to deter war and ensure the nation’s security.” With a vast organizational structure, DOD encompasses the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Military Departments (Army, Navy and Marine Corps, Air Force and Space Force), defense agencies and field activities, the Joint Staff, and Combatant Commands. As of June 2024, it employs over 2.8 million personnel, making it one of the largest employers in the world. Highlighting its strategic importance, DOD is the fourth-largest budget function of federal spending (~$824 billion for FY 2024).

DOD shapes emerging technology policy through multiple levers, such as funding for research, development, testing, and evaluation (RDT&E), military requirements and procurement, academic and industrial partnerships, and strategic guidance and policy documents. It accounts for approximately 45% of all federal R&D funding, fueling R&D advancements through agencies such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). In addition to developing emerging technologies, DOD’s substantial budget and procurement power allow it to influence market dynamics and technical standards for technology sold to DOD. The department is also responsible for or heavily contributes to all key national security strategies, which are often relevant to and impacted by emerging technology developments.

Background on DOD

• Government context: DOD is one of 15 executive departments in the US government; the Secretary is a member of the US president’s cabinet and the National Security Council
• Main activities: supporting many activities related to US national security, including defense policy, military planning and operations, logistics, building partner capacity, and intelligence and surveillance
• Budget: very large (~$824 billion appropriated in FY 2024)
• Staff: 2.87 million (750,000 civilians; 1.3 million active-duty military; 780,000 National Guard and reservists); among the largest employers worldwide
• Brief history: DOD traces its roots back to 1789 with the creation of the War Department; in the 19th and early 20th century, military authority began to sprawl over many separate agencies leading to duplicate programs, turf wars, and increased spending—after World War II, Congress and the Truman administration combined all of these various military functions in a new Department of Defense (see National Security Act of 1947, which created the Joint Chiefs of Staff, National Security Council, and CIA); in its modern form, DOD is therefore a fairly recent US government agency, its current structure established in law by the 1986 Goldwater-Nichols Act
• Headquarters: The Pentagon is DOD’s physical headquarters, located in Arlington, Virginia, near Washington, DC. The Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) is also located there, among other DOD components. About 26,000 people work at the Pentagon.
• Dep. of Defense Agency Performance Dashboard, Partnership for Public Service

DOD and AI policy

DOD contributes to AI policy and development particularly as it relates to national security, frontier capabilities, and military use in three primary ways:

1. Research: DOD’s enormous research budget ($152 billion/year) may support breakthroughs in AI innovation or scaling of AI technologies, including AI research, development, testing, and evaluation (RDT&E). They do this through their vast network of research labs and agencies (e.g. DARPA) and by coordinating with academic, industrial, and international partners. DOD R&D has been instrumental in developing key technologies such as the Internet, GPS, self-driving cars, and more.
2. Procurement: DOD has a $142 billion/year budget for procuring weapons systems and other technology. DOD’s market power as the sole buyer gives it tremendous leverage to shape industry behavior and technical standards through procurement rules. Past requirements have led the private sector to alter their products in the hopes of selling to DOD, e.g. requiring DOD contractors to follow NIST cybersecurity guidelines. New offices such as the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) have been established in recent years to facilitate faster acquisition of emerging technologies, including AI, from startup companies.
3. Policy and strategies: DOD may influence AI policy debates both domestically and abroad through its directives, strategies, guidelines, and policies, including how to integrate AI and autonomous systems into military programs and budget planning. For example, DOD’s updated Directive 3000.09 sets guidelines for the development and use of autonomous weapons, and DOD played a key role in drafting the Nov 2023 Political Declaration on Responsible Military Use of Artificial Intelligence and Autonomy. DOD has also shaped past international agreements and ongoing negotiations on consequential technologies, including international arms control treaties governing nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons.

Major AI-related developments at DOD

DOD first centralized its AI efforts in 2018 by establishing the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC) under the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) Chief Information Officer. JAIC focused on integrating AI across various military applications, including predictive maintenance, intelligence analysis, and autonomous systems, and setting benchmarks for responsible AI development and deployment. 

In 2022, the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office (CDAO) was established by merging the JAIC, Defense Digital Service (DDS), Office of the Chief Data Officer (CDO), and ADVANA (an enterprise data analytics platform).¹ CDAOs mission is to “accelerate DoD adoption of data, analytics, and artificial intelligence from the boardroom to the battlefield to enable decision advantage.” They are the lead OSD office overseeing DOD adoption of AI and coordinating with other relevant offices (see our OSD profile for more details).

Other highlights are listed below. Note that this list is not comprehensive; for a much longer collection of AI and technology-related DOD news, see the DOD website’s spotlight pages on AI and on Science & Tech.

DOD and biosecurity policy

DOD contributes to national biosecurity and biodefense through initiatives including monitoring and responding to infectious disease outbreaks and ensuring the protection of military personnel and civilians. Various DOD offices and programs support a wide range of biosecurity efforts, focusing primarily on deliberate biological threats. DOD collaborates with other federal agencies, international partners, multilateral organizations, and the private sector to enhance biosurveillance, improve diagnostic capabilities, and advance research in vaccines and therapeutics with a focus on preventing, detecting, and mitigating biological incidents that could impact national security.

Many offices and agencies within DOD contribute to its biosecurity efforts. Most of the programs directly related to biosecurity are overseen by OSD, such as the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (OUSD-P), the Defense Health Agency (DHA), Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear, Chemical, and Biological Defense Programs (ASD(NCB)). In addition, each of the military departments have research labs, which contribute to biodefense efforts through research on infectious disease, biological threats, vaccines, drugs, and diagnostic tools. 

DOD shares the responsibility for biosecurity with many other US departments, including Health and Human Services (HHS), Homeland Security (DHS), and State (DOS). DOD primarily contributes by supporting deployed US military forces, protecting US interests overseas, and safeguarding the homeland from deliberate biological threats.

National Biodefense Strategy & Biodefense Posture Review

Two of the most important US government strategies on biosecurity in recent years include the government-wide 2022 National Biodefense Strategy and Implementation Plan and the DOD-specific 2023 Biodefense Posture Review. Both documents provide helpful overviews of DOD’s role in US biosecurity and biodefense planning.

National Biodefense Strategy (NBS): The strategy defines biodefense as “actions to counter biological threats, reduce biological risks, and prepare for, respond to, and recover from biological incidents, whether naturally occurring, accidental, or deliberate in origin and whether impacting human, animal, plant, or environmental health.” While similar to the term biosecurity, biodefense is typically used in reference to protecting against bioterrorism and biowarfare and is used in military contexts. Under the NBS, DOD is assigned several important biosecurity and biodefense responsibilities, including (co-)leading or supporting various international and domestic efforts. For example, it (co-)leads or supports the following:

Biodefense Posture Review (BPR): It is the department’s first comprehensive assessment of its biodefense capabilities and clarifies the priorities and roles within the department to better prepare for and respond to a wide range of biological threats. The BPR outlines four reform lines of effort:

Major biosecurity-related developments at DOD

DOD’s work in biosecurity dates back to at least the 1950s; for a historical overview, see the Wikipedia articles on the US biodefense program and the discontinued US biological weapons program.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, DOD played a crucial role in responding by providing logistical support, medical assistance, and research capabilities. DOD mobilized military medical personnel and resources to support civilian healthcare systems, including setting up field hospitals and deploying hospital ships​​. Additionally, DOD was instrumental in distributing personal protective equipment (PPE) and vaccines, leveraging its logistics networks to expedite delivery​​. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and other DOD research entities also contributed to vaccine and therapeutic development efforts​​. For details, see this DOD page and this interactive timeline of the DOD’s response to COVID-19. 

Some other recent highlights are listed below (this list is not comprehensive):

Organizational structure

DOD is led by a Secretary of Defense (SecDef), appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. The SecDef is the principal defense policy advisor to the President and oversees the entire department. The Deputy Secretary of Defense (DepSecDef) is the number two of the Department and oversees day-to-day operations, including budgetary matters, programming, and assessment.

DOD is made up of five primary institutions, each containing thousands of employees and hundreds of individual offices:

1. The Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD)
2. The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) and Joint Staff (JS)
3. The Military Departments
4. The Unified Combatant Commands (CCMD)
5. The Defense Agencies and Field Activities

Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD)

→ For a deeper dive into OSD’s AI and biosecurity activities, see our OSD profile.

OSD houses the staff that assists the Secretary and Deputy Secretary of Defense. Different components of OSD are responsible for creating policy, resource planning, program evaluation, and overseeing all the Department’s activities. The Secretary, Deputy Secretary, Under Secretaries, and Assistant Secretaries, are presidentially appointed civilian officials, and OSD’s oversight role is rooted in the principle of civilian oversight of the military.

Each component is led by a principal staff assistant, or “OSD Component head”, including the Under Secretaries of Defense, the Assistant Secretaries of Defense, the Chief Digital and AI Officer (CDAO), and others. Some of these components are purely operational (e.g. the General Counsel who provides legal advice to OSD). In contrast, others are policy-oriented (e.g. Director of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation who plays a central role in DOD’s budget process).

OSD shapes emerging technology policy by leading department-wide strategic efforts in prioritizing research investments, overseeing the implementation of technologies in military planning and operations, establishing ethics guidelines and procurement rules, and assessing opportunities and risks associated with new technologies. Crucially, most OSD components do not have their own acquisition authority, so they provide guidance to the Military Departments and CCMDs to shape the Department’s strategic direction. 

Joint Chiefs of Staff and Joint Staff (JS)

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) advises the SecDef in direct military matters. The JCS are the eight most senior uniformed leaders within DOD, consisting of a Chairman (the president’s principal military advisor and a statutory member of the National Security Council), a Vice Chairman, and chiefs from six military services (Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Space Force, and National Guard Bureau). The JCS regularly gathers to advise the president, SecDef, the National Security Council (NSC), and other interagency policy coordination bodies in the president’s executive office on national security matters. It comprises eight directorates covering different topics, including intelligence, logistics, and technology.

The Chairman leads the Joint Staff (JS), which assists the Chairman and other members of the JCS in formulating policy recommendations. It is led by the Office of the Director of the Joint Staff, within which the Directorate of Management (DOM) is the principal advisor to the JS Director on management and implementation issues. JS personnel are drawn from civilians and commissioned and non-commissioned officers from the various services.

Compared to other parts of DOD, the JS tends to play a smaller role in AI. Within the JS, the J6 Directorate (Command, Control, Communications, & Computers/Cyber) is the main JS lead on AI and other digital technologies, responsible for advancing cyber, computing systems, and communications technologies across the JS, as well as informing ideal characteristics and requirements for military AI systems. Past activities include joint AI initiatives with CDAO (e.g. Global Information Dominance Experiments). The J8 Directorate is also relevant, as it runs the JCIDS process which determines program requirements that DOD needs to acquire. JS also plays a role in biosecurity—as it would be responsible for leading many operations following a bioterrorist event.

Military Departments

The Armed Forces can be divided into two parts: the military departments and the Unified Combatant Commands.

DOD has three military departments (MilDeps) (Army, Navy, and Air Force) that oversee five services (Navy, Marine Corps, Army, Air Force, and Space Force). The departments are responsible for doctrine, organization, training, materiel, leadership and education, personnel, and facilities (DOTMLPF), and they equip the forces employed by the combatant commands. The Army is responsible for land dominance, the Navy for sea, the Air Force for air capabilities, the Space Force for space, and the Marine Corps for expeditionary and amphibious operations.

Each MilDep is led by a presidential-appointed civilian service secretary who has authority over all affairs of their respective department. MilDeps have a parallel and complementary organizational structure with both uniformed and civilian leadership. For example, in the Air Force, the Air Staff, overseen by the Air Force Chief of Staff (CoS), handles operations like personnel management. Meanwhile, the Secretary of the Air Force (SAF) staff, such as SAF/M&RA (Secretary of the Air Force/Manpower and Reserve Affairs), operates under the civilian Secretary of the Air Force. This dual structure aims to ensure effective civilian control of the military. Neither the uniformed nor civilian leadership within the MilDeps employs troops or engages directly in operations; that role falls under the combatant commands (CCMDs). All entities outside the three MilDeps and CCMDs are collectively known as the “Fourth Estate.”

The departments and services operate many offices that shape emerging technologies. Each MilDep has its own research lab, such as the Navy’s Office of Naval Research or the Air Force’s Research Laboratory, which perform R&D on emerging technologies relevant to their service’s mission. The MilDep research labs have supported biodefense efforts focused on protecting warfighters from infectious diseases and other biological threats, including through vaccines, drugs, and diagnostic tools, and by researching pathogens, understanding disease processes, and creating medical countermeasures.

Other MilDep offices work on converting research into capabilities—for instance, the Army Futures Command was established in 2018 to modernize the Army through initiatives like Project Convergence, which aims to integrate AI to improve battlefield decision-making. Each service also has massive procurement budgets to purchase new technologies. In light of the long, bureaucratic process for traditional procurement, various Services have experimented with faster procurement pathways, such as the Air Force’s Rapid Capabilities Office (DAF RCO), which has accelerated methods for developing, acquiring, and fielding critical combat capabilities.

Unified Combatant Commands (CCMDs)

The CCMDs are the main operational commands through which the President directs forces to carry out their missions. They also organize multilateral and bilateral training exercises. While MilDeps are responsible for providing the resources and personnel needed to complete missions, the CCMDs are responsible for actually executing in the field. For instance, the Air Force might provide an airplane used in a military mission in some part of the world, but the relevant CCMD is the organization using that aircraft to complete the mission.

CCMDs are pivotal in establishing requirements and operationalizing emerging technologies on the battlefield. For instance, the US Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM), responsible for defending the nation’s cyberspace, has been at the forefront of integrating AI to enhance cyber capabilities, such as through the joint CYBERCOM-DARPA Constellation program and the recently-established USCYBERCOM AI Task Force.

There are eleven CCMDs total—seven regionally-focused ones (e.g. USEUCOM in Europe, USINDOPACOM in the Indo-Pacific) and four organized around functional topics, such as USCYBERCOM (cybersecurity) and USSOCOM (Special Operations Forces deployment). The chain of military command starts with the President as commander-in-chief, to SecDef, to the Combatant Commanders, with the Joint Chiefs of Staff providing military advice to the Secretary and President for the employment of CCMD forces.

The seven regional CCMDs are:

1. Africa Command (USAFRICOM)
2. Central Command (USCENTCOM)
3. European Command (USEUCOM)
4. Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM)
5. Northern Command (USNORTHCOM)
6. Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM)
7. Space Command (USSPACECOM)

The four functional CCMDs are:

1. Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM)
2. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM)
3. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM)
4. Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM)

Defense Agencies and Field Activities

Lastly, nineteen Defense Agencies and eight Field Activities provide certain cross-departmental services or supplies. They are overseen and receive strategic direction from an OSD Principal Staff Assistant. Examples include offices and agencies in charge of logistics, contracts, human resources, research, or intelligence. Eight of the Defense Agencies are also designated Combat Support Agencies, which support the US military during combat operations.

All Defense Agencies and Field Activities can interact with emerging technologies through a mix of research investments, procurement, operationalization, and informing policy formulation, depending on the organization’s jurisdiction. 

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is particularly significant in this context. With an annual budget of over $4 billion, DARPA invests in high-risk, high-reward research across the entire gambit of emerging technologies, from AI to robotics to biosecurity. DARPA’s Biological Technologies Office (BT) leads much of its biodefense-related research, which has historically leveraged synthetic biology, gene editing, bioinformatics, and molecular analysis.

Other notable agencies working on AI include those in the intelligence community (IC), such as the National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS), which has a very active AI Security Center that shapes internal AI use and adoption policies, and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), which has influenced data security and satellite regulations through its adoption and development of advanced technologies (e.g. AI) for geospatial analysis.

Notable agencies related to biosecurity include the Defense Health Agency (DHA), which has several programs related to warfighter readiness against biological threats, the Defense Technology Security Administration (DTSA), which supports export controls related to dual-use technologies, and the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA), whose overseas aid programs support biological threat readiness among partner nations.

The eight combat support Defense Agencies are:

1. Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA)
2. Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA)
3. Defense Logistics Agency (DLA)
4. Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA)
5. Defense Health Agency (DHA)
6. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA)
7. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA)
8. National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS)

The eleven non-combat Defense Agencies are:

1. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
2. Defense Commissary Agency (DeCA)
3. Defense Contract Audit Agency(DCAA)
4. Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA)
5. Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS)
6. Defense Legal Services Agency (DLSA)
7. Defense Logistics Agency (DLA)
8. Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA)
9. Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA)
10. Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA)
11. Missile Defense Agency (MDA)
12. National Reconnaissance Office (NRO)
13. Pentagon Force Protection Agency (PFPA)

The eight Field Activities are:

1. Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC)
2. Defense Technology Security Administration (DTSA)
3. Defense Human Resources Activity (DHRA)
4. Defense Media Activity (DMA)
5. Washington Headquarters Services (WHS)
6. Department of Defense Education Activity (DOD EA)
7. Department of Defense Test Resource Management Center (DOD TRMC)
8. Office of Local Defense Community Cooperation (OLDCC), formerly Office of Economic Adjustment (OEA)

DOD’s budget process in a nutshell

DOD accounts for approximately half of the federal government’s discretionary spending, making it an important stakeholder in the US government’s annual budgeting process. The annual cycle to produce the following year’s budget is called the Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) process. The process produces both a five-year Program Objective Memorandum (POM) and one-year Budget Estimate Submission (BES) for the first year. 

During this process, there are program budget reviews, which is DOD’s decision-making process for making significant top-level changes to the budget. This review involves collaboration between component analysts and Comptroller analysts to align budget requests with the overall defense budget. 

The final budget is typically submitted to the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in December for inclusion in the President’s annual budget request to Congress, usually submitted in February.

Working at DOD

DOD’s complicated structure means that the Department has many different recruiting pipelines. 

Many DOD components have their own careers pages with job listings, but there are also various job boards listing DOD positions, including:

1. USAJOBS is the US government’s largest job board, listing many jobs across the services, combatant commands, and OSD.² (See our federal agency application resources for guides to USAJOBS and more)
2. DOD Civilian Careers lists DOD job resources and opportunities for civilians. 
3. DOD STEM is a specialized job platform for STEM roles at DOD.
4. The DOD Emerging Technologies Talent Marketplace is another specialized job platform for DOD technical roles, such as those relating to AI, cybersecurity, data science, and software development.

As with other federal agencies, two of the main ways into DOD are the “competitive service” and non-competitive “excepted service”, which differ mainly in their hiring processes, eligibility criteria, and job protections (explained here and in-depth here). Both have certain upsides and downsides:

• Competitive service positions (i.e. most federal roles) are announced publicly and are open to all qualified U.S. citizens. They involve the federal government’s most structured, formalized hiring processes (e.g. interviews, written tests, questionnaires, etc.). Once in the competitive service, it’s generally easier to move into other competitive service roles, which increases your job flexibility. A key downside is that many competitive service positions—as the name suggests—are highly competitive. A reviewer of this post noted that for non-veterans, who don’t qualify for veterans’ preference in hiring, it’s often very difficult or even impossible to get hired directly into a competitive service position in your preferred DOD office. So, the most realistic way of getting your preferred role may be applying to competitive service jobs in a different (less popular) office, and then try to move laterally at a later time by applying to your preferred competitive service roles (after fulfilling the 90 days minimum requirement).
• Excepted service jobs are excluded from the formal hiring requirements of the competitive service, each agency having its procedures for filling those positions. Although the name might give the impression these roles are a rarity, they actually account for about one third of all federal employees, with DOD hiring more employees through the excepted service than any other department (except for the VA). Agencies can often hire directly for excepted service roles without the formal examination process, allowing for faster and more targeted recruitment. To qualify for excepted service positions you often need to participate in agency-specific recruitment programs including some fellowships and internships (as described below). Excepted service positions are often less competitive (on account of fewer applicants) and can sometimes be found using the “Excepted service” and/or “Special authorities” filters on USAJOBS—but note that, in contrast to competitive service positions, there is no guarantee that an excepted service position will be listed on USAJobs (and often, the best opportunities are least likely to be listed). As such, finding a promising excepted service opportunity is likely to require some amount of online detective work and networking.

DOD participates in the Pathways Program and offers a large number of fellowship and internship programs, including opportunities for people with STEM backgrounds. These programs are critical pathways into DOD employment, especially for non-veterans, who don’t qualify for veterans’ preference. A major benefit of many (but not all) DOD fellowships and internships is that they allow participants to access non-competitive, excepted service positions, which can make it much easier to transition into a full-time DOD role after program completion.

Notable fellowships and internship programs enabling DOD placements include:

• McCain Strategic Defense Fellowship – ​​a 1-year full-time “civilian fellowship program [for graduate degree holders] designed to provide leadership development for the commencement of a career track toward senior [DOD] leadership”³
• Presidential Management Fellowship – a 2-year full-time executive branch fellowship for graduate degree holders, including some DOD opportunities
• SMART Scholarship – DOD academic scholarship for STEM undergrads and graduate students, including DOD summer internships and post-education employment
• Defense Civilian Training Corps (DCTC) – a talent development program providing a 100% tuition scholarship and 2-year multidisciplinary curriculum with a project-based summer internship that prepares scholars for direct pathway into DOD acquisition-related careers
• Cyber Service Academy (DOD CSA) – “sponsors students who currently are not DoD or government employees…Following graduation, students are eligible for full-time employment with various components and agencies across the DoD. Students are required to work for the DoD a minimum of one year for each year of scholarship support they receive.”
• Boren Awards – a 2-12 month language scholarship for US undergraduates and graduate students that facilitates post-fellowship employment with the US government, particularly with DOD, DHS, State, and the Intelligence Community.
• Horizon Fellowship – a 1-2 year full-time US emerging technology policy fellowship facilitating job placements in the executive branch, Congress, or think tanks for early- and mid-career technologists.
• AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellowship – a 1-2 year full-time executive branch or congressional fellowship for science PhDs and engineers.

Another common way for people to get jobs at DOD is to be detailed by another organization, often via the Intergovernmental Personnel Act (IPA)’s personnel mobility program (see this and this report for more details on the program). For example, other government agencies or certain think tanks and FFRDCs (e.g. CFR, CSIS, CSET, RAND, and MITRE) may ‘lend’ some of their staff to the DOD. In addition, some executive branch fellowships use flexible hiring mechanisms to place subject-matter experts in DOD, such as the Horizon Fellowship and the AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellowship.

The Services typically recruit individually (see Air Force, Army, Marines, Navy, and Space Force recruitment sites). To do so, contact a recruiter at the respective Service. Relatedly, you might consider joining the military reserves or the National Guard, which can also serve as a pipeline for some tech talent (e.g. via the 75th Innovation Command, Marine Innovation Unit).

Jobs at Combatant Commands involve military assignments through one of the Services, federal civilian hiring (see USAJOBS), or through a federal contractor (e.g. Booz Allen Hamilton).

Further reading

• General DOD resources:
  • [report] Defense Primer: The Department of Defense
  • [report] 2019 Organization and Management of the Department of Defense
  • [video] Organizational structure of the Department of Defense (US Army War College)
  • [DOD Comptroller report] Management’s Discussion & Analysis: Provides a High Level Overview of the Department’s Programmatic and Financial Performance
  • Dep. of Defense Agency Performance Dashboard, Partnership for Public Service
• DOD and AI:
  • DOD spotlight webpages on AI and Science & Tech
  • CDAO blog
• DOD and biosecurity:
  • [report] Biodefense Budget Breakdown (Council on Strategic Risks)
  • [interactive org chart] B-SPAN Executive Branch Biodefense Interactive Tool (Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense)

Footnotes

Other agency profiles

Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD)

Department of Commerce (DOC)

Department of Energy (DOE)

Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)

Department of Homeland Security (DHS)

Department of State (DOS)

Federal Trade Commission (FTC)

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