On Wednesday evening, the Department of Defense took the rare and necessary step of terminating its problematic $17.9 billion Global Household Goods Contract (GHC) with HomeSafe Alliance. This decision to sever ties with HomeSafe came after months of persistent, widespread failures that disrupted military moves and significantly impacted the lives of service members and their families. However, ending this relationship alone is not enough. The Pentagon must now undertake a thorough investigation into why this disaster occurred, who was responsible, and how similar failures can be avoided in the future.
When initially announced, the GHC was presented as a revolutionary initiative designed to vastly improve the way military families relocate. Promises of streamlined processes, higher efficiency, enhanced customer service, and transparent operations were central to the initiative’s selling points. Instead, from its earliest stages, the GHC proved disastrous. Military families faced countless missed appointments, extensive delivery delays, damaged or lost personal belongings, and consistently inadequate customer support. HomeSafe Alliance, the primary contractor entrusted with this critical mission, continuously failed to uphold its contractual obligations, leaving military families to cope with undue stress and financial burdens.
While HomeSafe Alliance clearly bears significant responsibility, equal blame lies with U.S. Transportation Command (TRANSCOM), the DoD entity charged with oversight of the GHC. TRANSCOM leadership downplayed the crisis, presenting misleading and incomplete data to Congress. During testimony, TRANSCOM officials, including General Randall Reed, presented data suggesting a decrease in PCS delays but deliberately omitted key facts, such as the February directive instructing both the Army and Air Force to redirect short-notice moves back into the legacy moving system, effectively bypassing HomeSafe altogether.
General Reed compromised his leadership and integrity when he intentionally misled Congress about the severity and extent of the ongoing issues, despite possessing clear evidence of widespread and systemic failures. Worse yet, he abdicated his core responsibility to advocate for and safeguard the welfare of the service members and families he was appointed to serve. He has undoubtedly lost the confidence of Congress, the Department of Defense’s senior leaders, and the countless service members and military families he failed to support.
Reed’s predecessor, General Stephen Lyons, bears even greater responsibility. Just before retiring, he expedited the launch of the multibillion-dollar GHC contract, pushing it into execution without ensuring the necessary infrastructure and operational readiness were in place.
To ensure this failure is completely understood and never repeated, every senior official involved in awarding and overseeing the HomeSafe Alliance contract must be fully investigated. Congress and the public deserve to know whether this was gross negligence, preferential treatment, or another case of contracting abuse by senior military officers, like we recently saw with Admiral Robert P. Burke. Why else would leaders like General Lyons and General Reed push forward with a clearly unfit contractor at the expense of U.S. service members and their dependents?
Like Burke, the TRANSCOM leaders involved in this contract operated without meaningful oversight. It is imperative that all DoD personnel responsible for awarding and overseeing the HomeSafe Alliance contract – past and present – are subjected to a rigorous and transparent investigation. They knowingly made decisions that hurt the force and negatively impacted readiness. If we don’t investigate and expose why these leaders allowed such a massive failure to persist, we invite the next disaster.
On Wednesday evening, the Department of Defense took the rare and necessary step of terminating its problematic $17.9 billion Global Household Goods Contract (GHC) with HomeSafe Alliance. This decision to sever ties with HomeSafe came after months of persistent, widespread failures that disrupted military moves and significantly impacted the lives of service members and their families. However, ending this relationship alone is not enough. The Pentagon must now undertake a thorough investigation into why this disaster occurred, who was responsible, and how similar failures can be avoided in the future.
When initially announced, the GHC was presented as a revolutionary initiative designed to vastly improve the way military families relocate. Promises of streamlined processes, higher efficiency, enhanced customer service, and transparent operations were central to the initiative’s selling points. Instead, from its earliest stages, the GHC proved disastrous. Military families faced countless missed appointments, extensive delivery delays, damaged or lost personal belongings, and consistently inadequate customer support. HomeSafe Alliance, the primary contractor entrusted with this critical mission, continuously failed to uphold its contractual obligations, leaving military families to cope with undue stress and financial burdens.
While HomeSafe Alliance clearly bears significant responsibility, equal blame lies with U.S. Transportation Command (TRANSCOM), the DoD entity charged with oversight of the GHC. TRANSCOM leadership downplayed the crisis, presenting misleading and incomplete data to Congress. During testimony, TRANSCOM officials, including General Randall Reed, presented data suggesting a decrease in PCS delays but deliberately omitted key facts, such as the February directive instructing both the Army and Air Force to redirect short-notice moves back into the legacy moving system, effectively bypassing HomeSafe altogether.
General Reed compromised his leadership and integrity when he intentionally misled Congress about the severity and extent of the ongoing issues, despite possessing clear evidence of widespread and systemic failures. Worse yet, he abdicated his core responsibility to advocate for and safeguard the welfare of the service members and families he was appointed to serve. He has undoubtedly lost the confidence of Congress, the Department of Defense’s senior leaders, and the countless service members and military families he failed to support.
Reed’s predecessor, General Stephen Lyons, bears even greater responsibility. Just before retiring, he expedited the launch of the multibillion-dollar GHC contract, pushing it into execution without ensuring the necessary infrastructure and operational readiness were in place.
To ensure this failure is completely understood and never repeated, every senior official involved in awarding and overseeing the HomeSafe Alliance contract must be fully investigated. Congress and the public deserve to know whether this was gross negligence, preferential treatment, or another case of contracting abuse by senior military officers, like we recently saw with Admiral Robert P. Burke. Why else would leaders like General Lyons and General Reed push forward with a clearly unfit contractor at the expense of U.S. service members and their dependents?
Like Burke, the TRANSCOM leaders involved in this contract operated without meaningful oversight. It is imperative that all DoD personnel responsible for awarding and overseeing the HomeSafe Alliance contract – past and present – are subjected to a rigorous and transparent investigation. They knowingly made decisions that hurt the force and negatively impacted readiness. If we don’t investigate and expose why these leaders allowed such a massive failure to persist, we invite the next disaster.
Regardless of whether these failures stemmed from negligence or something more deliberate, Lyons and Reed must not be allowed to quietly retire and escape accountability for their faulty leadership. Allowing them to exit without consequence would reinforce a dangerous perception within the DoD – that senior leaders can make reckless decisions affecting millions and simply walk away. Their leadership decisions and refusal to correct course even as problems mounted should serve as a warning to every senior officer entrusted with the welfare of U.S. service members: failure at this scale demands consequences, not silence.
Congress, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), and the Department of Defense Inspector General must undertake comprehensive investigations into TRANSCOM’s and HomeSafe Alliance’s mismanagement of the GHC. These investigations must identify where oversight broke down, how taxpayer dollars were squandered, and why obvious red flags were ignored.
Terminating HomeSafe’s contract was the critical first step. But if the Pentagon is serious about restoring trust and preventing future failures, it must confront the broader pattern. This wasn’t just a one-off collapse, it was the predictable result of an overreliance on contractors, weak oversight, and a leadership culture that avoids accountability. Ending this contract means nothing if the same playbook continues elsewhere.
The Pentagon must now send a clear and unequivocal signal: neither failed contracts nor failed leadership are going to be tolerated. That is the only way to restore trust and begin correcting course.
COMMENTS
There are
You must become a subscriber or login to view or post comments on this article.