The Glossary: Defense Acquisition Acronyms and Terms, contains most acronyms, abbreviations, and terms commonly used in the systems acquisition process within the Department of Defense (DoD) and defense industries. It focuses on terms with generic DoD application but also includes some Service-unique terms. It has been extensively revised to reflect current acquisition initiatives and policy, and changes in the Planning, Programming, Budgeting and Execution (PPBE) process and the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS).

Appendix A contains a listing of common abbreviations and acronyms. Appendix B contains definitions of terms used throughout the DoD acquisition community, including terms that have commonality between U.S. and allied acquisition programs.

While the Glossary identifies and highlights many terms, it is not all-inclusive, particularly regarding the military services, defense agencies and other organizationally unique terms. For those, the reader must turn to publications issued by those organizations. The Glossary contains some jargon and buzz-words, but does not attempt to be a "Dictionary of Pentagon-ese."

The Glossary is published for use by students of the Defense Acquisition University (DAU), and others working on defense acquisition matters, including congressional staffs, Pentagon and other headquarters (HQ) staffs, program managers and requirements managers of the Department of Defense, and defense contractors.

Acronyms and abbreviations are generally capitalized for ease of reference. That does not imply they are capitalized in general usage. Readers should follow the style used by their own organizations.