The Defense Acquisition Professional Reading List is intended to enrich the knowledge and understanding of the civilian, military, contractor and industrial workforce who participate in the entire defense acquisition enterprise. These book recommendations are designed to complement the education and training that are vital to developing essential competencies and skills of the acquisition workforce. Each issue of the Defense Acquisition Research Journal will contain one or more reviews of suggested books.
We encourage our readers to submit reviews of books they believe should be required reading for the defense acquisition professional. The reviews should be 400 words or fewer, describe the book and its major ideas, and explain why it is relevant to defense acquisition. Please send your reviews to the Managing Editor, Defense Acquisition Review Journal (research@dau.mil).
For other Military Professional Reading Lists, see the National Defense University's comprehensive list-of-lists.
| DARJ Reading List Archives |
| Richard Whittle, Predator: The Secret Origins of the Drone Revolution |
| Henry Petroski, To Engineer is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design |
| Gary E. Weir, Forged in War: The Naval-Industrial Complex and American Submarine Construction, 1940–1961 |
| Richard Whittle, The Dream Machine: The Untold History of the Notorious V-22 Osprey |
| Glenn E. Bugos, Engineering the F-4 Phantom II: Parts into Systems |
| Walter S. Poole, Adapting to Flexible Response, 1960-1968 |
| Robert M. Farley, Grounded: The Case for Abolishing the United States Air Force |
| Paul Kennedy, , Engineers of Victory: The Problem Solvers Who Turned the Tide in the Second World War |
| John T. Kuehn, Agents of INNOVATION: The General Board and the Design of the Fleet That Defeated the Japanese Navy |
| J. Ronald Fox, Defense Acquisition Reform, 1960–2009: An Elusive Goal |
| Jacques S. Gansler, Democracy’s Arsenal: Creating a Twenty-First-Century Defense Industry |
| Nick Childs, The Age of Invincible: The Ship That Defined the Modern Royal Navy |
| Peter Yule and Derek Woolner, The Collins Class Submarine Story: Steel, Spies, and Spin |
| Alfred D. Chandler Jr, The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business |
| Elliott V. Converse III, Rearming for the Cold War, 1945-1960 |
| Singer, Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the Twenty-first Century |
| Sheehan, A Fiery Peace in a Cold War |
| Flyvbjerg, Bruzelius, and Rothengatter, Megaprojects and Risk |
| Mort, Building the Trident Network |
| Sapolsky, The Polaris System Development |
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