In U.S. history, the Department of War was the cabinet department that oversaw the Army from 1789 until it was replaced after World War II. The National Security Act of 1947 merged the War and Navy Departments into a new structure that became the Department of Defense (DoD), which since 1949 has been the single cabinet department responsible for all U.S. military forces and most defense agencies. Today, when U.S. contract announcements refer to the "Department of War" in this context, they are functionally describing what is now the Department of Defense and its military departments (Army, Navy/Marine Corps, Air Force, Space Force) and defense agencies under the Secretary of Defense.
“War.gov” in these notices is the public website where the department posts its daily contract announcements. The contracts landing page states that contracts valued at $7.5 million or more are announced each business day at 5 p.m. and lists each day’s entry (for example, “Contracts For Dec. 29, 2025”). The public can access the full text of each day’s announcement by going to the Contracts page and clicking the specific date’s link; each linked article then lists the individual awards and details.
Contracts landing page (with daily links): https://www.war.gov/News/Contracts/ Example daily announcement (Dec. 29, 2025): https://www.defense.gov/News/Contracts/Contract/Article/4368246/
The daily postings cover a wide range of contract types across the military services and defense agencies. They typically include: • Goods and equipment (e.g., aircraft, missiles, clothing, chemiluminescent lights) • Services (e.g., logistics support, maintenance and depot services, engineering and technical support) • Construction and facilities work (e.g., refueling and complex overhauls of ships, construction and modernization projects) • Architect–engineer and professional services (e.g., architectural and general engineering contracts)
The Dec. 29, 2025 announcement, for example, includes aircraft production (F‑15s), logistics and maintenance services for E‑4B aircraft, supply contracts for lights and flame‑resistant coveralls, naval ship overhaul materials, engineering support contracts, and architect/engineering services.
Yes. The "$7.5 million or more" language refers to the value of each individual contract (or contract modification) listed in these daily announcements. The department’s Contracts page explains that “Contracts valued at $7.5 million or more are announced each business day at 5 p.m.” Smaller awards are not routinely summarized on this news page, but they are still public: detailed data on essentially all federal contract awards, large and small, are available in government-wide systems such as USAspending.gov and SAM.gov’s contract data.
The contracts in this Dec. 29, 2025 announcement are awarded by the specific contracting offices within different services and defense agencies, which are identified at the end of each entry. In this notice, the awarding offices/commands include: • Air Force Life Cycle Management Center (Wright‑Patterson AFB, OH; Tinker AFB, OK) • Defense Logistics Agency Weapons Support (Richmond, VA) • Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support (Philadelphia, PA) • Naval Sea Systems Command (Washington, D.C.) • Army Contracting Command (Detroit Arsenal, MI) • U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Philadelphia District
Each daily announcement similarly lists the responsible contracting activity for every award.
Detailed information for each contract—such as contractor name, award or ceiling amount, contract or modification number, basic scope description, performance locations, expected completion dates, and funding type—is provided in the full text of the daily contract announcement, which you can reach by clicking the date on the Contracts page. For broader or more technical details (e.g., full solicitation history, competition information, obligated amounts over time), you can also look up the same contract numbers in government-wide databases like USAspending.gov and SAM.gov’s contract data.
Key locations: • Daily announcement (Dec. 29, 2025 example): https://www.defense.gov/News/Contracts/Contract/Article/4368246/ • Contracts index page: https://www.war.gov/News/Contracts/ • Federal award-level data: https://www.usaspending.gov/