Bureaucratic inertia makes officials extremely reluctant to stop started projects

Evidence

That would work, he said. “Congress could do it.” But in a system where it “takes enormous energy to get anything done,” he explained, inertia is a powerful force. Once a project is started, officials are “extremely reluctant to stop for anything.” For now, Luttwak said of members of Congress and military leaders alike, “They continue on like blind animals burrowing underground.” — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 817

Categorization

• QUESTION: What specific institutional mechanisms could break the inertia? The book doesn’t fully answer this.
• XREF: connects to: Beginning physical construction on a project makes authorities unable to stop it — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 961; Bureaucratic inertia and lax enforcement can quietly sabotage reform from within — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 359; Physically beginning a project makes it nearly impossible to stop — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 961 (+1 more)