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GAO-12-532R 1 (2012-05-31)

handle is hein.gao/gaobacgcu0001 and id is 1 raw text is: GAO Accounftability * Integrity - Reliability United States Government Accountability Office Washington, DC 20548 May 31, 2012 Congressional Committees Subject: Force Structure: Army and Marine Corps Efforts to Review Nonstandard Equipment for Future Usefulness This letter formally transmits the enclosed briefing in response to the House Armed Services Committee report accompanying a bill for the Fiscal Year 2012 National Defense Authorization Act that directed us to examine the Army and Marine Corps tables of equipment and submit a report to the congressional defense committees.1 Over the course of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army and the Marine Corps have quickly acquired and fielded new equipment to meet evolving threats. Largely supported with overseas contingency operations funds rather than through the Army's and the Marine Corps' regular budgets, this nonstandard (rapidly fielded) equipment is not listed on units' equipment authorization documents.2 However, with the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, their planned drawdown from Afghanistan, and the likely reductions in overseas contingency operations funding, the military services face decisions about which rapidly fielded equipment should be retained for future use, funded through regular budget processes, and incorporated into unit equipment authorization documents. We assessed (1) the status of Army and Marine Corps efforts to decide whether nonstandard equipment should be kept for the future and (2) the steps these services must take before adding nonstandard equipment to unit authorization documents and possible areas for improving the efficiency of these steps. In March 2012 we briefed congressional committees on these issues. Since that time we have received additional information and have updated the March 2012 briefing slides. The updated briefing is attached in enclosure I. To address these issues, we examined relevant documentation, interviewed Army and Marine Corps officials, and reviewed available Army and Marine Corps data on the status of decisions made on nonstandard equipment and the Army data on the length of the process to review and approve plans for adding new equipment to unit authorization documents. We determined that these data were sufficiently reliable for the purposes of this report. 'See H.R. Rep. No. 112-78 at 111 (2011). Tables of equipment-referred to as modified tables of organization and equipment in the Army and tables of equipment in the Marine Corps-list the type and amount of equipment that units are authorized to have for their assigned missions. 2The Army typically uses the term nonstandard equipment and the Marine Corps uses the term interim solutions to refer to equipment that was rapidly fielded to address wartime capability gaps. In this report, we will refer to both Army and Marine Corps rapidly fielded equipment as nonstandard equipment. GAO-12-532R Force Structure

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