Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO: (1) reviewed the Department of Defense's (DOD) infrastructure activities and their associated costs in the Future Years Defense Program (FYDP) to determine whether DOD plans to spend less for infrastructure activities by fiscal year (FY) 2001; and (2) summarized its work that identified opportunities for DOD to reduce or streamline infrastructure activities, and asked the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to estimate potential budgetary savings.

GAO found that: (1) there are no significant net infrastructure savings to DOD between FY 1996 and FY 2001, based on GAO analysis of infrastructure-related program elements in FYDP; (2) the proportion of planned infrastructure funding in DOD budgets will remain relatively constant at about 60 percent through 2001; (3) the combination of operation and maintenance and military personnel appropriations fund about 80 percent of infrastructure activities that can be identified in FYDP; (4) DOD excludes most intelligence, space, and command, control, and communications programs the provide support services to mission programs from its definition of infrastructure; (5) these programs account for about $25.2 billion in FY 1996; (6) parts of total infrastructure funding cannot be clearly identified in FYDP, including funds that pay for Defense Business Operations Fund activities; and (7) there were 13 options for consolidating, streamlining, or reengineering infrastructure activities that CBO estimates could result in savings of $11.8 billion from FY 1997 through FY 2001.