Force Structure: Army Support Forces Can Meet Two-Conflict Strategy With Some Risks

The Army has taken initiatives which address the intent of this recommendation.

In responding to this recommendation, the Army said that, during Total Army Analysis (TAA) 2005, it would analyze operations other than war (OOTW) support force requirements once the base case warfighting requirements analyses were completed. However, Army officials advised GAO that these analyses were not performed. GAO believes there may be opportunities to reduce the stress on high demand/low density specialties needed in peace operations, consistent with guidance. Further, the recommended analysis could prove useful to the Office of the Secretary of Defense in developing future policy. More recently, GAO found that during TAA 2007 the Army did, in fact, assess requirements for seven small scale contingencies based on the "moderate" posture of engagement contained in current defense guidance and determined the numbers and types of units needed to satisfy those seven contingencies. GAO used this data to determine if the Army's two-war force contained the right mix of forces to engage in multiple OOTWs. Both DOD and the Army have agreed to take corrective action in response to GAO's latest report, Force Structure: Army Lacks Units Needed for Extended Contingency Operations (GAO-01-198, February 2001), which was based on this analysis. The Army has agreed to assess the criticality of small scale contingency (SSC) shortfalls; however, the Army will use Quadrennial Defense Review 2001 Dynamic Commitment Games as the baseline. This data will be more current and robust than the data available from Total Army Analysis 2007. This analysis is ongoing and will be conluded later in 2001. Also, DOD has agreed to change Future Defense Planning Guidance to allow components to determine whether small scale contingency requirements should be considered as additive to Major Theater War assets and specific planning scenarios. However, prioritization of available resources will determine whether or not a particular requirement is funded. These are significant changes on the part of both the Army and DOD and substantially implement GAO's initial recommendation from this 1997 report.

The Army has taken some initiatives which address the intent of this recommendation.

The Army adopted the recommendation in TAA 2005. According to the U.S. Army Concepts Analysis Agency (CAA), which models the Army's warfighting requirements, the Army reran the mobility model with the TAA 2005 required force to determine the impact on force flow and the campaign.

The Army has no plans to consider contractor personnel or civilians in the resourcing phase of Total Army Analysis (TAA). However, the Army did agree that some of the National Guard's aviation assets could be applied against warfighting requirements. GAO previously verified that the Army had assigned a warfighting role to two National Guard Blackhawk aviation companies. Further, in a March 15, 1999, report, GAO found that, in addition to these two aviation companies, the Army identified warfighting missions for one attack helicopter battalion, seven chemical companies, and three field artillery battalions, for a total of 3,600 National Guard divisional spaces. GAO's work this year shows that in TAA 2007, the Army was able to identify within the Guard three additional field artillery battalions and an additional attack helicopter battalion that could be tasked with warfight missions, an increase of about 2200 over the spaces noted previously. In addition, in TAA 2007, the Army, for the first time, included all military civilian, and contractor employees. This is a significant step toward establishing an analytical basis for all Army requirements. The Army TAA process has continued to evolve since TAA 2003, when this recommendation was made, and now encompasses much more than deployable war-fighting forces.

The Army has taken some initiatives which address the intent of this recommendation.

DOD concurred with this recommendation, but GAO's subsequent review disclosed that the Army had not carried it out. In a February 1998 report (NSIAD-98-65), GAO concluded that the Army's savings from institutional redesign would be less than projected and that the Army may not know the source of some of its savings because no single office monitors the status of redesign initiatives or their implementation costs. The February 1998 report recommended specific actions to improve the Army's ability to oversee reforms for increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of its Institutional Force. In response: the Army published a final version of Pamphlet 100-1 (the Army's Redesign "vision" document); the Army's Strategic Management Plan now contains specific performance goals and indicators for redesign initiatives; the Army's Program Analysis and Evaluation organization is responsible for tracking results for the Assistant Vice Chief of Staff; and the Chief of Staff is to validate Plan goals annually.