Special Operations Forces: Several Human Capital Challenges Must Be Addressed to Meet Expanded Role

In our July 2006 report, Special Operations Forces: Several Human Capital Challenges Must Be Addressed to Meet Expanded Role, GAO-06-812, we reported that although DOD planned to significantly increase the number of special operations forces personnel, the Special Operations Command had not fully determined all of the personnel requirements needed to meet its expanded mission. Specifically, the Command had not completed analyses to determine the number of headquarters staff needed to train and equip additional warfighters or the number of staff needed for the Command's new mission to plan and synchronize global actions against terrorist networks. In the absence of such analyses, we concluded that the Special Operations Command could not provide assurances to the Secretary of Defense and the Congress that planned growth in the number of personnel for the Command's headquarters would meet, exceed, or fall short of the requirements needed for its expanded mission. We recommended that the Commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command establish specific milestones for completing the Command's ongoing analyses of personnel requirements and, once completed, make adjustments to the plans for personnel increases at the Command's headquarters. Consistent with our July 2006 recommendation, the Special Operations Command completed a series of manpower studies and the Commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command adjusted the manpower baseline of the Command in August 2009 based on the analyses and recommendations of the studies. For example, the Command reallocated 215 manpower positions from the Special Operations Center for Special Operations for other priority shortfalls.

The U.S. Special Operations Command is issuing a new directive for its program to monitor the status of special operations forces personnel in a manner consistent with our recommendation.

In our July 2006 report, Special Operations Forces: Several Human Capital Challenges Must Be Addressed to Meet Expanded Role, GAO-06-812, we reported that while the U.S. Special Operations Command (Command) had established a policy to manage increased deployments, the policy had not been consistently or fully implemented. Specifically, we found that the policy's guidelines were not clear and, as a result, the Command's service component commands were implementing the policy differently from one another. In addition, we reported that the service components did not maintain internal tracking systems with complete, valid, and reliable data on personnel deployments. For example, we reported that the Army Special Operations Command was developing an internal management tool to more accurately track its personnel deployments, and officials with the Navy Special Warfare Command told us they were not maintaining current data on personnel deployments. We reported that without such data, the Command would not have the information needed to effectively manage the personnel deployments of special operations forces, which affected the Command's ability to maintain the readiness, retention, and training of special operations forces personnel. We recommended that the Commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command clarify the methodology that the Command's service components use for enforcing the deployment policy and take steps to ensure that the service components have tracking systems in place to meet the requirements of the policy. Consistent with our July 2006 recommendation, the U.S. Special Operations Command released a revised "Dwell Time" policy in January 2007 with requirements that are in compliance with DOD's deployment rules for a 1:1 dwell time ratio. The revised policy established a formal tracking and reporting requirement whereby the component commands are required to provide a monthly report to the U.S. Special Operations Command's personnel directorate. The Command's personnel directorate provides the Commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command with dwell time statistics on a quarterly basis.