Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Aerospace Daily & Defense Report
April 19, 2007
The U.S. Army is seeking about $1 billion via off-budget appropriations through September 2008 to pay for an information technology (IT) effort to account for about $60 billion worth of the Army's goods worldwide, generals told lawmakers April 18.
The effort, which is trying to consolidate as many as 800 legacy inventory IT systems to a goal of three or so, comes as key Democratic House defense appropriators expressed concern over what military equipment will be given away or left in Iraq only to some day possibly be used against U.S. forces or allies.
To be sure, the roughly $60 billion in Army inventory -- an estimate provided off the cuff by one three-star general -- is not lost or inappropriately missing as much as it has not been well archived. But congressional auditors and Beltway critics have long noted the Defense Department's shortcomings in tracking its inventory.
Since 1990, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has identified DOD's management of inventory as a high-risk area because inventory levels were too high and management systems and procedures were too ineffective -- a problem only exacerbated with burgeoning spending, acquisition and fielding brought by the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
Furthermore, DOD has attributed readiness problems to parts shortages in the past. And with a newly Democratic-controlled Congress and the nation souring on the Iraq war while federal fiscal constraints continue to tighten in general, increased financial insight is becoming a higher priority on Capitol Hill and in the Pentagon, which has had a business transformation effort under way for years.
Lt. Gen. Ann Dunwoody, deputy chief of staff for Army logistics, asked the House defense appropriations subcommittee to support the Bush administration's $225 million request in the pending supplemental bill for the rest of fiscal 2007, as well as $897 million in the proposed FY '08 supplemental, for the inventory and IT consolidation effort.
Pressed by Democratic panel members to estimate how well the Army has done since trying to get a grasp of its total inventory since about 2003, she said the service has reached 80 percent or so, with outlying areas including the Reserve. Meanwhile, the Army has boosted its insight of its inventory from $130 billion worth to $240 billion in goods and valuables. The effort so far has cost about $800 million and has culled related IT systems to below 300, she said.
-- Michael Bruno
April 19, 2007
The U.S. Army is seeking about $1 billion via off-budget appropriations through September 2008 to pay for an information technology (IT) effort to account for about $60 billion worth of the Army's goods worldwide, generals told lawmakers April 18.
The effort, which is trying to consolidate as many as 800 legacy inventory IT systems to a goal of three or so, comes as key Democratic House defense appropriators expressed concern over what military equipment will be given away or left in Iraq only to some day possibly be used against U.S. forces or allies.
To be sure, the roughly $60 billion in Army inventory -- an estimate provided off the cuff by one three-star general -- is not lost or inappropriately missing as much as it has not been well archived. But congressional auditors and Beltway critics have long noted the Defense Department's shortcomings in tracking its inventory.
Since 1990, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has identified DOD's management of inventory as a high-risk area because inventory levels were too high and management systems and procedures were too ineffective -- a problem only exacerbated with burgeoning spending, acquisition and fielding brought by the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
Furthermore, DOD has attributed readiness problems to parts shortages in the past. And with a newly Democratic-controlled Congress and the nation souring on the Iraq war while federal fiscal constraints continue to tighten in general, increased financial insight is becoming a higher priority on Capitol Hill and in the Pentagon, which has had a business transformation effort under way for years.
Lt. Gen. Ann Dunwoody, deputy chief of staff for Army logistics, asked the House defense appropriations subcommittee to support the Bush administration's $225 million request in the pending supplemental bill for the rest of fiscal 2007, as well as $897 million in the proposed FY '08 supplemental, for the inventory and IT consolidation effort.
Pressed by Democratic panel members to estimate how well the Army has done since trying to get a grasp of its total inventory since about 2003, she said the service has reached 80 percent or so, with outlying areas including the Reserve. Meanwhile, the Army has boosted its insight of its inventory from $130 billion worth to $240 billion in goods and valuables. The effort so far has cost about $800 million and has culled related IT systems to below 300, she said.
-- Michael Bruno