The Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the MX Missile System

The Air Force prepared a draft environmental impact statement (EIS) for the MX Missile System to aid in making the major decisions related to selecting the MX deployment area or areas and the approximate locations of the operating bases. GAO offered its observations concerning the draft EIS in the context that a draft EIS is issued to gain information to be considered in preparing the final EIS. Several factors diminish the credibility of the draft EIS. Weaknesses exist in the Air Force's system of internal controls for data used in the EIS. The draft itself is voluminous and difficult to review; the description of the operational concept and resource requirements is incomplete in some instances; and the draft contains several questionable assumptions. GAO believes that assumptions are questionable for selecting alternative operating base locations, determining resource availability, assessing impacts, and suggesting mitigating measures to deal with the impacts. These conditions are attributed to two factors: (1) the Air Force was faced with the difficult task of preparing a draft EIS based on various presumptions that have changed as the program has evolved, and (2) the draft EIS was prepared under very tight time limits that were necessary to attain initial deployment in July 1986. Currently, the Air Force is allowing 45 days to review, evaluate, and incorporate comments from the close of the comment period for the draft EIS until the final EIS is issued, because additional time is not available if it is to meet the critical milestone of deploying the system in 1986. This raises the question of whether the Air Force can produce a final EIS of sufficient reliability within a 45-day timeframe to enable decisionmakers to make an informed decision on the highly controversial and politically sensitive issue of MX deployment.