Defense Communications

Millions May Be Spent Unnecessarily to Expand Data Network Gao ID: IMTEC-91-6 November 7, 1990

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO assessed the: (1) cost-effectiveness of the Defense Data Network (DDN); and (2) Defense Communication Agency's (DCA) plans to spend $126 million over 7 years to expand DDN.

GAO found that: (1) the Department of Defense (DOD) established DDN to provide its users cost-effective long distance data communications; (2) even though DDN may not be the most cost-effective solution, DCA still plans to spend millions of dollars to expand DDN over the next several years; (3) some DOD users would have to spend millions to make their systems compatible with DDN; (4) the DCA single-network approach to making DDN the most cost-effective solution to DOD long distance data communication needs was not supported by an economic analysis evaluating alternatives to the network; (5) the DCA approach also failed to recognize cheaper alternatives, technical incompatibilities, and possible network transfers; and (6) DDN is expected to lose part of its current and projected customer base if DOD systems that do not perform command and control applications switch to another federal telecommunications system.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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