Missile Procurement

GAO reviewed the status of the Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) program, focusing on whether the: (1) Department of Defense had conducted operationally realistic tests on AMRAAM effectiveness and suitability in combat; and (2) development contractors demonstrated the ability to produce quality missiles at the required rate.

GAO found that: (1) AMRAAM reliability more than doubled from an average of about 90 hours between maintenance in early 1990 to over 200 hours in early 1991, meeting the reliability requirement for full-rate production; (2) the Air Force only completed about 60 percent of its test program designed to demonstrate progress toward the 450 hours required after the system has been operational for 2 years; (3) the Defense Acquisition Board concluded that additional testing was needed before AMRAAM could enter full-rate production; (4) questions remained regarding AMRAAM effectiveness after being carried on operationally realistic flights and the lethality of the missile's warhead; (5) as of May 1990, the contractors' missile deliveries were at least 6 months behind schedule, since the design and manufacturing changes resulted in further delays, causing the Air Force to extend delivery schedules; (6) on the basis of new delivery schedules, $156.2 million of the $882 million requested for 891 missiles for fiscal year (FY) 1992 will not be needed, since the Air Force does not expect delivery of 314 requested missiles until FY 1993; and (7) unless both contractors substantially increase their deliveries, the amount of unneeded funds will increase.

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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