Operation Desert Shield/Storm

Update on Costs and Funding Requirements Gao ID: NSIAD-92-194 May 8, 1992

Congress established the Defense Cooperation Account in fiscal year 1991 to receive contributions from foreign countries to help defray the costs of national defense efforts, such as Operations Desert Shield/Storm. This report discusses (1) the status of the account through fiscal year 1992, (2) the extent of future funding requirements, (3) the impact of operations related to and financed by revolving fund surpluses on the Defense Department's budget, and (4) the status of the Persian Gulf Regional Defense Fund.

GAO found that: (1) contributions to the account will not fully cover estimated incremental costs or funding requirements for the operations; (2) not all operations costs were funded by the account and almost $2.3 billion in contributions and interest should remain in the account by the end of FY 1992; (3) DOD requested additional spending authority to finance Operation-related maintenance requirements for FY 1993, but the amount of funding required has not been fully determined; (4) using Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) data, DOD identified $3.9 billion in future benefits costs for veterans and their spouses; (5) Operation-related and financed surpluses in DOD revolving funds total at least $2.6 billion; and (6) DOD reduced its FY 1993 operation and maintenance budget request to offset an estimated $2-billion surplus in Operation-financed supplies and equipment.

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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