Defense Inventory

Lax compliance by the Defense Department with its own disposal policies and procedures has resulted in the inadvertent sale to the public of surplus parts with sensitive military technology intact. These sales occurred for three reasons. First, the military assigned the wrong demilitarization codes to the parts. Second, an initiative intended to correct inaccurately assigned demilitarization codes did not ensure that data systems were updated with the corrected codes. Third, the methods that the disposal offices used to demilitarize some parts did not adequately destroy the military technology they contained. At the same time, DOD has made slow and uneven progress in implementing initiatives to prevent the sale of dangerous aircraft parts to the public.

GAO noted that: (1) while DOD recognizes the dangers associated with selling surplus parts with military technology to the public and has taken certain actions to address the problem, DOD's disposal offices have inadvertently sold surplus parts with military technology intact; (2) these sales occurred for three reasons; (3) the military services assigned the wrong demilitarization codes to the parts; (4) because guidance was inadequate, codes assigned to parts with military technology incorrectly indicated that the parts did not contain the technology; (5) DOD has been considering ways to address this situation but has not yet reached a final decision; (6) an initiative intended to correct inaccurately assigned demilitarization codes did not ensure that data systems were updated with the corrected codes; (7) as a result, disposal offices continued to sell parts with military technology intact after the codes for the parts were determined to be inaccurately assigned; (8) personnel responsible for correcting the inaccurately assigned codes did not always update their data systems with the corrected codes; (9) the methods that the disposal offices used to demilitarize some parts did not adequately destroy the military technology contained in the parts; (10) guidance to disposal offices on how to destroy the military technology inherent in some items was not adequate; (11) DOD and its components have not aggressively pursued implementation of initiatives to prevent the sale of potentially dangerous flight safety critical aircraft parts through the disposal system; (12) DOD and the components have not set timelines for implementing the flight safety program; (13) also, none of the components have fully implemented all of the program initiatives, but some have made greater progress than others; (14) for example, at the time GAO's fieldwork was completed, the Army had identified over 4,500 aircraft parts with flight safety implications, whereas the Navy had not identified any aircraft parts with these implications; and (15) DOD plans to increase its interaction and involvement in the program, but the military services and the Defense Logistics Agency continue to have problems accomplishing flight safety program initiatives.

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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