**GAO-07-929R**                      Published: Jul 06, 2007. Publicly Released: Aug 02, 2007.                  

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## Highlights

Each year the Department of Defense (DOD) sells millions of dollars worth of excess property to the public through a Web site run by its contractor, Government Liquidation. Before excess property can be sold on this site, it is DOD policy to screen the property to ensure it cannot be reutilized by the department in another location or that its sale would not result in sensitive military property becoming publicly available. DOD assigns demilitarization codes to sensitive military property so that, when the property is no longer in use, it is recognized and disposed of properly. However, on several prior occasions--most recently at a July 2006 hearing--we reported that management control breakdowns in DOD's excess property reutilization program resulted in the sale of sensitive military property to the public through the liquidation Web site, including property subject to demilitarization controls (demil-required property) such as F-14 aircraft parts. One country with operational F-14s, Iran, is known to be seeking these parts. If such parts were publicly available, it could jeopardize national security. At the July 2006 hearing, DOD officials testified that they would take action to prevent the improper sale of sensitive military property, including demil-required property. Given the seriousness of the security risk posed by the sale of sensitive military property to the public, Congress requested that we investigate whether (1) demil-required property was still being sold on DOD's contractor-run liquidation Web site and (2) whether DOD has taken steps to prevent further improper sales of sensitive items, including controlled and demil-required property.

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## Topics

National Defense

Federal propertyMilitary materielProperty and supply managementProperty disposalSalesSurplus federal propertySurplus propertyNational securityFighter aircraftInternational organizations