United States General Accounting Office

GAO National Security and International

Affairs Division

March 1995 Defense Management and

NASA Issue Area Plan

Fiscal Years 1995-97

GAO/IAP-95-6

Foreword

The Defense Management and NASA issue area is one of the General

Accounting Office’s 35 issue areas. Relying heavily on input from

congressional committees, as well as industry, academia, agency officials

and other experts, GAO develops issue area plans to ensure that our

resources are focused on the most important concerns of the Congress.

GAO serves as a source of timely, accurate information and unbiased

analysis for decisionmakers in the Congress and executive agencies. For

each issue area, GAO’s strategic plan describes the significance of the

issues, our objectives, and the focus of our work. Our work includes such

products as reports, briefings, and testimonies.

Defense and NASA managers face many challenges as they strive to

streamline operations, control cost growth in high interest programs,

manage existing infrastructures, and accomplish their missions. GAO’s

overall strategy for Defense Management and NASA issues is to identify

innovative, efficient, and cost effective approaches to redesigning

Department of Defense (DOD) and National Aeronautics and Space

Administration (NASA) management and infrastructure. Our work focuses

on encouraging the reengineering and streamlining of Defense and NASA

operations through new processes and best management practices. Our

goal is to identify opportunities to save money, achieve management

efficiencies, and improve results. The principal issues in the Defense

Management and NASA area include

•opportunities for additional savings from consolidating or eliminating

infrastructure activities;

•the base closure process, recommendations, lessons learned, and

barriers to transitioning military bases to civilian use;

•best management practices of public and private sector entities that can

be applied to DOD operations;

•unfunded liabilities facing DOD in such areas as environmental cleanup

and chemical weapons disposal;

• progress in implementing such DOD initiatives as the Corporate

Information Management and the Defense Business Operation Fund;

•opportunities to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of NASA space

and aeronautical programs and the usefulness of their results; and

Page 1 GAO/IAP-95-6
Foreword

•cooperative efforts between NASA and other domestic and international

entities to enhance the resources available for space and aeronautical

research and development.

In the pages that follow, we describe our objectives and planned work on

these issues.

Because unanticipated events may affect this plan, GAO’s planning process

allows for updating the plan and responding to new emerging issues. If you

have any questions or suggestions about this plan, please call me at

(202) 512-8412.

David R. Warren

Director, Defense Management and NASA Issues

Page 2 GAO/IAP-95-6
Contents

Foreword 1

Table I: Key Issues 4

Table II: Planned

Major Work

6

Table III: GAO

Contacts

7

Page 3 GAO/IAP-95-6
Table I: Key Issues

Issue Significance

Infrastructure management: Is DOD efficiently and effectively

managing military and civilian elements of its infrastructure?

Infrastructure costs accounted for $160 billion (59 percent) of

DOD’s fiscal year 1994 budget. The Congress relies on GAO to

provide a detailed analysis of the base closure and realignment

process and recommendations. DOD anticipates operational

savings and efficiencies will be achieved in the base closure

process. DOD believes that additional infrastructure savings and

efficiencies could be achieved by consolidating more functions.

Best management practices: What best management practices of

public and private sector entities can be applied to DOD

operations?

DOD believes that improving management practices and

strengthening incentives would reduce its variable infrastructure

costs. DOD must increase privatization and change its existing

management practices and procedures to overcome

longstanding problems and to decrease costs, particularly in the

areas of inventory management and installation support activities.

Program management: Does DOD’s management approach

achieve efficiencies and allow it to maintain control over its

operations, including the management of high-interest programs?

DOD must streamline procedures and manage its cost growth of

programs, such as environmental compliance and chemical

weapons disposal, to maintain its force structure and readiness.

DOD has stewardship of 25 million acres of land with more than

18,000 sites that need to be cleaned up. Cleanup requirements

include fuels, solvents, hazardous and nuclear waste, unexploded

bombs and shells, and chemical weapons. Technology

development efforts are needed to meet DOD’s widespread

environmental needs and chemical weapons disposal

requirements.

NASA and space operations: What opportunities exist to improve

the management of space and aeronautical programs and the

usefulness of their results?

NASA’s budget is unlikely to grow for the foreseeable future. In

such an environment, NASA needs to make its projects affordable

by identifying and implementing more efficient management

practices, developing a more efficient infrastructure, and

improving its oversight of contractors. NASA should also extend

the influence of its space and aeronautical spending through

domestic and international arrangements that share development

cost and risk with others and make its research results more

relevant and available to other sectors of the U.S. economy.

Page 4 GAO/IAP-95-6
Table I: Key Issues

Objectives Focus of work

—Assess the base closure and realignment process,

recommendations, and transition to civilian use.

—Identify opportunities for additional savings from consolidating or

eliminating infrastructure activities.

—Monitor inventory reduction efforts.

•Base closure and realignment process, procedures,

recommendations, and results

•Savings and efficiencies of base closures

•Barriers to transitioning closed bases

•Infrastructure programs and costs affected by changes in force

structure

•The need for and costs of mandated infrastructure activities and

functions

•Inventory trends, levels, and goals

—Identify proven operational and management practices that

achieve economies, efficiencies, and savings; and asses how

DOD can best use them. 

—Monitor DOD’s management of high-risk areas. 

•Private sector’s management practices, concepts, and

techniques to achieve operational improvements and efficiencies

•Management practices, concepts, and techniques to change

DOD’s culture and to achieve operational improvements and

efficiencies

•DOD’s management of high-risk programs

—Evaluate the ability of DOD to efficiently and effectively manage

its new environment. 

—Identify areas that represent unfunded liabilities in future year

budgets. 

—Identify issues in disposing of chemical weapons. 

•DOD’s management initiatives to re-engineer, restructure, and

streamline operations

•DOD’s initiatives to streamline procedures and to maintain

control over CIM and DBOF

•Issues relating to funding, treaty ratification, environment,

storage, and disposal of biological and chemical munitions

—Assess NASA’s efforts to improve the efficiency and

effectiveness of its program, project, and procurement

management. 

—Evaluate whether NASA has developed an appropriate

infrastructure to support projected roles and missions. 

—Determine whether NASA is enhancing the resources available

for space and aeronautical research and development through

appropriate joint arrangements with others.

•Management of major programs (space transportation system,

space station, and earth observing system)

•Efficiency of government-wide space research and operations

•Effectiveness of NASA procurement reform

•Adequacy of budgetary and personnel resources

•Effectiveness of efforts to enhance resources through

arrangements with other domestic and international entities

•Efficiency and cost of NASA’s infrastructure

Page 5 GAO/IAP-95-6
Table II: Planned Major Work

Issue Planned major job starts

Infrastructure management — Review the 1995 base closure process 

— Evaluate transition of military bases 

— Assess public versus private depot maintenance

— Evaluate reducing secondary inventory 

— Evaluate cost of base closures

— Assess DFAS reengineering 

— Assess TRANSCOM reengineering 

— Review DOD infrastructure programs and costs

— Assess DPS versus GPO or private sector printing

Best management practices — Review best practices effectiveness 

— Evaluate benchmarking 

— Review aircraft repairables 

— Review tracked-vehicle repairables

— Evaluate disposal and reutilization systems 

— Evaluate best practices methodology

— Assess targets of opportunity

Program management — Review CIM 

— Evaluate compliance with environmental cleanup standards 

— Assess DOD’s pollution prevention 

— Review DBOF mechanism and customer impact

— Review chemical weapons disposal program

NASA and space operations — Evaluate space program infrastructure requirements

— Assess the adequacy of NASA’s program and project management cycle 

— Review effectiveness of space technology transfer

— Review NASA’s management of personnel downsizing 

— Evaluate effectiveness of cost controls in the space station program 

— Review application of best management practices by NASA

— Evaluate shuttle operations and management

— Review international cooperation initiatives

— Review life-cycle costs of the space station and earth observing system

Page 6 GAO/IAP-95-6
Table III: GAO Contacts

Director David R. Warren (202) 512-8412

Associate Director James F. Wiggins (202) 512-8412

Assistant Directors Uldis Adamsons

Francis P. Degnan Jr.

Julia C. Denman

Lee A. Edwards

James E. Hatcher

Barry W. Holman

Thomas J. Howard

George A. Jahnigen

John J. Klotz

Kenneth R. Knouse

Clementine H. Rasberry

Foy D. Wicker

Page 7 GAO/IAP-95-6
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