Missile Defense: Review of Allegations about an Early National Missile Defense Flight Test
Published: 2002-02-28T00:00:00

Fast Facts:

Highlights:
section_title: What GAO Found
paragraphs: The Department of Defense (DOD) awarded contracts to three companies in 1990 to develop and test exoatmospheric kill vehicles. One of the contractors--Boeing North American--subcontracted with TRW to develop software for the kill vehicle. In 1998, Boeing became the Lead System Integrator for the National Missile Defense Program and chose Raytheon as the primary kill vehicle developer. Boeing and TRW reported that the June 1997 flight test achieved its primary objectives but detected some sensor abnormalities. The project office relied on Boeing to oversee the performance of TRW. Boeing and TRW reported that deployed target objects displayed distinguishable features when being observed by an infrared sensor. After considerable debate, the program manager reduced the number of decoys planned for intercept flight tests in response to a recommendation by an independent panel. The Phase One Engineering Team, which was responsible for completing an assessment of TRW's software performance within two months using available data, found that although the software had weaknesses, it was well designed and worked properly, with only some changes needed to increase the robustness of the discrimination function. On the basis of that analysis, team members predicted that the software would perform successfully in a future intercept test if target objects deployed as expected.

section_title: Letter
paragraphs: For a number of years, the Department of Defense has been researching  and developing defenses against ballistic missile attacks on the United  States, its deployed forces, friends, and allies. In 1990, the Department  awarded research and development contracts to three contractors to  develop and test exoatmospheric kill vehicles. The Department planned to  use the best of the three vehicles in a follow-on missile defense program.  One of the contractors, Rockwell International, subcontracted a portion of  its kill vehicle design work to TRW. TRW was tasked with developing  software that could operate on a computer onboard the kill vehicle. The  software was to analyze data collected in flight by the kill vehicle’s sensor  (which collects real-time information about threat objects), enabling the  kill vehicle to distinguish an enemy warhead from accompanying decoys.
The three contractors proceeded with development of the kill vehicle  designs and built and tested key subsystems (such as the sensor) until  1994. In 1994, the Department of Defense eliminated Martin Marietta from  the competition. Both Rockwell—portions of which in December 1996  became Boeing North American—and Hughes—now Raytheon—  continued designing and testing their kill vehicles. In 1997 and 1998, the  National Missile Defense Joint Program Office conducted tests, in space,  of the sensors being developed by the contractors for their competing kill  vehicles.  Boeing's sensor was tested in June 1997 (Integrated Flight Test  1A) and Raytheon's sensor was tested in January 1998 (Integrated Flight  Test 2). Program officials said these tests were not meant to demonstrate  that the sensor met performance requirements, nor were they intended to  be the basis for any contract award decisions. Rather, they were early  research and development tests that the program office considered  experiments to primarily reduce risk in future flight tests.  Specifically, the  tests were designed to determine if the sensor could operate in space; to  examine the extent to which the sensor could detect small differences in  infrared emissions; to determine if the sensor was accurately calibrated;  and to collect target signature data for post-mission discrimination  analysis.
After the two sensor tests, the program office planned another 19 flight  tests from 1999 through 2005 in which the kill vehicle would attempt to  intercept a mock warhead. Initially, Boeing’s kill vehicle was scheduled for  testing in Integrated Flight Test 3 and Raytheon’s in Integrated Flight Test  4. However, Boeing became the Lead System Integrator for the National  Missile Defense Program in April 1998 and, before the third flight test was  conducted, selected Raytheon as the primary kill vehicle developer.
Meanwhile, in September 1995, TRW had hired a senior staff engineer,  Dr. Nira Schwartz, to work on various projects, including the company’s  effort to develop the exoatmospheric kill vehicle’s discrimination  software. The engineer helped evaluate some facets of a technology  known as the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor, which TRW  planned to add as an enhancement to its discrimination software. The  engineer reported to TRW in February 1996 that tests revealed that the  Filter could not extract the key characteristics, or features, from various  target objects that an enemy missile might deploy and demanded that the  company inform Rockwell and the Department of Defense. TRW fired the  engineer in March 1996. In April 1996, the engineer filed a lawsuit under  the False Claims Act alleging that TRW falsely reported or hid  information to make the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office  believe that the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor met the  Department’s technical requirements. The engineer has amended the  lawsuit several times, including adding allegations that TRW misled the  Department of Defense about the ability of its discrimination software to  distinguish a warhead from decoys and that TRW’s test reports on  Integrated Flight Test 1A falsely represented the discrimination software’s  performance.
The False Claims Act allows a person to bring a lawsuit on behalf of the  U.S. government if he or she has knowledge that a person or company has  made a false or fraudulent claim against the government. If the suit is  successful, the person bringing the lawsuit may share in any money  recovered. The Department of Justice reviews all lawsuits filed under the  act before deciding whether to join them. If it does, it becomes primarily  responsible for prosecuting the case.
To determine whether it should join the engineer's lawsuit against TRW,  Justice asked the Defense Criminal Investigative Service, a unit within the  Department of Defense Inspector General’s office, to examine the  allegations. The engineer cooperated with the Investigative Service for  more than 2 years. During the course of the Department of Defense’s  investigation into the allegations of contractor fraud, two groups  examined the former employee’s specific allegations regarding the  performance of TRW’s basic discrimination software and performed  limited evaluations of the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor. The  first was Nichols Research Corporation, a contractor providing technical  assistance to the Ground Based Interceptor Project Management Office for  its oversight of the exoatmospheric kill vehicle contracts. (This office  within the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office is responsible for  the exoatmospheric kill vehicle contracts.) Because an investigator for the  Defense Criminal Investigative Service was concerned about the ability of  Nichols to provide a truly objective assessment, the National Missile  Defense Joint Program Office asked an existing advisory group, known as  the Phase One Engineering Team, to undertake another review of the  specific allegations of fraud with respect to the software. This group is  comprised of scientists from Federally Funded Research and Development  Centers who were selected for the review team because of their  knowledge of the National Missile Defense system. In addition, both  Nichols and the Phase One Engineering Team assessed the feasibility of  using the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor to extract additional  features from target objects that an enemy missile might deploy.
The Department of Justice and the Defense Criminal Investigative Service  investigated the engineer’s allegations until March 1999. At that time, the  Department of Justice decided not to intervene in the lawsuit. The  engineer has continued to pursue her lawsuit without Justice’s  intervention.
Because you were the principal sponsors of the 1986 amendments to the  False Claims Act and are interested in eliminating fraud in federal  government programs, you asked that we review the former TRW  employee’s allegations. As agreed with your offices, we focused our review  on Integrated Flight Test 1A. We also examined the evaluations of TRW’s  discrimination software and Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor  conducted by Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase One  Engineering Team. To answer your question regarding whether the Phase  One Engineering Team’s evaluation was objective and unbiased, we  examined how the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office  addressed the team’s potential conflicts of interest. We also reviewed the  basis for the Department of Justice’s decision not to intervene in the  former TRW employee’s lawsuit. Specifically, this report addresses the  following questions:  1.	 Did Boeing and TRW disclose the key results and limitations of the  flight test to the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office?  2.	 What were the methodology, findings, and limitations of the  evaluations conducted by Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase  One Engineering Team of TRW’s discrimination software and the  Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor?  3.	 What was the basis for the Department of Justice’s decision not to join  the lawsuit?  4.	 How did the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office assure  itself that the Phase One Engineering Team could provide an  independent and objective review?
subsections: section_title: Disclosure of Key Results and Limitations
paragraphs: Boeing and TRW disclosed the key results and limitations of Integrated  Flight Test 1A in written reports released between August 13, 1997, and  April 1, 1998.  The contractors explained in a report issued 60 days after  the June 1997 test that the test achieved its primary objectives, but that  some sensor abnormalities were noted. For example, while the report  explained that the sensor detected the deployed targets and collected  some usable target signals, the report also stated that some sensor  components did not operate as desired and the sensor often detected  targets where there were none.  In December 1997, the contractors  documented other test anomalies.  According to briefing charts prepared  for a December meeting, the Boeing sensor tested in Integrated Flight Test  1A had a low probability of detection; the sensor’s software was not  always confident that it had correctly identified some target objects; the  software significantly increased the rank of one target object toward the  end of the flight; and in-flight calibration of the sensor was inconsistent.  Additionally, on April 1, 1998, the contractors submitted an addendum to  an earlier report that noted two more problems.  In this addendum, the  contractors disclosed that their claim that TRW’s software successfully  distinguished a mock warhead from decoys during a post-flight analysis  was based on tests of the software using about one-third of the target  signals collected during Integrated Flight Test 1A. The contractors also  noted that TRW reduced the software’s reference data so that it would  correspond to the collected target signals being analyzed.  Project office  and Nichols Research officials said that in late August 1997, the  contractors orally communicated to them all problems and limitations that  were subsequently described in the December 1997 briefing and the April  1998 addendum.  However, neither project officials nor contractors could  provide us with documentation of these communications.
Although the contractors reported the test’s key results and limitations,  they described the results using some terms that were not defined. For  example, one written report characterized the test as a “success” and the  sensor’s performance as “excellent.”  We found that the information in the  contractors’ reports, in total, enabled officials in the Ground Based  Interceptor Project Management Office and Nichols Research to  understand the key results and limitations of the test. However, because  such terms are qualitative and subjective rather than quantitative and  objective, their use increased the likelihood that test results would be  interpreted in different ways and might even be misunderstood. As part of  our ongoing review of missile defense testing, we are examining the need  for improvements in test reporting.
Appendix I provides details on the test and the information disclosed.
section_title: Evaluations of TRW’s Discrimination Software
paragraphs: Two groups—Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase One  Engineering Team— evaluated TRW’s basic discrimination software.  Nichols evaluated the software by testing it against simulated warheads  and decoys similar to those that the contractors were directed to design  their software to handle. The evaluation concluded that although the  software had some weaknesses, it met performance requirements  established by Boeing in nearly all cases. However, Nichols explained  that the software was successful because the simulated threat was  relatively simple. Nichols said that TRW’s software was highly dependent  on prior knowledge about the threat and that the test conditions that  Nichols' engineers established for the evaluation included providing  perfect knowledge of the features that the simulated warhead and decoys  would display during the test.
Nichols’ evaluation was limited because it did not test TRW’s software  using actual flight data from Integrated Flight Test 1A. Nichols told us that  it had planned to assess the software’s performance using real target  signals collected during Integrated Flight Test 1A, but did not do so  because resources were limited. Because it did not perform this  assessment, Nichols cannot be said to have definitively proved or  disproved TRW’s claim that its software discriminated the mock warhead  from decoys using data collected from Integrated Flight Test 1A.
The Phase One Engineering Team was tasked by the National Missile  Defense Joint Program Office to assess the performance of TRW’s  software and to complete the assessment within 2 months using available  data. The team’s methodology included determining if TRW’s software was  based on sound mathematical, engineering, and scientific principles and  testing the software’s critical modules using data from Integrated Flight  Test 1A.
The team reported that although the software had weaknesses, it was well  designed and worked properly, with only some changes needed to  increase the robustness of the discrimination function. Further, the team  reported that the results of its test of the software using Integrated Flight  Test 1A data produced essentially the same results as those reported by  TRW. Based on its analysis, team members predicted that the software  would perform successfully in a future intercept test if target objects  deployed as expected.
Because the Phase One Engineering Team did not process the raw data  from Integrated Flight Test 1A or develop its own reference data, the team  cannot be said to have definitively proved or disproved TRW’s claim that  its software successfully distinguished the mock warhead from decoys  using data collected from Integrated Flight Test 1A. A team member told  us its use of Boeing- and TRW-provided data was appropriate because the  former TRW employee had not alleged that the contractors tampered with  the raw test data or used inappropriate reference data.
In assessing TRW’s Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor, both  Nichols and the Phase One Engineering Team tested whether the Filter  could be used to extract an additional feature (key characteristic) from a  target object’s signal to help identify that object. Nichols tested the Filter’s  ability against a number of simulated target signals and found that it was  generally successful. The Phase One Engineering Team tested the Filter’s  ability using the signals of one simulated target and one collected during  Integrated Flight Test 1A. Both groups concluded that the Filter could  feasibly provide additional information about target objects, but neither  group’s evaluation allowed it to forecast whether the Filter would improve  the basic software’s discrimination capability.
Appendix II provides additional details on the Nichols and Phase One  Engineering Team evaluations.
section_title: Justice’s Decision Not to Join Suit
paragraphs: The Department of Justice relied primarily on scientific reports, but  considered information from two Army legal offices when it determined in  March 1999 that it would not intervene in the false claims lawsuit brought  by the former TRW employee. The scientific reports were prepared by  Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase One Engineering Team.  Justice’s attorneys said they also considered an opinion of the Army Space  and Missile Defense Command’s legal office that said it did not consider  vouchers submitted by Boeing for work performed by its subcontractor,  TRW, as being false claims. In addition, the attorneys said a  recommendation from the Army Legal Services Agency that Justice not  intervene was a factor in their decision. It is not clear how the Army Legal  Services Agency came to that decision as very little documentation is  available and agency officials told us that they remember very little about  the case.
Appendix III provides additional information on factors that were  considered in Justice’s decision.
section_title: Steps to Assure Independent and Objective Review by the Phase One Engineering Team
paragraphs: When the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office determined that  another assessment of TRW’s software should be undertaken, it tasked an  existing advisory group, known as the Phase One Engineering Team, to  conduct this review. Comprised of various Federally Funded Research and  Development Centers, this group was established in 1988 by the Strategic  Defense Initiative Organization as a mechanism to provide the program  office with access to a continuous, independent, and objective source of  technical and engineering expertise. Since the Federally Funded Research  and Development Centers are authorized, established, and operated for  the express purpose of providing the government with independent and  objective advice, program officials determined that making use of this  existing advisory group would be sufficient to assure an independent and  objective review. Program officials said that they relied upon the centers’  adherence to requirements contained in both the Federal Acquisition  Regulation and their contracts and agreements with their sponsoring  federal agencies to assure themselves that the review team could provide  an independent, unbiased look at TRW’s software.
Appendix IV provides a fuller explanation of the steps taken by the  National Missile Defense Joint Program Office to assure itself that the  Phase One Engineering Team would provide an independent and objective  review.
section_title: Agency Comments and Our Evaluation
paragraphs: In commenting on a draft of this report, the Department of Defense and  the Department of Justice concurred with our findings.  The Department  of Defense also suggested technical changes, which we incorporated as  appropriate.  The Department of Defense's comments are reprinted in  appendix VII. The Department of Justice provided its concurrence via  e-mail and had no additional comments.
We conducted our review from August 2000 through February 2002 in  accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.  Appendix VI provides details on our scope and methodology. The National  Missile Defense Joint Program Office’s process for releasing documents  significantly slowed our work. For example, the program office took  approximately 4 months to release key documents, such as Nichols  Research Corporation’s 1996 and 1998 evaluations of the Extended  Kalman Filter Feature Extractor and Nichols’ 1997 evaluation of TRW’s  discrimination software. We requested these and other documents on  September 14, 2000, and received them on January 9, 2001.
As arranged with your staff, unless you publicly announce its contents earlier, we plan no further distribution of this report until 30 days from its issue date. At that time, we plan to provide copies of this report to the Chairmen and Ranking Minority Members of the Senate Committee on Armed Services; the Senate Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Defense; the House Committee on Armed Services; and the House Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Defense; and the Secretary of Defense; the Attorney General; and the Director, Missile Defense Agency. We will make copies available to others upon request.
If you or your staff have any questions concerning this report, please contact Bob Levin, Director, Acquisition and Sourcing Management, on (202) 512-4841; Jack Brock, Managing Director, on (202) 512-4841; or Keith Rhodes, Chief Technologist, on (202) 512-6412. Major contributors to this report are listed in appendix VIII.
section_title: Appendix I: Disclosure of Flight Test’s Key Results and Limitations
paragraphs: Boeing and TRW disclosed the key results and limitations of an early  sensor flight test, known as Integrated Flight Test 1A, to the Ground Based  Interceptor Project Management Office. The contractors included some  key results and limitations in written reports submitted soon after the June  1997 test, but others were not included in written reports until December  1997 or April 1998.  However, according to project office and Nichols  officials, all problems and limitations included in the written reports were  communicated orally to the project management office in late August  1997. The deputy project office manager said his office did not report  these verbal communications to others within the Program Office or the  Department of Defense because the project office was the office within  the Department responsible for the Boeing contract.
One problem that was included in initial reports to program officials was a  malfunctioning cooling mechanism that did not lower the sensor’s  temperature to the desired level. Boeing characterized the mechanism’s  performance as somewhat below expectations but functioning well  enough for the sensor’s operation. We hired experts to determine the  extent to which the problem could affect the sensor’s performance. The  experts found that the cooling problem degraded the sensor’s performance  in a number of ways, but would not likely result in extreme performance  degradation. The experts studied only how increased noise affected the  sensor’s performance regarding comparative strengths of the target signals  and the noise (signal to noise ratio).  The experts did not evaluate  discrimination performance, which is dependent on the measurement  accuracy of the collected infrared signals. The experts’ findings are  discussed in more detail later in this appendix.
subsections: section_title: The Test
paragraphs: Integrated Flight Test 1A, conducted in June 1997, was a test of the Boeing  sensor—a highly sensitive, compact, infrared device, consisting of an array  of silicon detectors, that is normally mounted on the exoatmospheric kill  vehicle. However, in this test, a surrogate launch vehicle carried the sensor  above the earth’s atmosphere to view a cluster of target objects that  included a mock warhead and various decoys. When the sensor detected  the target cluster, its silicon detectors began to make precise  measurements of the infrared radiation emitted by the target objects. Over  the tens of seconds that the target objects were within its field of view, the  sensor continuously converted the infrared radiation into an electrical  current, or signal, proportional to the amount of energy collected by the  detectors. The sensor then digitized the signal (converted the signals into  numerical values), completed a preliminary part of the planned signal  processing, and formatted the signal so that it could be transmitted via a  data link to a recorder on the ground. After the test, Boeing processed the  signals further and formatted them so that TRW could input the signals  into its discrimination software to assess its capability to distinguish the  mock warhead from decoys. In post-flight ground testing, the software  analyzed the processed data and identified the key characteristics, or  features, of each signal. The software then compared the features it  extracted to the expected features of various types of target objects. Based  on this comparison, the software ranked each item according to its  likelihood of being the mock warhead. TRW reported that the highest- ranked object was the mock warhead.
The primary objective of Integrated Flight Test 1A was to reduce risk in  future flight tests.  Specifically, the test was designed to determine if the  sensor could operate in space; to examine the extent to which the sensor  could detect small differences in infrared emissions; to determine if the  sensor was accurately calibrated; and to collect target signature data for  post-mission discrimination analysis. In addition, Boeing established  quantitative requirements for the test. For example, the sensor was  expected to acquire the target objects at a specified distance. According to  a Nichols’ engineer, Boeing established these requirements to ensure that  its exoatmospheric kill vehicle, when fully developed, could destroy a  warhead with the single shot precision (expressed as a probability)  required by the Ground Based Interceptor Project Management Office. The  engineer said that in Integrated Flight Test 1A, Boeing planned to measure  its sensor’s performance against these lower-level requirements so that  Boeing engineers could determine which sensor elements, including the  software, required further refinement. However, the engineer told us that  because of the various sensor problems, of which the contractor and  project office were aware, Boeing determined before the test that it would  not use most of these requirements to judge the sensor’s performance.  (Although Boeing did not judge the performance of its sensor against the  requirements as it originally planned, Boeing did, in some cases, report the  sensor’s performance in terms of these requirements. For a summary of  selected test requirements and the sensor’s performance as reported by  Boeing and TRW in their August 22, 1997, report, see app. V.)
section_title: Reported Key Results and Limitations
paragraphs: Table 1 provides details on the key results and limitations of Integrated  Flight Test 1A that contractors disclosed in various written reports and  briefing charts.
Although the contractors disclosed the key results and limitations of the  flight test in written reports and in discussions, the written reports  described the results using some terms that were not defined. For  example, in their August 22, 1997, report, Boeing and TRW described  Integrated Flight Test 1A as a “success” and the performance of the Boeing  sensor as “excellent.”  We asked the contractors to explain their use of  these terms. We asked Boeing, for example, why it characterized its  sensor’s performance as “excellent” when the sensor’s silicon detector  array did not cool to the desired temperature, the sensor’s power supply  created excess noise, and the sensor detected numerous false targets.  Boeing said that even though the silicon detector array operated at  temperatures 20 to 30 percent higher than desired, the sensor produced  useful data. Officials said they knew of no other sensor that would be  capable of producing any useful data under those conditions. Boeing  officials went on to say that the sensor continuously produced usable, and,  much of the time, excellent data in “real-time” during flight. In addition,  officials said the sensor component responsible for suppressing  background noise in the silicon detector array performed perfectly in  space and the silicon detectors collected data in more than one wave  band. Boeing concluded that the sensor’s performance allowed the test to  meet all mission objectives.
Based on our review of the reports and discussions with officials in the  Ground Based Interceptor Project Management Office and Nichols  Research, we found that the contractors’ reports, in total, contained  information for those officials to understand the key results and  limitations of the test. However, because terms such as “success” and  “excellent” are qualitative and subjective rather than quantitative and  objective, we believe their use increases the likelihood that test results  would be interpreted in different ways and could even be misunderstood.  As part of our ongoing review of missile defense testing, we are examining  the need for improvements in test reporting.
subsections: section_title: The August 13 Report
paragraphs: This report, sometimes referred to as the 45-day report, was a series of  briefing charts. In it, contractors reported that Integrated Flight Test 1A  achieved its principal objectives of reducing risks for subsequent flight  tests, demonstrating the performance of the exoatmospheric kill vehicle’s  sensor, and collecting target signature data. In addition, the report stated  that TRW’s software successfully distinguished a mock warhead from  accompanying decoys.
section_title: The August 22 Report
paragraphs: The August 22 report, known as the 60-day report, was a lengthy document  that disclosed much more than the August 13 report. As discussed in more  detail below, the report explained that some sensor abnormalities were  observed during the test, that some signals collected from the target  objects were degraded, that the launch vehicle carrying the sensor into  space adversely affected the sensor’s ability to collect target signals, and  that the sensor sometimes detected targets where there were none. These  problems were all noted in the body of the report, but the report summary  stated that review and analysis subsequent to the test confirmed the  “excellent” performance and nominal operation of all sensor subsystems.
subsections: section_title: Some Sensor Abnormalities Were Observed During the Test
paragraphs: Boeing disclosed in the report that sensor abnormalities were observed  during the test and that the sensor experienced a higher than expected  false alarm rate. These abnormalities were (1) a cooling mechanism that  did not bring the sensor’s silicon detectors to the intended operating  temperature, (2) a power supply unit that created excess noise, and  (3) software that did not function as designed because of the slow  turnaround of the surrogate launch vehicle.
In the report’s summary, Boeing characterized the cooling mechanism’s  performance as somewhat below expectations but functioning well  enough for the sensor’s operation. In the body of the report, Boeing said  that the fluctuations in temperature could lead to an apparent decrease in  sensor performance. Additionally, Boeing engineers told us that the  cooling mechanism’s failure to bring the silicon detector array to the  required temperature caused the detectors to be noisy. Because the  discrimination software identifies objects as a warhead or a decoy by  comparing the features of a target’s signal with those it expects a warhead  or decoy to display, a noisy signal may confuse the software. Boeing and  TRW engineers said that they and program office officials were aware that  there was a problem with the sensor’s cooling mechanism before the test  was conducted. However, Boeing believed that the sensor would perform  adequately at higher temperatures. According to contractor documents,  the sensor did not perform as well as expected, and some target signals  were degraded more than anticipated. Boeing disclosed in the report that  sensor abnormalities were observed during the test and that the sensor  experienced a higher than expected false alarm rate. These abnormalities  were (1) a cooling mechanism that did not bring the sensor’s silicon  detectors to the intended operating temperature, (2) a power supply unit  that created excess noise, and (3) software that did not function as  designed because of the slow turnaround of the surrogate launch vehicle.
In the report’s summary, Boeing characterized the cooling mechanism’s  performance as somewhat below expectations but functioning well  enough for the sensor’s operation. In the body of the report, Boeing said  that the fluctuations in temperature could lead to an apparent decrease in  sensor performance. Additionally, Boeing engineers told us that the  cooling mechanism’s failure to bring the silicon detector array to the  required temperature caused the detectors to be noisy. Because the  discrimination software identifies objects as a warhead or a decoy by  comparing the features of a target’s signal with those it expects a warhead  or decoy to display, a noisy signal may confuse the software. Boeing and  TRW engineers said that they and program office officials were aware that  there was a problem with the sensor’s cooling mechanism before the test  was conducted. However, Boeing believed that the sensor would perform  adequately at higher temperatures. According to contractor documents,  the sensor did not perform as well as expected, and some target signals  were degraded more than anticipated.
section_title: Power Supply Creates Noise
paragraphs: The report also referred to a problem with the sensor’s power supply unit  and its effect on target signals. An expert we hired to evaluate the sensor’s  performance at higher than expected temperatures found that the power  supply, rather than the temperature, was the primary cause of excess  noise early in the sensor’s flight. Boeing engineers told us that they were  aware that the power supply was noisy before the test, but, as shown by  the test, it was worse than expected.
section_title: Payload Launch Vehicle Affected Software’s Ability to Remove Background Noise
paragraphs: The report explained that, as expected before the flight, the slow  turnaround of the massive launch vehicle on which the sensor was  mounted in Integrated Flight Test 1A caused the loss of some target  signals. Engineers explained to us that the sensor would eventually be  mounted on the lighter, more agile exoatmospheric kill vehicle, which  would move back and forth to detect objects that did not initially appear in  the sensor’s field of view. The engineers said that Boeing designed  software that takes into account the kill vehicle’s normal motion to  remove the background noise, but the software’s effectiveness depended  on the fast movement of the kill vehicle. Boeing engineers told us that,  because of the slow turnaround of the launch vehicle used in the test, the  target signals detected during the turnaround were particularly noisy and  the software sometimes removed not only the noise but the entire signal as  well.
section_title: Sensor Sometimes Detected False Targets
paragraphs: The report mentioned that the sensor experienced more false alarms than  expected. A false alarm is a detection of a target that is not there.  According to the experts we hired, during Integrated Flight Test 1A, the  Boeing sensor often mistakenly identified noise produced by the power  supply as signals from actual target objects. In a fully automated  discrimination software program, a high false alarm rate could overwhelm  the tracking software. Because the post-flight processing tools were not  fully developed at the time of the August 13 and August 22, 1997, reports,  Boeing did not rely upon a fully automated tracking system when it  processed the Integrated Flight Test 1A data. Instead, a Boeing engineer  manually tracked the target objects. The contractors realized, and  reported to the Ground Based Interceptor Project Management Office, that  numerous false alarms could cause problems in future flight tests, and  they identified software changes to reduce their occurrence.
section_title: December 11 Briefing
paragraphs: On December 11, 1997, Boeing and TRW briefed officials from the Ground  Based Interceptor Project Management Office and one of its support  contractors on various anomalies observed during Integrated Flight Test  1A.  The contractors’ briefing charts explained the effect the anomalies  could have on Integrated Flight Test 3, the first planned intercept test for  the Boeing exoatmospheric kill vehicle, identified potential causes of the  anomalies, and summarized the solutions to mitigate their effect.  While  some of the anomalies included in the December 11 briefing charts were  referred to in the August 13 and August 22 reports, others were being  reported in writing for the first time.
The anomalies referenced in the briefing charts included the sensor’s high  false alarm rate, the silicon detector array’s higher-than-expected  temperature, the software’s low confidence factor that it had correctly  identified two target objects correctly, the sensor’s lower than expected  probability of detection, and the software’s elevation in rank of one target  object toward the end of the test.  In addition, the charts showed that an  in-flight attempt to calibrate the sensor was inconsistent.  According to the  charts, actions to prevent similar anomalies from occurring or impacting  Integrated Flight Test 3 had in most cases already been implemented or  were under way.
subsections: section_title: Contractors Report Further on False Alarms
paragraphs: The contractors again recognized that a large number of false alarms  occurred during Integrated Flight Test 1A.  According to the briefing  charts, false alarms occurred during the slow turnarounds of the surrogate  launch vehicle.  Additionally, the contractors hypothesized that some false  alarms resulted from space-ionizing events. By December 11, engineers  had identified solutions to reduce the number of false alarms in future  tests.
section_title: Briefing Charts Include Observations on Higher Detector Array Temperature
paragraphs: As they had in the August 22, 1997, report, the contractors recognized that  the silicon detector array did not cool properly during Integrated Flight  Test 1A.  The contractors reported that higher silicon detector array  temperatures could cause noisy signals that would adversely impact the  detector array’s ability to estimate the infrared intensity of observed  objects.  Efforts to eliminate the impact of the higher temperatures, should  they occur in future tests, were on-going at the time of the briefing.
section_title: Some Software Confidence Factors Lower Than Expected
paragraphs: Contractors observed that the confidence factor produced by the software  was small for two target objects.  The software equation that makes a  determination as to how confident the software should be to identify a  target object correctly, did not work properly for the large balloon or  multiple-service launch vehicle.  Corrections to the equation had been  made by the time of the briefing.
section_title: Sensor’s Probability of Detection Is Lower Than Expected
paragraphs: The charts state that the Integrated Flight Test 1A sensor had a lower than  anticipated probability of detection and a high false alarm rate.  Because a  part of the tracking, fusion, and discrimination software was designed for  a sensor with a high probability of detection and a low false alarm rate, the  software did not function optimally and needed revision. Changes to  prevent this from happening in future flight tests were under way.
section_title: Software Increases the Rank of One Object Near Test’s End
paragraphs: The briefing charts showed that TRW’s software significantly increased  the rank of one target object just before target objects began to leave the  sensor’s field of view.  Although a later Integrated Flight Test 1A report  stated the mock warhead was consistently ranked as the most likely  target, the charts show that if in Integrated Flight Test 3 the same object’s  rank began to increase, the software could select the object as the  intercept target.  In the briefing charts, the contractors reported that TRW  made a software change in the model that is used to generate reference  data.  When reference data was generated with the software change, the  importance of the mock warhead was increased, and it was selected as the  target.  Tests of the software change were in progress as of December 11.
section_title: In-Flight Calibration Was Inconsistent
paragraphs: The Boeing sensor measures the infrared emissions of target objects by  converting the collected signals into intensity with the help of calibration  data obtained from the sensor prior to flight.  However, the sensor was not  calibrated at the higher temperature range that was experienced during  Integrated Flight Test 1A.  To remedy the problem, the sensor viewed a  star with known infrared emissions.  The measurement of the star’s  intensity was to have helped fill the gaps in calibration data that was  essential to making accurate measurements of the target object signals.  Boeing disclosed that the corrections based on the star calibration were  inconsistent and did not improve the match of calculated and measured  target signatures.  Boeing subsequently told us that the star calibration  corrections were effective for one of the wavelength bands, but not for  another, and that the inconsistency referred to in the briefing charts was in  how these bands behaved at temperatures above the intended operating  range.  Efforts to find and implement solutions were in progress.
section_title: April 1, 1998, Report
paragraphs: On April 1, 1998, Boeing submitted a revised addendum to replace an  addendum that had accompanied the August 22, 1997, report. This revised  addendum was prepared in response to comments and questions  submitted by officials from the Ground Based Interceptor Project  Management Office, Nichols Research Corporation, and the Defense  Criminal Investigative Service concerning the August 22 report. In this  addendum, the contractors referred in writing to three problems and  limitations that had not been addressed in earlier written test reports or  the December 11 briefing.  Contractors noted that a gap-filling module,  which was designed to replace noisy or missing signals, did not operate as  designed.  They also disclosed that TRW’s analysis of its discrimination  software used target signals collected during a selected portion of the  flight timeline and used a portion of the Integrated Flight Test 1A  reference data that corresponded to this same timeline.
subsections: section_title: Gap-Filling Software Module Did Not Perform As Designed
paragraphs: The April 1 addendum reported that a gap-filling module that was designed  to replace portions of noisy or missing target signals with expected signal  values did not operate as designed.  TRW officials told us that the module’s  replacement values were too conservative and resulted in a poor match  between collected signals and the signals the software expected the target  objects to display.
section_title: Assessment Uses Selected Target Signals
paragraphs: The April 1, 1998, addendum also disclosed that the August 13 and August  22 reports, in which TRW conveyed that its software successfully  distinguished the mock warhead from decoys, were based on tests of the  software using about one-third of the target signals collected during  Integrated Flight Test 1A.  We talked to TRW officials who told us that  Boeing provided several data sets to TRW, including the full data set.  The  officials said that Boeing provided target signals from the entire timeline  to a TRW office that was developing a prototype version of the  exoatmospheric kill vehicle’s tracking, fusion, and discrimination  software, which was not yet operational.  However, TRW representatives  said that the test bed version of the software that TRW was using so that it  could submit its analysis within 60 days of Integrated Flight Test 1A could  not process the full data set.  The officials said that shortly before the  August 22 report was issued, the prototype version of the tracking, fusion,  and discrimination software became functional and engineers were able to  use the software to assess the expanded set of target signals. According to  the officials, this assessment also resulted in the software’s selecting the  mock warhead as the most likely target.  In our review of the August 22  report, we found no analysis of the expanded set of target signals.  The  April 1, 1998, report, did include an analysis of a few additional seconds of  data collected near the end of Integrated Flight Test 1A, but did not  include an analysis of target signals collected at the beginning of the flight.
Most of the signals that were excluded from TRW's discrimination analysis  were collected during the early part of the flight, when the sensor’s  temperature was fluctuating. TRW told us that their software was designed  to drop a target object’s track if the tracking portion of the software  received no data updates for a defined period. This design feature was  meant to reduce false tracks that the software might establish if the sensor  detected targets where there were none. In Integrated Flight Test 1A, the  fluctuation of the sensor’s temperature caused the loss of target signals.  TRW engineers said that Boeing recognized that this interruption would  cause TRW’s software to stop tracking all target objects and restart the  discrimination process. Therefore, Boeing focused its efforts on  processing those target signals that were collected after the sensor’s  temperature stabilized and signals were collected continuously.
Some signals collected during the last seconds of the sensor’s flight were  also excluded. The former TRW employee alleged that these latter signals  were excluded because during this time a decoy was selected as the target.  The Phase One Engineering Team cited one explanation for the exclusion  of the signals. The team said that TRW stopped using data when objects  began leaving the sensor’s field of view. Our review did not confirm this  explanation. We reviewed the target intensities derived from the infrared  frames covering that period and found that several seconds of data were  excluded before objects began to leave the field of view. Boeing officials  gave us another explanation. They said that target signals collected during  the last few seconds of the flight were streaking, or blurring, because the  sensor was viewing the target objects as it flew by them. Boeing told us  that streaking would not occur in an intercept flight because the kill  vehicle would have continued to approach the target objects. We could not  confirm that the test of TRW’s discrimination software, as explained in the  August 22, 1997, report, included all target signals that did not streak. We  noted that the April 1, 1998, addendum shows that TRW analyzed several  more seconds of target signals than is shown in the August 22, 1997,  report. It was in these additional seconds that the software began to  increase the rank of one decoy as it assessed which target object was most  likely the mock warhead. However, the April 1, 1998, addendum also  shows that even though the decoy’s rank increased the software continued  to rank the mock warhead as the most likely target.  But, because not all of  the Integrated Flight Test 1A timeline was presented in the April 1  addendum, we could not determine whether any portion of the excluded  timeline might have been useful data and if there were additional seconds  of useful data whether a target object other than the mock warhead might  have been ranked as the most likely target.
section_title: Corresponding Portions of Reference Data Excluded
paragraphs: The April 1 addendum also documented that portions of the reference data  developed for Integrated Flight Test 1A were also excluded from the  discrimination analysis.  Nichols and project office officials told us the  software identifies the various target objects by comparing the target  signals collected from each object at a given point in their flight to the  target signals it expects each object to display at that same point in the  flight.  Therefore, when target signals collected during a portion of the  flight timeline are excluded, reference data developed for the same portion  of the timeline must be excluded.
section_title: Information Provided Verbally to Project Office
paragraphs: Officials in the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office’s Ground  Based Interceptor Project Management Office and Nichols Research told  us that soon after Integrated Flight Test 1A the contractors orally  disclosed all of the problems and limitations cited in the December 11,  1997, briefing and the April 1, 1998, addendum. Contractors made these  disclosures to project office and Nichols Research officials during  meetings that were held to review Integrated Flight Test 1A results  sometime in late August 1997. The project office and contractors could  not, however, provide us with documentation of these disclosures.
The current Ground Based Interceptor Project Management Office deputy  manager said that the problems that contractors discussed with his office  were not specifically communicated to others within the Department of  Defense because his office was the office within the Department  responsible for the Boeing contract. The project office’s assessment was  that these problems did not compromise the reported success of the  mission, were similar in nature to problems normally found in initial  developmental tests, and could be easily corrected.
section_title: Effect of Cooling Failure on Sensor’s Performance
paragraphs: Because we questioned whether Boeing’s sensor could collect any usable  target signals if the silicon detector array was not cooled to the desired  temperature, we hired sensor experts at Utah State University’s Space  Dynamics Laboratory to determine the extent to which the sub-optimal  cooling degraded the sensor’s performance. These experts concluded that  the higher temperature of the silicon detectors degraded the sensor’s  performance in a number of ways, but did not result in extreme  degradation. For example, the experts said the higher temperature  reduced by approximately 7 percent the distance at which the sensor  could detect targets. The experts also said that the rapid temperature  fluctuation at the beginning and at the end of data acquisition contributed  to the number of times that the sensor detected a false target. However,  the experts said the major cause of the false alarms was the power supply  noise that contaminated the electrical signals generated by the sensor in  response to the infrared energy. When the sensor signals were processed  after Integrated Flight Test 1A, the noise appeared as objects, but they  were actually false alarms.
Additionally, the experts said that the precision with which the sensor  could estimate the infrared energy emanating from an object based on the  electrical signal produced by the energy was especially degraded in one of  the sensor’s two infrared wave bands. In their report, the experts said that  the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Lincoln Laboratory analyzed  the precision with which the Boeing sensor could measure infrared  radiation and found large errors in measurement accuracy. The Utah State  experts said that their determination that the sensor’s measurement  capability was degraded in one infrared wave band might partially explain  the errors found by Lincoln Laboratory.
Although Boeing’s sensor did not cool to the desired temperature during  Integrated Flight Test 1A, the experts found that an obstruction in gas flow  rather than the sensor’s design was at fault. These experts said the  sensor’s cooling mechanism was properly designed and Boeing’s sensor  design was sound.
section_title: Appendix II: Evaluations of TRW’s Software and a Planned Enhancement
paragraphs: Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase One Engineering Team  tested TRW’s discrimination software and a planned enhancement to that  software, known as the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor.  Nichols concluded that although it had weaknesses, the discrimination  software met performance requirements established by Boeing when it  was tested against a simple threat and given near perfect knowledge about  the key characteristics, or features, that the target objects would display  during flight. The Phase One Engineering Team reported that despite some  weaknesses, TRW’s discrimination software was well designed and  worked properly. Like Nichols, the team found that the software’s  performance was dependent upon prior knowledge of the target objects.  Because Nichols did not test the software’s capability using data collected  from Integrated Flight Test 1A and the Phase One Engineering Team did  not process the raw data from Integrated Flight Test 1A or develop its own  reference data, neither group can be said to have definitively proved or  disproved TRW’s claim that its software successfully identified the mock  warhead from decoys using data collected from Integrated Flight Test 1A.  From their assessments of TRW’s Extended Kalman Filter Feature  Extractor, both groups concluded that it was feasible that the Filter could  provide additional information about target objects, but neither group  determined to what extent the Filter would improve the software’s  discrimination performance.
subsections: section_title: Nichols Evaluation of TRW’s Discrimination Software
paragraphs: Nichols Research Corporation evaluated TRW’s discrimination software to  determine if it met performance requirements developed by Boeing.  Boeing established discrimination performance requirements to ensure  that its exoatmospheric kill vehicle, when fully developed, could destroy a  warhead with the single shot precision (expressed as a probability)  required by the Ground Based Interceptor Project Management Office.The kill vehicle must perform a number of functions successfully to  accurately hit-to-kill its target, such as acquiring the target cluster,  discriminating the warhead from other objects, and diverting to hit the  warhead. Boeing believed that if it met the performance requirements that  it established for each function, including the discrimination function, the  exoatmospheric kill vehicle should meet the required single shot  probability of kill.
subsections: section_title: Nichols’ Methodology
paragraphs: To determine if TRW’s software performed as required, Nichols’ engineers  obtained a copy of TRW’s software; verified that the software was based  on sound scientific and engineering principles; validated that it operated  as designed; and tested its performance in 48 simulated scenarios that  included countermeasures, such as decoys, that the system might  encounter before 2010.
Nichols validated the software by obtaining a copy of the actual source  code from TRW and installing the software in a Nichols computer.  Engineers then examined the code line-by-line; verified its logic, data flow,  and input and output; and determined that the software accurately  reflected TRW's baseline design.
Nichols next verified that the software performed exactly as reported by  TRW. Engineers ran 13 TRW-provided test cases through the software and  compared the results to those reported by TRW. Nichols reported that  their results were generally consistent with TRW’s results with only minor  performance differences in a few cases.
After analyzing the 13 reference cases, Nichols generated additional test  cases by simulating a wide-range of enemy missiles with countermeasures  that included decoys. Including the 13 reference cases, Nichols analyzed  the software’s performance in a total of 48 test scenarios.
section_title: Nichols’ Key Results
paragraphs: Because the software performed successfully in 45 of 48 simulated test  cases, Nichols concluded that the system met the performance  requirements established by Boeing. However, Nichols explained that the  software met its requirement because it was tested against a simple threat.  In addition, Nichols said that the software was given nearly perfect  knowledge of the features the simulated warhead and any decoys included  in each test would display.
Nichols found anomalies when it simulated the performance of TRW’s  software. Nichols’ December 2, 1997, report identified anomalies that  prevented the software from meeting its performance requirement in 3 of  the 48 cases. First, Nichols found that a software module did not work  properly. (TRW used this gap-filling software module to replace missing or  noisy target signals.) Second, Nichols found that the software’s target  selection logic did not always work well. As a result, the probability that  the software would select the simulated warhead as the target was lower  than required in three of the test cases.
Nichols reported inconsistencies in TRW’s software code. Engineers found  that in some cases the software did not extract one particular feature from  the target signals, and, in other cases, the results improved substantially  when this feature was excluded. The Nichols report warned that in cases  where this feature was the most important in the discrimination process,  the software’s performance could be significantly degraded.
Evaluation Parameters. In its 1997 report, Nichols cautioned that TRW’s  software met performance requirements because the countermeasures  included in the 48 tests were relatively simple. Nichols’ testing also  assumed perfect knowledge about the warhead and decoys included in the  simulations. Engineers told us that all 48 test cases were constructed to  test the software against the simple threats that the Department of  Defense believed “nations of concern” might deploy before 2010. The  engineers said that their evaluation did not include tests of the software  against the number and type of decoys deployed in Integrated Flight Test  1A because that threat cluster was more complex than the simple threat  that contractors were required to design their software to handle. In  addition, Nichols reported that in all 48 test cases perfect reference data  was used—that is, the software was told what features the warhead and  decoys would display during the simulations. Nichols engineers said  TRW’s software is sensitive to prior knowledge about the threat and the  Ground Based Interceptor Project Management Office was aware of this  aspect of TRW’s design.
section_title: Limitation in Nichols’ Evaluation
paragraphs: Nichols’ evaluation was limited because it did not test TRW’s software  using actual flight data from Integrated Flight Test 1A. Nichols told us that  in addition to testing TRW’s discrimination software using simulated data  it had also planned to assess the software’s performance using real target  signals collected during Integrated Flight Test 1A. Because it did not  perform this assessment, Nichols can not be said to have definitively  proved or disproved TRW’s claim that its software discriminated the mock  warhead from decoys using data collected from Integrated Flight Test 1A.  Officials said they did not complete this aspect of the evaluation because  their resources were limited.  However, we noted that Nichols’ engineers  had already verified TRW’s software and obtained the raw target signals  collected during Integrated Flight Test 1A. These engineers told us that  this assessment could be done within two weeks after Nichols received all  required information. (Nichols said it did not have some needed  information.)
section_title: Phase One Engineering Team’s Evaluation
paragraphs: In 1998, the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office asked the  Phase One Engineering Team to conduct an assessment, using available  data, of TRW’s discrimination software, even though Nichols Research  Corporation had already concluded that it met the requirements  established by Boeing. The program office asked for the second  evaluation because the Defense Criminal Investigative Service lead  investigator expressed concern about the ability of Nichols to provide a  truly objective evaluation.
The Phase One Engineering Team developed a methodology to  (1) determine if TRW’s software was consistent with scientific,  mathematical, and engineering principles; (2) determine whether TRW  accurately reported that its software successfully discriminated a mock  warhead from decoys using data collected from Integrated Flight Test 1A;  and (3) predict the performance of TRW’s basic discrimination software  against Integrated Flight Test 3 scenarios. The key results of the team’s  evaluation were that the software was well designed; the contractors  accurately reported the results of Integrated Flight Test 1A; and the  software would likely perform successfully in Integrated Flight Test 3. The  primary limitation was that the team used Boeing- and TRW-processed  target data and TRW-developed reference data in determining the  accuracy of TRW reports for Integrated Flight Test 1A.
subsections: section_title: Phase One Engineering Team’s Methodology
paragraphs: The team began its work by assuring itself that TRW’s discrimination  software was based on sound scientific, engineering, and mathematical  principles and that those principles had been correctly implemented. It did  this primarily by studying technical documents provided by the  contractors and the program office. Next, the team began to look at the  software’s performance using Integrated Flight Test 1A data. The team  studied TRW’s August 13 and August 22, 1997, test reports to learn more  about discrepancies that the Defense Criminal Investigative Service said it  found in these reports. Team members also received briefings from the  Defense Criminal Investigative Service, Boeing, TRW, and Nichols  Research Corporation.
Team members told us that they did not replicate TRW’s software in total.  Instead, the team emulated critical functions of TRW’s discrimination  software and tested those functions using data collected during Integrated  Flight Test 1A. To test the ability of TRW’s software to extract the features  of each target object’s signal, the team designed a software routine that  mirrored TRW’s feature-extraction design. Unlike Nichols, the team did  not obtain target signals collected during the test and then process those  signals. Rather, the team received Integrated Flight Test 1A target signals  that had been processed by Boeing and then further processed by TRW.  These signals represented about one-third of the collected signals. Team  members input the TRW-supplied target signals into the team’s feature- extraction software routine and extracted two features from each target  signal. The team then compared the extracted features to TRW’s reports  on these same features and concluded that TRW’s software-extraction  process worked as reported by TRW. Next, the team acquired the results  of 200 of the 1,000 simulations that TRW had run to determine the features  that target objects deployed in Integrated Flight Test 1A would likely  display. Using these results, team members developed reference data that  the software could compare to the features extracted from Integrated  Flight Test 1A target signals. Finally, the team wrote software that ranked  the different observed target objects in terms of the probability that each  was the mock warhead. The results produced by the team’s software were  then compared to TRW’s reported results.
The team did not perform any additional analysis to predict the  performance of the Boeing sensor and its software in Integrated Flight  Test 3. Instead, the team used the knowledge that it gained from its  assessment of the software’s performance using Integrated Flight Test 1A  data to estimate the software’s performance in the third flight test.
section_title: The Phase One Engineering Team’s Key Results
paragraphs: In its report published on January 25, 1999, the Phase One Engineering  Team reported that even though it noted some weaknesses, TRW’s  discrimination software was well designed and worked properly, with only  some refinement or redesign needed to increase the robustness of the  discrimination function. In addition, the team reported that its test of the  software using data from Integrated Flight Test 1A produced essentially  the same results as those reported by TRW. The team also predicted that  the Boeing sensor and its software would perform well in Integrated Flight  Test 3 if target objects deployed as expected.
subsections: section_title: Weaknesses in TRW’s Software
paragraphs: The team’s assessment identified some software weaknesses.  First, the  team reported that TRW’s use of a software module to replace missing or  noisy target signals was not effective and could actually hurt rather than  help the performance of the discrimination software. Second, the Phase  One Engineering Team pointed out that while TRW proposed extracting  several features from each target-object signal, only a few of the features  could be used.
The Phase One Engineering Team also reported that it found TRW’s  software to be fragile because the software was unlikely to operate  effectively if the reference data—or expected target signals—did not  closely match the signals that the sensor collected from deployed target  objects. The team warned that the software’s performance could degrade  significantly if incorrect reference data were loaded into the software.  Because developing good reference data is dependent upon having the  correct information about target characteristics, sensor-to-target  geometry, and engagement timelines, unexpected targets might challenge  the software. The team suggested that very good knowledge about all of  these parameters might not always be available.
section_title: Accuracy of Contractors’ Integrated Flight Test 1A Reports
paragraphs: The Phase One Engineering Team reported that the results of its  evaluation using Integrated Flight Test 1A data supported TRW’s claim  that in post-flight analysis its software accurately distinguished a mock  warhead from decoys. The report stated that TRW explained why there  were differences in the discrimination analysis included in the August 13,  1997, Integrated Flight Test 1A test report and that included in the August  22, 1997, report. According to the report, one difference was that TRW  mislabeled a chart in the August 22 report. Another difference was that the  August 22 discrimination analysis was based on target signals collected  over a shorter period of time (see app. I for more information regarding  TRW’s explanation of report differences). Team members said that they  found TRW’s explanations reasonable.
section_title: Predicted Success in Integrated Flight Test 3
paragraphs: The Phase One Engineering Team predicted that if the targets deployed in  Integrated Flight Test 3 performed as expected, TRW’s discrimination  software would successfully identify the warhead as the target.  The team  observed that the targets proposed for the flight test had been viewed by  Boeing’s sensor in Integrated Flight Test 1A and that target-object features  collected by the sensor would be extremely useful in constructing  reference data for the third flight test. The team concluded that given this  prior knowledge, TRW’s discrimination software would successfully select  the correct target even in the most stressing Integrated Flight Test 3  scenario being considered, if all target objects deployed as expected.  However, the team expressed concern about the software’s capabilities if  objects deployed differently, as had happened in previous flight tests.
section_title: Limitations of the Team’s Evaluation
paragraphs: The Phase One Engineering Team’s conclusion that TRW’s software  successfully discriminated is based on the assumption that Boeing’s and  TRW’s input data were accurate. The team did not process the raw data  collected by the sensor’s silicon detector array during Integrated Flight  Test 1A or develop their own reference data by running hundreds of  simulations. Instead, the team used target signature data extracted by  Boeing and TRW and developed reference data from a portion of the  simulations that TRW ran for its own post-flight analysis. Because it did  not process the raw data from Integrated Flight Test 1A or develop its own  reference data, the team cannot be said to have definitively proved or  disproved TRW’s claim that its software successfully discriminated the  mock warhead from decoys using data collected from Integrated Flight  Test 1A. A team member told us its use of Boeing- and TRW-provided data  was appropriate because the former TRW employee had not alleged that  the contractors tampered with the raw test data or used inappropriate  reference data.
section_title: Evaluations of the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor
paragraphs: Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase One Engineering Team  evaluated TRW’s Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor and  determined that it could provide additional information to TRW’s  discrimination software. However, Nichols Research told us that its  evaluation was not an exhaustive analysis of the Filter’s capability, but an  attempt to determine if a Kalman Filter—which is frequently used to  estimate such variables as an object's position or velocity—could extract a  feature from an infrared signal. The Phase One Engineering Team reported  that because of the limited time available to assess both TRW’s  discrimination software and the Extended Kalman Filter Feature  Extractor, it did not rigorously test the Filter. Its analysis was also aimed  at determining whether the Filter could extract a feature from target  objects.
subsections: section_title: Nichols’ Assessments of the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor
paragraphs: Nichols engineers assessed TRW’s application of the Kalman Filter in 1996  and again in 1998. For both evaluations, Nichols engineers constructed a  stand-alone version of the Filter (the Filter is comprised of mathematical  formulas converted into software code) that the engineers believed  mirrored TRW’s design. However, Nichols designed its 1996 version of the  Filter from information extracted and pieced together from multiple  documents and without detailed design information from TRW engineers.  Nichols Research Corporation and Ground Based Interceptor Project  Management Office officials said the Nichols’ engineers did not talk with  TRW’s engineers about the Filter’s design because the project office was  limiting communication with the contractors in order to prevent  disclosure of contractors’ proprietary information during the source  selection for the exoatmospheric kill vehicle.
subsections: section_title: Nichols’ 1996 Evaluation Methodology and Key Results
paragraphs: In 1996, Nichols engineers tested the Filter’s ability to extract the features  of simulated signals representative of threat objects. Engineers said that  under controlled conditions they attempted to determine from which  signals the Filter could extract features successfully and from which  signals it could not. Also, because the Filter could not begin to extract  features from the target objects unless it had some advance knowledge  about the signal, engineers conducted tests to determine how much  knowledge about initial conditions the Filter needed.
In its November 1996 report, Nichols concluded that the Filter was  unlikely to enhance the capability of TRW’s discrimination software. The  assessment showed that the Filter could not extract the features of a  signal unless the Filter had a great deal of advance knowledge about the  signal. It also showed that the Filter was sensitive to “noise” (undesirable  energy that degrades the target signal).
section_title: Nichols’ 1998 Evaluation Methodology and Key Results
paragraphs: By 1998, the competitive phase of the exoatmospheric kill vehicle  contracts was over. Based on additional understanding of the Filter’s  implementation, coupled with its proposed candidacy as an upgrade to the  discrimination software, the Ground Based Interceptor Project  Management Office asked Nichols to test the Filter again. Nichols  engineers were now able to hold discussions with TRW engineers  regarding their respective Filter designs. From these discussions, Nichols  learned that it had designed two elements of the Filter differently from  TRW. The primary difference was in the number of filters that Nichols and  TRW used to preprocess the infrared signals before the feature extraction  began. Nichols’ design included only one pre-processing filter, while  TRW’s included several. There was also one less significant difference,  which was the difference in a delay time before feature extraction began.  Nichols modified its version to address these differences.
In its second assessment, Nichols again examined the feature extraction  capability of the Filter. Engineers pointed out that in both assessments the  Filter was tested as stand-alone software, not as an integrated part of  TRW’s discrimination software program.
The new tests showed that the redesigned Filter could perform well  against the near-term threat. However, in its report, Nichols expressed  reservations that unless the target and specifics of the target’s deployment  were well defined, the Filter’s performance would likely be sub-optimal.  Nichols also pointed out that the Filter was unlikely to perform well  against targets that exhibited certain characteristics.
section_title: Limitations of Nichols’ 1998 Assessment
paragraphs: Nichols tested the ability of the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor  to extract features over a wide range of object dynamics and  characteristics, including elements of the far-term threat. Nichols  demonstrated the Filter's ability to extract information (features), but did  not assess the Filter's potential impact on the TRW discrimination design.
Because it did not assess the discrimination capability of the Extended  Kalman Filter, Nichols could not predict how the Filter would have  performed against either the target complex for Integrated Flight Test 1A  or the target complex proposed for Integrated Flight Test 3. Target sets for  Integrated Flight Test 1A and initially proposed for Integrated Flight Test 3  were more complex than the near-term threat that Nichols tested the Filter  against.
In their discussions with us, Nichols’ engineers stressed that their  assessments should be viewed as an evaluation of a technology concept,  not an evaluation of a fully integrated component of the discrimination  software. Engineers admitted that their approach to this assessment was  less thorough than the evaluation they conducted of TRW’s discrimination  software and that engineers did not fully understand why the additional  bank of pre-processing filters improved the Filter’s performance. They  said a more systematic analysis would be needed to fully evaluate the  Filter’s performance.
section_title: Phase One Engineering Team’s Assessment of the Extended Kalman Filter Feature Extractor
paragraphs: The National Missile Defense Joint Program Office did not originally ask  the Phase One Engineering Team to evaluate TRW’s application of the  Kalman Filter. However, the team told us that program officials later asked  them to do a quick assessment as an addition to their evaluation of TRW’s  software. Team members designed an Extended Kalman Filter Feature  Extractor similar to TRW’s. Like Nichols first design, the Phase One  Engineering Team’s design was not identical to TRW’s Filter. In fact, the  team did not include any filters to preprocess the infrared signals before  the feature extraction began.
The Phase One Engineering Team tested the capability of its Filter against  one simulated target object and one of the objects whose signal was  collected during Integrated Flight Test 1A. The team reported that the  Filter did stabilize and extract the features of the objects’ infrared signals.  However, the team added the caveat that the Filter would need good initial  knowledge about the target object before it could begin the extraction  process.
The team reported that its evaluation of the Filter was limited. It said it did  not evaluate the Filter's sensitivity to noise, the information the Filter  needed to begin operation, or the extent to which the Filter would improve  the performance of the discrimination software.
section_title: Appendix III: Justice’s Decision Not to Join Lawsuit
paragraphs: Before deciding in March 1999 not to intervene in the False Claims lawsuit  brought by the former TRW employee, the Department of Justice  considered scientific reports and information from two Army sources.  Specifically, Justice relied upon evaluations of TRW’s software conducted  by the Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase One Engineering  Team (see appendix II for more information on these evaluations),  information provided by the Army Space and Missile Defense Command,  and a recommendation made by the Army Legal Services Agency. Justice  officials told us that the input of the Space and Missile Defense Command  carried more weight in the decision-making process than the  recommendation by the Army Legal Services Agency because the  Command is the contracting agency for the kill vehicle and is therefore  more familiar with the contractors involved as well as the technical details  of the lawsuit.
subsections: section_title: Information from the Army Space and Missile Defense Command
paragraphs: The Army Space and Missile Defense Command was brought into this  matter in response to an inquiry by the Department of Justice concerning  the vouchers that were submitted for cost reimbursement by Boeing for  work performed by its subcontractor, TRW. Specifically, Justice asked  whether the Army would have paid the contractor's vouchers if Boeing  and TRW had misrepresented the capabilities of the software in the  vouchers. In a letter to Justice, dated February 24, 1999, the Command  stated that the Army did not consider the vouchers submitted by Boeing  for TRW’s work to be false claims. The letter cited the Nichols’ and Phase  One Engineering Team’s reports as support for its conclusions and noted  that a cost-reimbursement research-and-development contract only  requires that the contractor exercise its “best efforts.”
section_title: Recommendation of the Army Legal Services Agency
paragraphs: There is some uncertainty about how the Army Legal Services Agencycame to recommend in February 1999 that Justice not intervene in the  lawsuit. Army Legal Services had very little documentation to explain the  recommendation, and agency officials told us that they remember very  little about the case. The agency’s letter stated that it was basing its  recommendation on conversations with investigators handling the case  and on the former TRW engineer’s wishes.
However, the lead investigator in the case (from the Defense Criminal  Investigative Service) stated that he and his team had not recommended to  the Army that the case not proceed. The little documentation available  shows only that the case attorney’s predecessor spoke with the lead  investigator shortly after the case was opened. Officials said they could  not remember why they cited conversations with case investigators in the  letter and agreed that there were no other investigators aside from those in  the Defense Criminal Investigative Service. One official stressed that the  letter does not explicitly say that the investigators recommended  nonintervention.
As for the engineer’s wishes, Army Legal Services has no record of direct  contacts with the engineer, and agency officials acknowledged that they  probably obtained information about the engineer’s wishes from Justice.  Agency officials also said they could not remember why they cited the  engineer’s wishes in their letter. The engineer told us that she did tell  Justice that if it was not going to help, it should not hinder the case. The  engineer also told us that this may have been misinterpreted by the agency  as a refusal of any help. Justice officials agreed that the engineer  consistently wanted Justice to take up the case. Legal Services Agency  officials noted that it would be very unusual for someone not to want help  from Justice, especially considering that less than 10 percent of False  Claims cases succeed when Justice is not involved.
Army Legal Services Agency officials said that the case was one of several  hundred the agency handles at any one time and that their involvement in  a case like this one is usually minimal, unless the agency is involved in the  prosecution. The officials stated that the Army Space and Missile Defense  Command letter likely would have influenced their own letter because the  Command’s deputy counsel was recognized for his expertise in matters of  procurement fraud. They also said that they relied on Justice to provide  information about technical details of the case. The case attorney stated  that he had not reviewed the Phase One Engineering Team or Nichols  studies.
section_title: Appendix IV: Steps to Assure Independent and Objective Review by the Phase One Engineering Team
paragraphs: The Defense Criminal Investigative Service, which was investigating the  allegations against Boeing and TRW, asked the National Missile Defense  Joint Program Office to establish an independent panel to evaluate the  capability and performance of TRW’s discrimination software. Although  Nichols Research Corporation, a support contractor overseeing Boeing’s  work, had already conducted such an assessment and reported that the  software met requirements, the case investigator was concerned about the  ability of Nichols to provide a truly objective assessment. In response to  the investigator’s request, the program office utilized an existing advisory  group, known as the Phase One Engineering Team, to conduct the second  assessment. Comprised of various Federally Funded Research and  Development Centers, this group had been established by the Strategic  Defense Initiative Organization in 1988 in order to provide the program  office access to a continuous, independent and objective source of  technical and engineering expertise. Since Federally Funded Research and  Development Centers are expressly authorized, established and operated  to provide the government with independent and objective advice, the  Joint Program Office officials determined that making use of such a group  would be sufficient to assure an independent and objective review.  Scientific associations, however, said that there are alternative ways of  choosing a panel to review contentious issues. Nonetheless, program  officials said that establishing a review team using such methods would  likely have increased the time the reviewers needed to complete their  work and could have increased the cost of the review.
subsections: section_title: The Phase One Engineering Team
paragraphs: When the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office determined that it  should undertake a review of the TRW discrimination software because of  allegations that contractors had misrepresented their work, it turned to  the Phase One Engineering Team. The Phase One Engineering Team was  established in 1988 by the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization—later  known as the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization—as an umbrella  mechanism to obtain technical and engineering support from Federally  Funded Research and Development Centers. To ensure that the individual  scientists who work on each review undertaken by the Phase One  Engineering Team have the requisite expertise, membership on each  review team varies with each assignment. When asked to advise a  program, the director of the Phase One Engineering Team determines  which Federally Funded Research and Development Centers have the  required expertise. The director then contacts officials at those centers to  identify the appropriate scientists for the task. According to the director,  the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office does not dictate the  individuals who work on a Phase One Engineering Team review. When the  director received the request to conduct a review of TRW’s discrimination  software, he determined there were three Federally Funded Research and  Development Centers best suited to undertake this review. A total of five  scientists were then selected from these three centers to comprise the  review team: one member from the Aerospace Corporation, sponsored by  the U.S. Air Force; two members from the Massachusetts Institute of  Technology’s Lincoln Laboratory, also sponsored by the U.S. Air Force;  and two members from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory,  sponsored by the Department of Energy.
The federal government established the Federally Funded Research and  Development Centers to meet special or long-term research or  development needs of the sponsoring federal government agencies that  were not being met effectively by existing in-house or contractor  resources. The federal government enters into long-term relationships  with the Federally Funded Research and Development Centers in order to  encourage them to provide the continuity that allows them to attract high  quality personnel who will maintain their expertise, retain their objectivity  and independence, preserve familiarity with the government’s needs, and  provide a quick response capability. To achieve these goals, the Federally  Funded Research and Development Centers must have access, beyond  that required in normal contractual relationships with the government, to  government and supplier information, sensitive or proprietary data, and to  employees and facilities. Because of this special access, the Federally  Funded Research and Development Centers are required by the Federal  Acquisition Regulation and agreements with their sponsoring agencies to  operate in the public interest with objectivity and independence, to be free  from organizational conflicts of interest, and to fully disclose their affairs  to the sponsoring agency. To further ensure that they are free from  organizational conflicts of interest, Federally Funded Research and  Development Centers are operated, managed, and/or administered by a  university or consortium of universities; other not-for-profit or non-profit  organization; or an industrial firm, as an autonomous organization or as an  identifiable separate operating unit of a parent organization.
All three of the Federally Funded Research and Development Centers  involved in this review had entered into sponsoring agreements and  contracts with their respective sponsoring agencies that contain the  requirements imposed on such Centers by the Federal Acquisition  Regulation. For example, the sponsoring agreement between the Air Force  and Lincoln Laboratory requires that Lincoln Laboratory avoid any action  that would put its personnel in perceived or actual conflicts of interest  regarding either unfair competition or objectivity. Joint Program Office  officials said they relied upon adherence to the governing regulations and  sponsoring agreements to assure themselves that the members of this  review team could provide a fresh, unbiased look at TRW’s software.
Officials with whom we spoke expressed confidence in the team’s  independence. Justice officials said that they had no reason to doubt the  objectivity or independence of the review team’s members nor the  seriousness and thoroughness of their effort. The Phase One Engineering  Team director told us that independence is a program goal and that their  reviews report the technical truth regardless of what the National Missile  Defense Joint Program Office might want to hear. The director noted that  the best way to ensure independence is to have the best scientists from  different organizations discuss the technical merits of an issue.
section_title: Alternative Panel Composition
paragraphs: At your request, we spoke with officials of the National Academy of  Sciences and the American Physical Society who told us that there are  alternative ways to choose a panel. One method commonly used by these  scientific organizations, which frequently conduct studies and evaluate  reports or journal articles, is peer review. According to a GAO report that  studied federal peer review practices, peer review is a process wherein  scientists with knowledge and expertise equal to that of the researchers  whose work they review make an independent assessment of the technical  or scientific merit of that research. According to the Phase One  Engineering Team director, the evaluation performed by the team assigned  to review TRW’s software was a type of peer review. However, National  Academy of Sciences and American Physical Society officials told us that  since individuals knowledgeable in a given area often have opinions or  biases, an unbiased study team should include members who would, as a  group, espouse a broad spectrum of opinions and interests. Such a team  should include both supporters and critics of the issue being studied.  These officials told us that it was their opinion that the Phase One  Engineering Team members are “insiders” who are unlikely to be overly  critical of the National Missile Defense program.
The National Missile Defense Joint Program Office official who requested  that the Phase One Engineering Team conduct such a review said that he  could have appointed a panel such as that suggested by the National  Academy of Sciences and the American Physical Society. But he said that  he wanted a panel that was already knowledgeable about warhead  discrimination in space and required little additional knowledge to  complete its review. The official noted that the team’s report was  originally intended to be a one-to-two-month effort, even though it  eventually took about eight months to complete. Some additional time was  required to address further issues raised by the Defense Criminal  Investigative Service. A team member said that the statement of work was  defined so that the panel could complete the evaluation in a timely manner  with the data available. Officials of the National Academy of Sciences and  the American Physical Society acknowledged that convening a panel such  as the type they suggested would likely have required more time and could  have been more costly.
section_title: Appendix V: Boeing Integrated Flight Test 1A Requirements and Actual Performance as Reported by Boeing and TRW
paragraphs: The table below includes selected requirements that Boeing established  before the flight test to evaluate sensor performance and the actual sensor  performance characteristics that Boeing and TRW discussed in the August  22 report.
section_title: Appendix VI: Scope and Methodology
paragraphs: We determined whether Boeing and TRW disclosed key results and  limitations of Integrated Flight Test 1A to the National Missile Defense  Joint Program Office by examining test reports submitted to the program  office on August 13, 1997, August 22, 1997, and April 1, 1998, and by  examining the December 11, 1997, briefing charts.  We also held  discussions with and examined various reports and documents prepared  by Boeing North American, Anaheim, California; TRW Inc., Redondo  Beach, California; the Raytheon Company, Tucson, Arizona; Nichols  Research Corporation, Huntsville, Alabama; the Phase One Engineering  Team, Washington, D.C.; the Massachusetts Institute of  Technology/Lincoln Laboratory, Lexington, Massachusetts; the National  Missile Defense Joint Program Office, Arlington, Virginia, and Huntsville,  Alabama; the Office of the Director, Operational Test and Evaluation,  Washington D.C.; the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command,  Huntsville, Alabama; the Defense Criminal Investigative Service, Mission  Viejo, California, and Arlington, Virginia; and the Institute for Defense  Analyses, Alexandria, Virginia.
We held discussions with and examined documents prepared by Dr.  Theodore Postol, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge,  Massachusetts; Dr. Nira Schwartz, Torrance, California; and Mr. Roy  Danchick, Santa Monica, California.
In addition, we hired the Utah State University Space Dynamics  Laboratory, Logan, Utah, to examine the performance of the Boeing sensor  because we needed to determine the effect the higher operating  temperature had on the sensor’s performance. As agreed with your offices,  we did not replicate TRW’s assessment of its software using target signals  that the Boeing sensor collected during the test. This would have required  us to make engineers and computers available to verify TRW’s software,  format raw target signals for input into the software, develop reference  data, and run the data through the software. We did not have these  resources available, and we, therefore, cannot attest to the accuracy of  TRW’s discrimination claims.
We examined the methodology, key results, and limitations of evaluations  completed by Nichols Research Corporation and the Phase One  Engineering Team by analyzing Nichols’ report on TRW’s discrimination  software dated December 1997; Nichols’ reports on the Extended Kalman  Filter dated November 1996 and November 1998; and the Phase One  Engineering Team’s “Independent Review of TRW Discrimination  Techniques” dated January 1999. In addition, we held discussions with the  Nichols engineers and Phase One Engineering Team members that  conducted the assessments and with officials from the National Missile  Defense Joint Program Office. We did not replicate the evaluations  conducted by Nichols and the Phase One Engineering Team and cannot  attest to the accuracy of their reports.
We examined the basis for the Department of Justice’s decision not to  intervene in the False Claims lawsuit by holding discussions with and  examining documents prepared by the Department of Justice, Washington,  D.C. We also held discussions with and reviewed documents at the U.S.  Army Legal Services Agency, Arlington, Virginia, and the U.S. Army Space  and Missile Defense Command, Huntsville, Alabama.
We reviewed the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office’s efforts to  address potential conflicts of interest that an expert panel might have in  reviewing the results of Integrated Flight Test 1A by holding discussions  with National Missile Defense Joint Program Office officials and with  members of the expert panel, known as the Phase One Engineering Team.  We also examined the federal regulations and support agreements agreed  to by the Federally Funded Research and Development Centers and  national laboratory that employed the panel members. Last, as you  requested, we discussed alternative methods of establishing an expert  panel with the American Physical Society, Ridge, New York; and the  National Academy of Sciences’ National Research Council, Washington,  D.C.
Our work was conducted from August 2000 through February 2002  according to generally accepted government auditing standards. The  length of time the National Missile Defense Joint Program Office required  to release documents to us significantly slowed our review. For example,  the program office required approximately 4 months to release key  documents such as Nichols 1997 evaluation of TRW’s discrimination  software and Nichols 1996 and 1998 evaluations of the Extended Kalman  Filter Feature Extractor. We requested these and other documents on  September 14, 2000, and received them on January 9, 2001.
section_title: Appendix VIII: Major Contributors
subsections: section_title: General Counsel