DOD's POW/MIA Mission: Top-Level Leadership Attention Needed to Resolve Longstanding Challenges in Accounting for Missing Persons from Past Conflicts
Released: 2013-07-17T00:00:00


Highlights: section_title: Why GAO Did This Study
paragraphs: DOD reports that more than 83,000 persons are missing from past conflicts in Vietnam, Korea, the Cold War, the Persian Gulf, and World War II. Several DOD organizations, known as the accounting community, have a role in accounting for the missing. Between 2002 and 2012, DOD accounted for an average of 72 persons each year. In 2009, Congress mandated DOD to increase its capability and capacity such that the community could account for at least 200 missing persons annually by 2015. The law also added all World War II losses to the list of conflicts for which DOD was responsible, thus increasing from about 10,000 to 83,000 the number of missing persons for whom DOD must account. A committee report accompanying the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 mandated GAO to review DOD's efforts to address the accounting-for goal. GAO assessed DOD's capability and capacity to accomplish the missing persons accounting mission. In doing so, GAO analyzed guidance and requirements, discussed accounting efforts and the structure of the community with community members, and surveyed accounting community members and related entities.

section_title: What GAO Found
paragraphs: While the Department of Defense (DOD) has made some progress in promoting communication among the several organizations responsible for accounting for missing persons--known collectively as the accounting community--DOD's capability and capacity to accomplish its missing persons accounting mission is being undermined by longstanding leadership weaknesses and a fragmented organizational structure. Leadership from the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (USD Policy) and U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) have not been able to resolve disagreements among accounting community members, thereby impacting DOD's ability to meet the mandated goal of increasing its capability and capacity to account for 200 missing persons a year by 2015. DOD averaged 72 identifications annually in the decade ending in 2012. GAO found the following areas of progress and continuing areas of weakness:

In response to a 2009 direction from the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the accounting community has begun drafting a community-wide plan to meet the accounting-for goal, but as of July 2013 this plan had not been completed due to a fragmented approach to planning and disputes among community members. Without a community-wide plan, members have had varied success in obtaining resources to meet the goal.

DOD is working to clarify its guidance, but roles and responsibilities for community members are not well defined, and this lack of clarity has led to overlap in key aspects of the mission such as investigations.

DOD does not have agreements with all combatant commands to conduct operations to find missing persons outside of PACOM's area of responsibility. JPAC negotiated an updated agreement with European Command, signed in April 2013, but it has not negotiated similar agreements with any of the other four geographic combatant commands.

While DOD has established criteria to prioritize recovery efforts for missing persons from the Vietnam War, it has not established criteria to prioritize potentially recoverable missing persons from other conflicts.

DOD has not established mechanisms to sustain recent improvements in communication among community members.

Statute and DOD guidance assign responsibility for the accounting mission to many organizations and each reports through a different line of authority. Thus, no single entity is responsible for communitywide personnel and resources. This fragmented organizational structure has exacerbated weaknesses in leadership, and most community organizations GAO spoke to believe alternative structures would be more effective. A majority of community members GAO surveyed conveyed a lack of confidence about the organizational structure. For example, 12 out of 13 survey respondents ranked an option with a more centralized chain of command as the most effective in enabling the accounting community to achieve its mission. Until top-level leaders at USD Policy and PACOM can ensure that all mission activities are carried out with unity of effort, inefficient and potentially avoidable overlap, unexpected operational concerns, and disagreements among members could continue to hinder the mission.

section_title: What GAO Recommends
paragraphs: GAO is making nine recommendations to DOD, including for example: examining options to reorganize; clarifying responsibilities for the accounting community; improving planning, guidance, and criteria to prioritize cases; and sustaining communication. DOD generally concurred with these recommendations.

section_title: Letter
paragraphs: The Department of Defense (DOD) reports that more than 83,000  persons remain missing from past conflicts in Vietnam, Korea, the Cold  War, the Persian Gulf, and World War II. Since the early 1970s, DOD has  identified the remains of and accounted for approximately 1,910 persons.  Several DOD components and organizations, collectively known as the  missing persons accounting community, have a role in accounting for  missing persons. Specifically, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense  for Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Affairs who by law also serves as  the Director of the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office  (DPMO), under the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (USD Policy),  is responsible for policy, control, and oversight of the missing persons  accounting program. The Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action  Accounting Command (JPAC), which is subordinate to U.S. Pacific  Command (PACOM), conducts operations to investigate, recover, and  identify human remains. The Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel  and Readiness is responsible for establishing policy on casualty  assistance and mortuary affairs. The military departments also play a role  by providing casualty and family support, and handling mortuary and  funereal issues. The Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory, under  the Army Surgeon General, analyzes deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)  samples; and the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory, under the Air  Force Materiel Command, analyzes life support and equipment wreckage  from sites. In addition, several family and veterans organizations have an  interest in DOD’s efforts to account for persons missing from past  conflicts.

Between fiscal years 2002 and 2012, DOD accounted for an average of  72 missing persons each year. In 2009, Congress established an  accounting-for goal in Section 541 of the National Defense Authorization  Act for Fiscal Year 2010. This act required the Secretary of Defense to  provide such funds, personnel, and resources as the Secretary considers  appropriate to increase significantly the capability and capacity of DOD,  the Armed Forces, and commanders of the combatant commands to  account for missing persons, so that the accounting community has  sufficient resources to ensure that at least 200 missing persons are   The act also  accounted for annually, beginning in fiscal year 2015.added all World War II losses to the conflicts for which DOD would be  responsible to account for missing persons. Approximately 10,000  missing persons are associated with the other conflicts in the overall  mission, and the inclusion of all World War II losses increased this figure  by approximately 73,000, making the current total of around 83,000  missing persons.

In 2012, in a committee report  to accompany a proposed bill for the  National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013, the House  Armed Services Committee mandated us to review DOD’s efforts to  increase its capability and capacity to account for missing persons, and to  report to the Senate Armed Services Committee and House Armed  Services Committee. This report assesses DOD’s capability and capacity  to accomplish its missing persons accounting mission.

To assess DOD’s capability and capacity to accomplish the missing  persons accounting mission, we reviewed relevant legislation related to  DOD’s missing persons accounting program, as well as DOD directives,  instructions, memoranda of agreement, standard operating procedures,  and other guidance. We also interviewed officials from all of the missing  persons accounting community organizations as well officials from top- level leadership offices and other stakeholder organizations, to obtain  their perspectives on DOD’s missing persons accounting efforts and the  organization of the accounting community. Further, we reviewed  proposed and funded plans developed by members of the accounting  community to address the accounting-for goal, and determined the  various community members’ processes for requesting resources and  additional resources the community members had requested or planned  to request to meet the goal. In addition, we assessed roles and  responsibilities of various community members by examining related  statutes and guidance and discussing areas of potential overlap with  community members and key stakeholders, such as family and veterans  groups. We also discussed guidance available to accounting community  members for potential operations outside of PACOM’s area of  responsibility, and examined the extent to which the community had  established criteria for prioritizing potentially recoverable missing persons.  We discussed and reviewed communication efforts, and determined the  status of a statutory requirement to establish personnel files for all  unaccounted for persons. Although we found some discrepancies in  DPMO’s data, we found these data to be sufficiently reliable to enumerate  unaccounted for missing persons for background and illustrative  purposes. The numbers also relate to our discussion on criteria for  prioritizing potentially recoverable missing persons. Finally, we reviewed  the existing organizational structure of the accounting community, as well  as prior organizational assessments, and we administered a  questionnaire to the accounting community member organizations and  several DOD stakeholder organizations regarding their views on  alternative options for organizing the accounting community. This  questionnaire is presented in appendix I, along with a summary of the  responses. We compared the results of these analyses with consideration  of several practices GAO has identified in prior work that can benefit  collaborating agencies, including (1) having overarching plans to align  activities and resources; (2) clearly defining roles and responsibilities; (3)  articulating agreements in formal documents; (4) communicating  frequently; and (5) having a single designated leader. For a more  detailed discussion of our scope and methodology, please see Appendix  II. We conducted this performance audit from June 2012 through June  2013 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing  standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to  obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for  our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe  that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings  and conclusions based on our audit objectives.
subsections: section_title: Background
subsections: section_title: Missions and Organizations Involved in Accounting for Missing Persons
paragraphs: DOD’s current missing persons accounting mission began largely in  response to public concerns raised during and after the Vietnam War.  The mission originally focused on recovering missing persons from the  Vietnam War. It has evolved over time into an enduring mission for the  department. In 1994, DOD was required to provide certain assistance to  the families of missing persons from the Korean Conflict and the Cold  War. In 1996 the scope of the missing persons mission expanded to  include DOD contractors. In 2000 members of the armed forces who  were lost in the Pacific theater during World War II flight operations were  added to the mission. In 2009 all World War II losses, along with Persian  Gulf War losses and those from any other conflicts designated by the  Secretary of Defense, were added to the mission.

Many organizations play a role in DOD’s efforts to account for missing  persons. Section 1509 of Title 10 of the United States Code defines  DOD’s Prisoners of War/Missing in Action accounting community as  including the following members who are assigned roles by statute or by  DOD directives and instructions:

The Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for Prisoner of  War/Missing Personnel Affairs is responsible for, among other things,  exercising policy, control, and oversight for the entire process of  accounting for missing persons; monitoring and advocating for  program funding requirements and resources for the mission; and  leading and coordinating related communications efforts, such as the  public outreach program. The DASD reports to USD Policy, who is  responsible for developing, coordinating, and overseeing the  implementation of DOD policy to account for personnel unaccounted  for as a result of hostile acts.

The Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) was  established within DOD in 1993 to provide centralized management of  Prisoner of War/Missing in Action (POW/MIA) affairs in order to  enhance the efficiency, effectiveness, and responsiveness of DOD’s  efforts in addressing these issues. DPMO’s mission is to lead the  national effort to account for personnel—including members of the  armed forces on active duty, DOD civilian employees, or employees  of a DOD contractor—who are missing as a result of hostile action,  and the mission establishes the conditions necessary to recover those  who become isolated during operations. DPMO is responsible for,  among other things, overseeing archival research and standardizing  procedures for methodology and prioritization; rendering final analytic  judgments as to what constitutes fullest possible accounting for each  case by identifying possibilities for future action, or determining when  no further pursuit is possible; and defining, maintaining, and  enumerating accounting lists. The DPMO Director is responsible for  overseeing the execution of DPMO’s mission and duties. In addition,  the DASD for Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Affairs serves as the  DPMO director and reports to USD Policy in that capacity as well.

The Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Command  (JPAC) is responsible for conducting operations in support of  achieving the missing persons accounting mission. In 2003 JPAC was  established as a Joint Command by the merger of the Joint Task  Force-Full Accounting with the Central Identification Laboratory –  Hawaii in order to achieve unity of command, permanence of  operational elements, and efficiency and effectiveness in the use of  DOD’s resources, as well as to strengthen the command and control  of military forces in achieving the fullest possible accounting. JPAC’s  functions include analysis, archival research, investigations,  recoveries, repatriations, identifications, and reporting. The Central  Identification Laboratory is the laboratory component of JPAC. JPAC  reports to the U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM).

The past conflict accounting section of the Armed Forces DNA  Identification Laboratory conducts DNA analyses of remains of  missing persons from past military conflicts for JPAC and its  laboratory component, the Central Identification Laboratory, and  maintains the past conflict accounting family reference sample  database, to include processing of all DNA references. The Armed  Forces DNA Identification Laboratory is part of the Armed Forces  Medical Examiner System, which reports to the Army Surgeon  General.

The Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory provides technical and  analytical support to the accounting community, and is primarily  tasked by JPAC’s Central Identification Laboratory to analyze and  identify life science equipment-related artifacts that have been  recovered and may potentially be related to missing persons cases.  The Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory is part of the Air Force  Materiel Command.

The service casualty offices serve as the primary liaison for families  concerning missing persons recovery and accounting. Officials from  these offices also assist families and help explain the methods used  to account for their missing loved ones. Additional activities include  gathering family DNA reference samples, coordinating responses to  family inquiries and concerns, and maintaining family contact  information.

In addition to these members of the missing persons accounting  community, several other organizations play a role in the missing persons  accounting process, including the following:

The Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and  Readiness coordinates casualty matters among the military services,  other federal agencies, non-profit organizations, and family support  groups. In addition, this organization provides policy guidance to the  military services and other agencies on casualty reporting, recording,  notification, and legislation affecting casualty matters, and develops  issuances on mortuary affairs. Additionally, this organization develops  policy requiring personnel recovery in DOD component education and  training programs.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is responsible for monitoring  program funding requirements and resources for the execution of the  personnel accounting mission, and for supporting joint manning  requirements for joint accounting organizations in coordination with  PACOM.

The Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence  coordinates with other non-DOD intelligence organizations and  agencies and appropriate DOD agencies as necessary to promote  intelligence information-sharing and to support missing persons  accounting operations. According to Defense Intelligence Agency  officials, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence  has delegated responsibility for coordinating on missing person  accounting operations to the Defense Intelligence Agency.

The State Department assists the accounting community by providing  diplomatic support on an as-needed, country-by-country basis,  according to State Department officials. These officials explained that  each State Department country desk coordinates with DPMO and  JPAC when their diplomatic support is requested.

Family and veterans organizations serve as constituency groups to  the accounting community. The accounting-for goal and other  accounting community mission requirements were developed in part  with support from several of these organizations. DOD’s policy is to  establish and maintain an open dialogue with non-federal entities and  private citizens and offer them advice regarding how they can  responsibly assist official efforts to recover missing persons and bring  closure to families, without giving preferential treatment to any entity  or individual.

section_title: Missing Persons Accounting Process
paragraphs: Accounting for persons missing from past conflicts is a multi-step  process, as summarized below in figure 1.

As of May 2013, DOD reported that more than 83,000 persons remained  missing or unaccounted for from past conflicts in Vietnam, Korea, the  Cold War, the Persian Gulf, and World War II. As shown in figure 2 below,  missing persons from World War II comprise more than 73,000, or about  88 percent, of this total. Of the missing from all conflicts, DPMO estimates  that about 44,000 are believed to have gone missing on land, and about  39,000 over water. Missing persons are believed to be located within the  areas of responsibility of every geographical combatant command. For  example, more than 1,400 persons were reported missing somewhere  within the Northern Command area of responsibility, in areas that include  the United States and Canada.

Since the early 1970s, DOD has identified the remains of and accounted  for approximately 1,910 previously missing persons. Of the 1,910 missing  persons who were accounted for as of May 15, 2013, 999 persons, or  about 52 percent, were from the Vietnam War; 652, or about 34 percent,  were from World War II; 239, or about 13 percent, were from the Korean  War; and 19, or about 1 percent, were from the Cold War; and 1 person  was from Iraq and other conflicts. Figure 3 below shows, by conflict, the  number of missing persons accounted for from 1993, when DPMO was  created, through July 18, 2012.

DPMO conducts periodic updates and annual government briefings for  families of missing persons. These events are designed to keep family  members informed of the U.S. government’s worldwide mission to  account for those still missing, as well as to discuss in detail the latest  information available about specific cases. DPMO invites family members  who live within a 350-mile radius of these events, which are held up to  eight times a year in major metropolitan areas. In addition, DPMO invites  families to the annual briefings held for the Vietnam and Korean/Cold War  conflicts. Service casualty offices coordinate case reviews with family  members attending these briefings. At these meetings, government  officials from the accounting community make formal presentations, hold  question and answer sessions, and meet one-on-one with family  members.

An additional purpose of family outreach is to obtain DNA samples,  known as family reference samples, from family members of missing  persons. DOD often uses DNA transferred from mother to child, known as  mitochondrial DNA sequencing, or various forms of nuclear DNA testing  to support an identification or, conversely, to help exclude individuals.  For example, in cases where there may be commingling of remains,  scientists will use mitochondrial DNA sequences to divide the  commingled remains into smaller groups, and will then use nuclear DNA  to further distinguish individuals. To correlate remains with a specific  individual known to be missing, scientists determine the mitochondrial  and/or nuclear DNA sequence from an extract taken from a bone or tooth  that was recovered. By comparing that sequence to a family reference  sample, they can either exclude or provide supportive evidence of the  maternal relationship to a particular family. To do this, scientists need a  database with both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA samples from the  families of the unaccounted-for servicemembers.

section_title: Leadership Weaknesses and Fragmented Organizational Structure Undermine DOD’s Capability and Capacity to Accomplish Missing Persons Accounting Mission
paragraphs: While DOD has made some progress in promoting collaboration and  communication among members of the missing persons accounting  community, its capability and capacity to accomplish its missing persons  accounting mission is being undermined by longstanding top-level  leadership weaknesses and a fragmented organizational structure.  Leadership from both the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (USD  Policy) and PACOM have not been able to resolve disagreements  between key members of the accounting community. DOD Directive  2310.07E assigns to USD Policy responsibility to develop, coordinate,  and oversee implementation of policy to account for personnel  unaccounted-for as a result of hostile acts. In addition, the Deputy  Assistant Secretary of Defense for Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel  Affairs (DASD), under USD Policy, has statutory responsibility for policy,  control, and oversight of the entire accounting process. PACOM officials  told us that the directive assigns responsibility to USD Policy to develop  and coordinate policy on personnel accounting, and that PACOM has not  been required or called upon to resolve or mediate any issues between  DPMO and JPAC. However, the directive requires PACOM, among other  things, to establish clear, direct, and expeditious lines of communication  on personnel accounting matters between JPAC and the DASD, and to  work in consonance with the DASD, DPMO, and other stakeholders, as  appropriate, to search for, recover, and identify remains of personnel  unaccounted for as a result of hostile acts. Therefore, PACOM, like USD  Policy, has a coordinating role to play in the accounting community. We  have previously reported that collaborating agencies benefit from having  overarching plans to align activities and resources; clearly defined roles  and responsibilities; agreements articulated in formal documents;  frequent communication; and a single designated leader. However, as  of June 2013, DOD had not completed a community-wide plan enabling it  to increase its capability and capacity to account for missing persons so  that the community has sufficient resources to ensure that at least 200  missing persons are accounted for annually beginning in fiscal year  2015. While members of the accounting community have credited the  current DASD with improving areas such as trust and communication, we  found that problems persist and impede DOD’s efforts to ensure the  effective and efficient accomplishment of the mission. Specifically, we  identified issues related to planning, roles and responsibilities, conducting  operations outside of PACOM’s area of responsibility, having criteria to  prioritize cases, communication, and other areas discussed below.  Moreover, the fragmented organizational structure—with each member of  the accounting community reporting to a different line of authority—has  exacerbated these problems, such that a majority of accounting  community members believe that alternative structures would be more  effective.
subsections: section_title: Development of Community-wide Plan Is Impeded by a Fragmented Approach to Planning and Disputes among Community Members
paragraphs: While DOD has made some progress in drafting a community-wide plan  to increase its capability and capacity, as of June 2013 DOD had not  completed a community-wide plan. Community-wide planning to meet the  accounting-for goal established by Congress has been impeded by  disputes and by a lack of coordination among members of the missing  persons accounting community, with DPMO and JPAC developing two  competing proposed plans, neither of which encompassed the entire  community. DOD programmed funding for JPAC’s proposed plan, but key  parts of this plan are not being realized. In the absence of a community- wide plan, the members of the accounting community have had varied  success in independently identifying and obtaining resources to help meet  the goal. Until DOD finalizes a plan that encompasses the support and  participation of all accounting community members, these members will  be challenged to obtain the resources necessary to increase their  capability and capacity to meet the accounting-for goal, and DOD’s ability  to achieve that mandated increase may be at risk.

Disputes and a lack of coordination characterized the initial response of  the missing persons accounting community to the increased accounting- for goal, as illustrated by the development of competing proposed plans  by two key accounting community organizations, DPMO and JPAC. We  have previously reported that overarching plans can help agencies better  align their activities, processes, and resources to collaborate effectively to  accomplish a commonly defined outcome. However, in response to the  accounting-for goal established by Congress, USD Policy and PACOM  allowed for the development of and supported two competing proposed  plans for obtaining additional funding and resources to meet the  mandated capability and capacity, even though neither proposed plan  encompassed the entire accounting community. PACOM officials said  that although they review and comment on JPAC products, PACOM has  no control over the plans of DPMO, which is not a PACOM subordinate  organization.

Pub. Law No. 111-84, § 541 (2009).

JPAC’s capability and capacity to support an increased number of  operations in PACOM’s geographic area of responsibility. The second  proposed plan, developed by JPAC and PACOM, called for JPAC to  increase its capability and capacity and have responsibility for worldwide  investigations and recoveries—that is, both inside and outside of  PACOM’s geographic area of responsibility; and also called for the  creation of a satellite remains identification laboratory in the continental  United States, under JPAC’s control. The other accounting community  members and their resource needs were not mentioned in either  proposed plan. According to DPMO officials, in May 2010 USD Policy  intended to recommend the DPMO proposed plan as the better approach  for DOD to select.

JPAC disputed USD Policy’s proposal to recommend the DPMO plan  and, according to JPAC officials, expressed the view that a better solution   which focused on  would be to continue to pursue its proposed plan,what JPAC alone would need to reach the accounting-for goal. JPAC  refined its proposed plan, with the approval and support of PACOM, and  submitted a request to PACOM and then the Joint Staff through the  program budget review process asking for an additional $216 million over  fiscal years 2012 through 2016, and an additional 251 personnel.  According to DPMO officials, neither the Joint Staff nor USD Policy  provided oversight or intervention in the disagreement at that time. These  officials stated that such oversight and intervention could have helped  JPAC and DPMO to resolve their impasse by improving communication,  interaction, and cooperation.

The dispute concerning the two competing proposed plans was resolved  through DOD’s Program Budget Review Process, after being assessed  by a DOD-wide team led by DOD’s Office of Cost Assessment and  Program Evaluation (CAPE). CAPE officials stated that a senior-level  panel composed of three-star level military officers and civilian  counterparts ultimately supported JPAC’s proposed plan. These officials  said that the recommendation was presented to a four-star level panel of  military officers and civilian counterparts chaired by the Deputy Secretary  of Defense. In a DOD resource management decision issued in January  2011,resources for JPAC over fiscal years 2012 through 2016, including an  additional 253 personnel (a more than 60 percent increase over JPAC’s  2011 level).

Although DOD programmed increases in funding and personnel for  JPAC, key parts of JPAC’s plan are not being realized. The plan requires  an initial surge in investigative missions, to be followed by increased  efforts for recovery missions and then identifications in subsequent years.  While JPAC initially began hiring additional personnel and conducting  additional operations as called for by its plan, JPAC officials told us that  the planned rates for increasing investigation and recovery missions were  not feasible, in part because JPAC was unable to include the planned  number of investigation and recovery missions for fiscal year 2013 and  beyond when developing its operational plans. In addition, JPAC’s plan  called for 114 sites to be added to the master excavation list in fiscal year  2012, but only 56 sites were added in that year. Further, the JPAC plan  presumed there would be five recovery missions each year for the Korean  War, but a planned recovery mission in North Korea was cancelled in  2012 due to political developments and it is unknown when the political  environment will again enable access to that country.

According to JPAC and DPMO officials, some of the shortfalls associated  with the JPAC plan’s increases could be made up by including  identifications from disinterments. JPAC’s plan did not include any  identifications resulting from disinterments of unknown personnel who are  buried at memorial cemeteries around the world,unknown personnel who had already been buried with honor previously   as identifications of  were given a lower priority by DOD policy. However, JPAC and DPMO  officials told us that in the future, disinterments are expected to comprise  a substantial source for identifications. JPAC stated that it has the  potential to achieve more than 100 identifications from disinterments  annually, but only to the extent that disinterments are not a detriment to  JPAC’s field operations. DPMO officials said it was their intent that no  more than 50 percent of identifications would come from disinterred  persons. JPAC has established a dedicated disinterment cell to  investigate and identify cases that would be likely candidates for  disinterment, according to comments from JPAC on a draft of this report.  Moreover, DPMO and JPAC officials expressed uncertainty over whether  there would be widespread support within the department for a large  number of disinterments. For example, JPAC reported that a request to  disinter remains from the U.S.S. Oklahoma was denied by the Navy.

JPAC officials explained that they have identified some new methods  having the potential to improve their efforts, such as placing more  investigative capabilities in JPAC’s forward detachments and using  contractors in some locations to help locate potential recovery sites.  However, changes to JPAC’s operating environment—such as the  decreased number of investigation and recovery missions, the inability to  access North Korea, disinterments, and JPAC’s new methods—have not  yet coalesced into a revised plan. As of May 2013, the JPAC plan had not  been updated to reflect any of these changed circumstances, and JPAC  officials told us they did not expect the JPAC plan to be updated until after  a community-wide plan had been finalized. As a result, it is unclear  whether JPAC’s current execution of its planned operations and  personnel increases will enable it to develop the necessary capability and  capacity to meet the accounting-for goal.

While the community has taken some recent steps to draft a community- wide plan as directed by the 2009 memo from the Deputy Secretary of  Defense, as of May 2013, the JPAC plan, which does not incorporate  the larger accounting community, is DOD’s only plan to increase  capability and capacity to account for missing persons. We have  previously reported that interagency collaboration can be hindered when  agencies have different planning processes and funding sources to plan  for and conduct their national security activities, which can result in a  patchwork of activities that waste scarce funds and limit the overall  effectiveness of federal efforts. An increased number of identifications  will require the support of as well as participation from other members of  the accounting community. For example, the Armed Forces DNA  Identification Laboratory will have to increase the number of DNA  analyses it performs in order for JPAC to support an increased number of  identifications, and the service casualty offices will have to communicate  with increased numbers of families and arrange and budget for more  funerals every year. According to JPAC officials, when their competing  plans were being developed, there was never a community gathering to  discuss how to increase DOD’s capability and capacity to account for  missing persons.

In 2012 the new DASD/DPMO Director, who was a former JPAC  Commander, made an effort to mend relations between DPMO and JPAC  and develop a community-wide plan to address the accounting-for goal.  DPMO officials told us in June 2012 that they were trying to develop such  a plan, incorporating the already funded JPAC plan, and that they  intended to complete the plan within 6 months. Since that time, DPMO  has instituted several positive steps. For example, it established a task  team, known as the purple team, with representation from all community  members to work on developing the community-wide plan and resolving  areas of disagreement in the community. DPMO also initiated a “lean six  sigma” review,community. The report resulting from this review made several  recommendations related to areas such as organizational alignment,  strategic planning, accounting strategy, and process and technology.  DPMO officials said that the report was not received by DPMO until May  2013, and that DPMO plans to take actions to address some of these  recommendations. However, DPMO officials told us in January 2013 that  disagreements between JPAC and DPMO had hindered progress in  developing the community-wide plan. According to both DPMO and JPAC  officials, the areas of disagreement included topics such as (1) the   which evolved to encompass the entire accounting  division of research and analysis responsibilities between DPMO and  JPAC, (2) determination of the appropriate levels of effort for each of the  various conflicts, and (3) agreement on a policy to address lower priority  cases that have been on JPAC’s list of potential recovery sites for a long  time. As of June 2013, DPMO and JPAC officials said that the areas of  disagreement had been informally resolved and needed to be  documented. DPMO has developed a draft of the community-wide plan,  but DPMO officials explained that the draft would not be sufficiently  comprehensive to share for review among the community members until  it included the resolved areas of disagreement. The officials stated that  the revised timeframe for finalizing the community-wide plan is by the end  of calendar year 2013.

Without a community-wide plan, the accounting community organizations  have had varied success in identifying and obtaining funds and resources  to meet the accounting-for goal. Moreover, there is no community-wide  process to provide resources for the missing persons accounting mission.  While DOD guidance designates the DASD as being responsible for  advocating for program funding requirements and resources for  implementation of the missing persons accounting mission, each  member organization of the accounting community has its own processes  for requesting resources, because they belong to diverse parent  organizations, and these processes are not integrated or coordinated.  Based on funding data provided by each organization, DOD’s obligations  for the accounting mission have risen each year since fiscal year 2008, as  shown in table 1 below, with obligations from JPAC and the Army  casualty office showing most of the increases over this period. JPAC  received the most funding each year, followed by DPMO, and then the  Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory.

Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in  Action Accounting Command  Armed Forces DNA Identification  Laboratory Marine Corps service casualty  office  Air Force service casualty office Totals may not add due to rounding.

In response to the accounting-for goal, the accounting community  members obtained varying levels of additional resources. JPAC along  with the Marine Corps and Army casualty offices successfully obtained  additional resources to support the increased goal. The JPAC plan that  was integrated into DOD’s budget request proposed to provide JPAC with  253 additional personnel and $312 million in additional funding over fiscal  years 2012 through 2016. According to JPAC officials, although JPAC  was on track to implement the programmed personnel and budget growth  to increase its capability and capacity, the DOD civilian workforce cap  and the budget reductions and expected furloughs associated with  sequestration placed those increases at risk. For example, JPAC had  planned to hire 91 civilians in fiscal year 2013; however, JPAC officials  explained that JPAC was granted an exception to the workforce cap to  hire 6 personnel in fiscal year 2013. Without the ability to hire additional  personnel, the officials said JPAC will be very challenged to meet the  growth in planned operations, which could jeopardize its ability to meet  the accounting-for goal. For example, in fiscal year 2013 JPAC had  planned to conduct 36 joint field activities (which include multiple recovery  missions and investigation missions in a specific country), and that  number has been reduced to 30 joint field activities. The Marine Corps  added one additional civilian position in its casualty office starting in fiscal  year 2013. With the drawdown in the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan,  Marine Corps officials said that they expected the demand for current loss  cases to decrease as the workload from past cases potentially increases,  thus enabling workload to be assigned to other staff personnel as  needed. To address the accounting-for goal, the Army requested and  received authorization to hire 10 additional civilian personnel to support  the increased requirements associated with the addition of World War II  to the accounting mission.

DPMO, the Navy, and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory  each intend to request additional resources through the DOD budget  process to support the increased accounting-for goal. Officials from all of  these organizations told us that if they did not receive additional funding,  their ability to meet the accounting-for goal would be negatively affected.  After DPMO’s proposed plan to address the accounting-for goal was  disapproved in 2010, DPMO officials said they had made no progress in  identifying or developing any additional capability and capacity  requirements that would be needed at DPMO. However, in conjunction  with the community-wide planning efforts, in late 2012 DPMO began  assessing its funding and resource needs to meet the accounting-for  goal, and DPMO officials told us they would request funding for any  identified needs as part of the budget process for fiscal years 2015  through 2019. The Navy POW/MIA Branch has requested additional  funding and personnel each year since the accounting-for goal was  established, as part of the Navy’s internal budget development process,  but it has not received any additional resources. The Navy POW/MIA  Branch has submitted a budget estimate for fiscal year 2015 to its  leadership, requesting three additional personnel to begin a World War II  branch, but as of May 2013 Navy officials said that no decision had been  made on this proposal. The officials told us that, because 2015 is the year  when the increased accounting-for goal takes effect, they expect this  issue to become a higher priority in the future for the Navy to include in its  budget submission to the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory officials told us that unless  additional resources are approved, the laboratory will be unable to meet  increased demand, creating a bottleneck in JPAC’s ability to meet the  increased number of identifications. Officials projected that their  laboratory would need to increase the number of DNA analyses it  performs from about 1,300 to approximately 2,600 specimens each year.  With their current personnel and funding levels, officials explained that the  laboratory cannot provide the necessary support for the increased  requirements. The laboratory requested additional funding and personnel  as part of the Army’s budget formulation process for 2 consecutive years,  but the Army did not approve its requests for additional resources. Armed  Forces DNA Identification Laboratory officials said that in November 2012  they again requested additional funding and personnel for fiscal years  2013 and 2014 through the Army’s internal budget process, and this  request was under consideration as of May 2013. In addition, the officials  said that the laboratory submitted a request as part of the Army’s budget  formulation process for additional personnel and funding for fiscal years  2015 through 2019, and as of May 2013 this request was still under  consideration by the Army.

The Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory also identified some  other funding and personnel challenges. First, some of the equipment it  uses to perform DNA analyses has been discontinued and will not be  serviced by the manufacturer and must be replaced prior to fiscal year  2016, but equipment replacement costs have not been programmed into  its budget. The laboratory included the funds needed to replace this  equipment in its request for additional resources. Second, laboratory  officials explained that funding concerns prevent management from easily  rebalancing staff workload as needed to adjust to changes in demand for  different types of DNA analysis. For example, according to officials, the  laboratory lacks the flexibility to easily redirect contractors who typically  perform nuclear DNA analysis for current conflicts to perform that same  type of DNA analysis on specimens from past conflicts, because of the  different way in which these efforts are funded. Third, these officials  expressed concern with the laboratory’s heavy reliance on contractor  personnel, who provide all of its scientific and technical support. They  stated that if the current personnel provider loses the contract, the  laboratory’s entire scientific staff might have to be replaced and all DNA  analyses would cease until new individuals are hired and trained  according to accredited forensic standards.

The Air Force’s efforts in meeting the missing persons mission are  performed by both its mortuary affairs and its casualty offices, and the  casualty office has expressed a need for additional resources. The Air  Force mortuary affairs office does not intend to request additional  resources as officials there said they believe they have sufficient  resources for the mission. Because the Air Force was not established  until 1947, subsequent to World War II, all missing persons from World  War II era air losses are handled by the Army casualty office. However,  Air Force casualty office officials stated that they need three additional  positions to support the mission, because three positions were eliminated  in 2012 as the result of an Office of the Secretary of Defense budget  decision and in anticipation of a merger of the Air Force casualty and  mortuary affairs offices. However, the casualty office officials said the  merger of the two offices is now on indefinite hold, and they still have a  requirement for these three positions. They further stated that they may  request funding for additional personnel some time in the future, and that  the Air Force casualty office’s ability to support the mission may be  degraded without additional resources.

The Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory does not intend to request  additional resources to increase its capability and capacity at the present  time. Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory officials said that neither they  nor the Air Force could justify seeking additional resources to increase  their capability and capacity without receiving a more definite demand for  an increase in their services from DPMO or JPAC, which they have not  received. These officials stated that they expected additional funding  would be needed for the equipment laboratory to keep pace with  increased demand for their analyses; however, JPAC told the equipment  laboratory that they did not forecast any increased requirements for the  Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory. Until DOD finalizes a community- wide plan, that addresses the resource needs of community members, as  well as changes in planned operations and the extent to which  disinterments will be performed, the accounting community will be  challenged to justify the resources it needs to increase DOD’s capability  and capacity to account for at least 200 missing persons a year by 2015.

section_title: DOD Guidance Does Not Clearly Articulate Roles and Responsibilities for All Accounting Community Organizations
paragraphs: While DOD is working to revise its existing guidance and develop new  guidance, the roles and responsibilities of the various members of the  missing persons accounting community are not all clearly articulated in  existing DOD directives or instructions. We have previously reported on  the need for collaborating agencies to work together to define and agree  on their roles and responsibilities. Such guidance can help agencies  overcome differences in missions, cultures, and ways of doing business  by providing strategic direction for activities and articulating a common  outcome toward which they can collaboratively work. DOD has  established several directives and instructions related to the missing  persons accounting program. However, none of this guidance clearly  delineates the specific roles and responsibilities of all the organizations  comprising the missing persons accounting community in the key areas  that we examined. Disagreements over roles and responsibilities where  the guidance is broad or vague enough to support different interpretations  have led to discord, lack of collaboration, and friction among the  community’s members, and particularly between DPMO and JPAC. For  example, DPMO views itself as having primary responsibility for research  and analysis, and its officials expressed concerns to us over the  increased research and analysis role performed by JPAC. Similarly,  JPAC views itself as having the lead on operational activities, such as  conducting investigation and recovery missions, and JPAC officials  expressed concerns with DPMO’s plans to conduct some operational  activities. Conflicting views such as these have contributed to the ongoing  disputes between the two organizations. Moreover, the lack of clarity in  the guidance has given rise to overlapping and fragmented efforts among  accounting community members. We have previously reported that  overlap in efforts may be appropriate in some instances, especially if  agencies can leverage each others’ efforts. In other instances, overlap  may be unintended, may be unnecessary, or may represent an inefficient  use of U.S. government resources. As described in table 2, in  implementing the accounting mission, overlapping and duplicativeefforts have led to inconsistent practices and inefficiencies in four key  areas: (1) equipment and artifact identification and analysis, (2) research  and analysis, (3) investigations, and (4) family outreach and external  communications.

JPAC and the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory disagree about the  laboratory’s roles and responsibilities for equipment and artifact  identification and analysis, and DOD guidance is vague regarding those  responsibilities. DOD Directive 2310.07E directs JPAC to work in  “consonance” with, among others, the Life Sciences Equipment  Laboratory to search for, recover, and identify remains, as appropriate.

The PACOM transition planshall establish or continue its working relationship with the Life Sciences  Equipment Laboratory. However, neither document specifies or  differentiates the roles and responsibilities of the Life Sciences Equipment  Laboratory and the JPAC Central Identification Laboratory for equipment  and artifact identification and analysis. A memorandum of agreement  governing work between JPAC and the Life Sciences Equipment  Laboratory was negotiated in 2004, but this agreement does not establish  clear roles and responsibilities in several areas. As a result, the  interactions between JPAC’s Central Identification Laboratory and the Life  Sciences Equipment Laboratory have been inefficient and ineffective and  have led to underutilizing government resources, as the following  examples demonstrate.   that established JPAC states that JPAC  First, JPAC and Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory officials disagree  about the value provided by the equipment laboratory’s analyses. JPAC’s  life support equipment analysis capability overlaps with the analysis that  the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory provides. A JPAC official stated  that the equipment laboratory’s current operational support serves as  unnecessary overlap. JPAC stated that its life support investigators are  able to produce reports that are adequate to support an identification and  are produced under faster timeframes than the reports prepared by the  Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory. In contrast, Life Sciences  Equipment Laboratory officials stated that their capabilities are  complementary to JPAC’s. These officials recognized JPAC’s need for  artifact expertise in the field, but noted that JPAC’s field analysis reports  do not have the same fidelity as the laboratory analysis they provide. In  addition, JPAC officials said that they had discussed concerns about the  length and utility of the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory’s reports, but  that the equipment lab had made no changes to address JPAC’s  concerns. DPMO officials stated that DPMO has been working with the  Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory to make their reports better conform  with what JPAC would like to receive, and better enable the equipment  laboratory to contribute to the accounting mission.

Second, JPAC officials criticized the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory  for not providing timely analyses when JPAC’s Central Identification  Laboratory sent materials to the equipment laboratory, noting that cases  can go from being unresolved to resolved while the equipment lab is  preparing its report. However, we found that about half of the cases that  JPAC’s Central Identification Laboratory sent to the Life Sciences  Equipment Laboratory for analysis in 2011 and 2012 had already been  resolved, and Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory officials told us they  did not intend to conduct any analysis of those cases’ items. Records of  the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory show that of the 27 cases JPAC  sent during this 2-year period, 13 had been accounted for prior to JPAC’s  sending the artifacts and a fourteenth was accounted for 2 weeks after  JPAC sent the artifacts. The memorandum of agreement governing work  between JPAC and the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory does not  indicate whether it is appropriate for JPAC to request the Life Sciences  Equipment Laboratory to analyze resolved cases, but it would appear that  no utility is provided by a Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory report that  is requested and prepared after the missing person has already been  accounted for, as it would be duplicative of any report that had been  prepared by JPAC to support the identification. Life Sciences Equipment  Laboratory officials stated that their analysis was unnecessary for those  cases, and that expending scarce resources and staffing to work on a  resolved case was not a sound business practice and would constitute a  waste of government resources. JPAC officials explained that in the past,  they retained all materials until a recovery site had been closed—which  can take years—and that older case work associated with resolved cases  or cases with little prospect of identification were not routinely submitted  to the equipment lab. However, in response to criticism from the Life  Sciences Equipment Laboratory, JPAC officials said that they changed  procedures and now send all Vietnam-era life support materials to the Life  Sciences Equipment Laboratory at least quarterly, regardless of whether  a case has been resolved.

Third, JPAC and Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory officials disagree  about roles and responsibilities in terms of which conflicts and types of  equipment the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory can analyze. JPAC  officials told us it is unlikely that they would forward case work to the Life  Sciences Equipment Laboratory for conflicts other than Vietnam, and that  they do not send ground equipment remnants to the equipment  laboratory, regardless of conflict. These officials stated that the Life  Sciences Equipment Laboratory’s core expertise was the Vietnam War  era and life sciences aircraft equipment, and that the lab’s competency  with regard to World War II sites was no greater than JPAC’s capabilities.  Conversely, Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory officials stated that their  capabilities can support analysis of cases for conflict periods ranging from  World War I through current military operations for all military services,  and that their mission includes analyzing artifacts recovered at aircraft  crash or ground action loss sites. The 2004 memorandum of agreement  between JPAC and the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory states that  the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory has the capability to provide  analysis for equipment from World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Cold War,  and current day conflicts. The agreement focuses on aircraft equipment  but is otherwise very general as to the types of artifacts to be provided to  the equipment laboratory. According to Life Sciences Equipment  Laboratory officials, its facilities house military aircraft, other equipment,  and artifacts from conflicts dating back to World War I, with a significant  amount from World War II, and they have the capability to analyze aircraft  and other equipment artifacts from multiple conflicts. Life Sciences  Equipment Laboratory officials expressed concern that JPAC and its  Central Identification Laboratory are trying to exclude the Life Sciences  Equipment Laboratory from the accounting process by downplaying its  potential contributions. Until DOD guidance or the memorandum of  agreement between JPAC and the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory is  revised to more clearly define their roles and responsibilities, including the  appropriate scope of the equipment laboratory’s case work, the inefficient  and ineffective interactions between the two organizations are likely to  continue.

DOD guidance is unclear regarding the research and analysis  responsibilities of DPMO and JPAC. DOD Directive 2310.07E states  that the responsibilities of the Director of DPMO include overseeing  archival research; standardizing procedures for methodology and  prioritization; conducting national and international archival research; and  coordinating with JPAC, which also conducts archival research, to  improve efficiency and prevent duplication of effort. However, the  directive does not provide details regarding DPMO’s specific research  and analysis responsibilities, and does not provide a detailed description  of JPAC’s responsibilities. The October 2003 PACOM transition plan that  established JPAC does not provide clarification and states that JPAC will  conduct archival research and other analysis. While JPAC’s standard  operating procedures document delineates its research and analysis  responsibilities, it states that the authority to perform these responsibilities  come from the DOD directive and PACOM. However, neither the directive  nor the transition plan clearly delineates JPAC’s responsibilities with  regard to research. DPMO and JPAC officials both told us that the  absence of defined responsibilities in the areas of research and analysis  has been a source of disagreements between the two organizations.  DPMO officials told us that their organization has the lead responsibility to  perform research and analysis, while JPAC officials contended that they  have a role particularly as it relates to supporting investigations and  recovery missions. Until DOD clarifies and differentiates DPMO’s and  JPAC’s respective research and analysis responsibilities, the two  organizations will continue to have overlapping functions, and  disagreements are likely to continue.

DOD guidance is also unclear with respect to defining investigation  responsibilities for DPMO and JPAC, and this lack of clarity has enabled  each organization to develop its own operational roles, which overlap one  another. For example, both DPMO and JPAC conduct investigations for  missing persons from World War II in Europe. DOD Directive 2310.07E  states that the DASD shall exercise policy, control, and oversight within  DOD for the entire process of accounting for missing persons, but it does  not mention what role, if any, DPMO should play in performing  investigations. Further, the directive does not describe JPAC’s  investigation responsibilities. JPAC’s 2013 operational plan states that  JPAC conducts worldwide investigation, recovery, and laboratory  operations to identify missing personnel from past conflicts in order to  support DOD’s personnel accounting mission, and that JPAC’s functions  include field investigations. JPAC officials contend that they are DOD’s  primary operational organization for accounting for missing persons, and  that JPAC’s operational responsibilities include having the primary role in  conducting investigations. In contrast, DPMO officials told us that their  organization also has an operational role, particularly as it relates to  performing investigations of World War II missing persons in many  European countries. DPMO officials told us that JPAC does not have the  capability and capacity to perform the investigative work for all World War  II cases by itself, and that DPMO has the personnel and expertise to  perform some investigations. Although the purple team has  recommended that JPAC perform all operational functions, in May 2013  DPMO officials told us that the disagreement between DPMO and JPAC  regarding investigation responsibilities had been resolved and that DPMO  will be conducting investigations for World War II cases outside of  PACOM’s area of responsibility. However, this resolution has not yet  been documented. Until DOD clarifies and differentiates DPMO’s and  JPAC’s investigation responsibilities, the two organizations will continue  to have overlapping functions, and disagreements are likely to continue.

While there is limited DOD guidance regarding family outreach and  external communications roles and responsibilities for DPMO and the  service casualty offices, there is no guidance on JPAC’s roles and  responsibilities in this area. DOD Directive 5110.10 states that DPMO  shall establish and lead a communications and outreach program in  coordination with, among others, the service casualty offices to share  information with a variety of external stakeholders, including families of  unaccounted-for personnel, and shall serve as an advocate for families  throughout the accounting process. Further, this directive states that  DPMO will conduct communications and outreach with families of  unaccounted-for personnel through the appropriate service casualty  offices. DOD Instruction 1300.18 states that the military departments shall  maintain a service casualty office as a focal point on all casualty matters  and the concerned component will notify, advise, and assist the primary  next of kin in cases where the individual is deceased or missing. Neither  the directive nor the instruction mentions JPAC’s role in this area, and the  JPAC transition plan does not mention JPAC’s role either. In addition, the  guidance does not specify how DPMO, JPAC, and the service casualty  offices are to coordinate family outreach responsibilities with one another.  To carry out its family outreach and external communication  responsibilities, DPMO organizes periodic updates and annual  government briefings to keep family members informed and discuss their  specific cases. Although guidance does not assign a specific family  outreach goal to JPAC, JPAC’s 2010 annual report notes that JPAC  conducts some family outreach activities by hosting numerous private  tours for family members and providing operational briefings and  individual family meetings at nine family update events. Service casualty  office officials told us they serve as the primary liaison for families. They  coordinate the briefings for the families concerning case status and  developments through the regularly scheduled updates and annual  government briefings organized by DPMO, as well as notify family  members of an identification and assist them with funeral arrangements.  None of the family organizations with which we spoke raised concerns  about DOD’s having several organizations involved with family outreach  and external communications. However, without clear guidance regarding  the roles and responsibilities for each organization, there is potential for  inconsistent communication of information to family members and  external parties.

Since 2010, DPMO has attempted to address the above-described issues  surrounding the accounting community organizations’ roles and  responsibilities by developing new guidance or revising existing guidance,  but these efforts have not been completed. DPMO has drafted a revision  to DOD Directive 2310.07E and has also drafted a new DOD instruction  to provide more clarity with regard to roles and responsibilities. As of May  2013, however, neither the draft instruction nor the revised directive had  been finalized, because the drafts had been stymied by disagreements  among community members regarding their respective roles and  responsibilities as stated in the drafts. DPMO and JPAC––the two primary  community organizations––disagreed with regard to several areas of their  respective roles and responsibilities. For example, JPAC’s initial  comments on the draft instruction expressed disagreements about issues  such as the role of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner, the  responsibilities of JPAC and PACOM versus the other combatant  commands, and JPAC’s specific roles and responsibilities in areas such  as research and analysis and investigations. Subsequent disagreements  on a later draft included similar issues, and DPMO officials held a meeting  with JPAC officials to resolve some of these issues. Both DPMO and  JPAC officials said they have made progress in addressing these areas of  disagreement, and DPMO officials stated that they hoped to have the  draft directive finalized by September 2013 and the draft instruction  published by March 2014. Because the drafts of these documents are still  under revision, it is unclear whether the final guidance will clarify the roles  and responsibilities sufficiently to address the four areas of overlap and  disagreements discussed above. Until DOD issues its revised directive  and new instruction that more clearly define the roles and responsibilities  of all the accounting community organizations, these areas of inefficient  overlap may continue, and the disputing factions within the accounting  community may continue to hinder future progress.

section_title: DOD Does Not Have Agreements in Place to Conduct Missing Persons Operations Outside of PACOM’s Area of Responsibility
paragraphs: While JPAC has negotiated an agreement with European Command  governing JPAC’s operations in Europe, JPAC has not established  agreements or other appropriate mechanisms with the other combatant  commands to conduct operations outside of PACOM’s area of  responsibility. DOD Directive 2310.07 applies to personnel  unaccounted for as a result of hostile acts in Operations Desert Shield  and Desert Storm, the Indochina War era, the Korean Conflict, the Cold  War, and World War II, as well as those who may be unaccounted for  after the cessation of future conflicts. This directive states that the  commanders of the combatant commands are responsible for supporting  personnel accounting operations within their areas of responsibility. It also  states that PACOM has designated JPAC as the command office of  primary responsibility for personnel accounting matters pertaining to  losses due to hostile acts, and that PACOM shall exercise combatant  command authority over JPAC.

Investigations and recoveries associated with World War II may require  operations in combatant command areas other than PACOM, and  combatant commands have expressed differing opinions as to whether  PACOM should conduct worldwide operations to support the missing  persons accounting mission. DOD estimates that more than 73,000  persons are missing from World War II and are located in the areas of  responsibility of all geographic combatant commands (see figure 2  above). For example, an estimated 1,444 are missing in Northern  Command’s area of responsibility, and 997 are missing in Africa  Command’s area of responsibility. JPAC and its predecessor organization  were originally placed within PACOM because DOD’s accounting efforts  were focused on persons unaccounted-for from the Vietnam and Korean  conflicts. While the establishment of JPAC to conduct operations in  support of the missing persons accounting mission was approved by the  Deputy Secretary of Defense and coordinated with the joint staff when  JPAC was formed in 2003, the scope of the accounting mission has  expanded since then, and the statutory addition of all World II losses in  2009 has increased the likelihood that JPAC will need to operate in all  of the combatant commands’ areas of responsibility. According to DPMO  officials, some combatant commanders did not agree that PACOM should  conduct worldwide operations because these operations are beyond the  span of a single geographic combatant command and contrary to the  intent of the Unified Command Plan. JPAC, however, maintains that its  placement within PACOM continues to be appropriate in part because  about 70 percent of missing persons are believed to be located in  countries and seas within that command’s area of responsibility.

In anticipation of the increased activity in European Command’s area of  responsibility related to World War II cases, JPAC and European  Command updated their 2007 memorandum of agreement governing  JPAC’s operations. The updated agreement, signed in April 2013,  specifies European Command’s and JPAC’s responsibilities and  procedures for conducting investigations and recoveries in European  Command’s area of responsibility. The stated purpose of the updated  agreement is to enable JPAC to accomplish its assigned mission  objectives while respecting European Command’s enduring relationships  with nations within its area of responsibility. The agreement does not  confer JPAC with tasking authority over European Command personnel  and activities.

JPAC officials told us that the statutory requirement to increase DOD’s  capability and capacity, along with JPAC’s recognition of the need to  expand operational activity in European Command’s area of  responsibility, contributed to their decision to update the agreement with  European Command to establish more robust processes. The officials  explained that JPAC will have to conduct significantly more investigations  and recoveries than previously, including in countries where JPAC has  not routinely conducted operations. However, DPMO officials told us that  another reason for the updated agreement with European Command was  to address concerns from that command, as well as criticisms from  embassies and the joint staff, regarding some accounting efforts that had  been conducted in Europe. DPMO officials said that complexities  sometimes arise when interacting with foreign countries, explaining that  the archaeological laws and cultural considerations governing the  excavation, handling, and transport of human remains can be very  different in each European country, and can vary from JPAC’s customary  mode of operations in the Asia-Pacific region. DPMO officials said that  foreign governments have their own protocols, cultural norms, and ways  of doing business, so to accomplish tasks and address  misunderstandings or obstacles, individuals who perform recovery  operations should coordinate closely with the combatant command that  possesses the knowledge, experience, and insight about these foreign  countries. While the updated agreement with European Command  represents a positive step toward addressing these issues, JPAC has not  negotiated similar agreements or other appropriate mechanisms with any  of the other combatant commands. We have previously reported that  articulating agreements in formal documents can strengthen agencies’   JPAC officials explained that  commitment to working collaboratively.JPAC will seek agreements with other combatant commands as needed  as the accounting community expands its routine operational activities to  include the areas of responsibility of other combatant commands.  Moreover, the commander of JPAC stated that regardless of the  existence of memoranda of agreement, JPAC considers coordination with  other combatant commands as an imperative in its operations.  Nonetheless, until these imperatives are formalized in memoranda of  agreement or other documents specifying roles and responsibilities and  negotiated with all of the combatant commands in which DOD may need  to operate in its efforts to account for missing persons, future missing  persons operations may be adversely affected due to unexpected  operational or diplomatic concerns.

section_title: DOD Accounting Community Has Not Established Criteria to Prioritize Potentially Recoverable Missing Persons from Conflicts Other Than the Vietnam War
paragraphs: While DPMO has established criteria to prioritize recovery efforts for  missing persons from the Vietnam War, the DOD accounting community  is hampered in its ability to estimate how many recoveries can reasonably  be expected from other conflicts, because DPMO has not established  criteria that can be used to prioritize missing persons cases by reflecting  feasibility of recovery. DOD Directive 2310.07E calls for DPMO to define,  maintain, and enumerate government lists to account for missing  persons. It further requires DPMO to render final analytic judgments as to  what constitutes the fullest possible accounting on each case by  identifying possibilities for future action and determining when further  investigation must be deferred, pending new information or determination  that no further pursuit is possible that may recover remains. One of the  goals of DPMO’s research and analysis efforts is to develop a  comprehensive list of missing persons information for all past conflicts  starting with World War II, and to prioritize the missing persons cases  according to probability of recovery, according to DPMO officials.

DPMO has made some progress toward establishing criteria to prioritize  missing persons cases from more recent conflicts, but it has not grouped  the cases from World War II into categories to help the accounting  community prioritize further investigations or recoveries of those cases.  DPMO officials told us they rely on conflict-specific information in  ascertaining why each individual is unaccounted for. According to these  officials, their most precise information pertains to missing persons from  the Vietnam War, for which a total of 1,647 persons are currently  unaccounted-for. The Vietnam War missing persons cases are  categorized as either “further pursuit,” “no further pursuit,” or  “deferred.” In contrast, DPMO officials said they have the least  information about World War II missing persons, in part because of the  sheer magnitude of the number (more than 73,000). Although DPMO has  developed what officials consider to be a comprehensive list of World War  II missing persons, they have not yet developed categories or other  criteria comparable to the “pursuit” and “no further pursuit” categories  used for Vietnam War missing persons to help them prioritize their efforts  for World War II. In recent years, DPMO has undertaken an effort to  develop more detailed and complete information on the specific loss  circumstances for World War II cases, and has completed this work on  14,000 cases. As of May 2013, DPMO has not established a date by  when it expects to complete this effort for all World War II cases.  According to DPMO officials, the information they have for Korean War  missing persons is not as refined or detailed as that for Vietnam War  missing persons, but it is more detailed than the information for World  War II missing persons.

Of the more than 83,000 missing persons who have yet to be accounted  for, DOD officials told us that recovery of only an estimated 25,000 to  35,000 persons can be reasonably expected, due to the circumstances of  some of the losses. According to DPMO officials, between 48,000 and  58,000 of the missing were in airplanes or ships lost over inaccessibly  mountainous regions throughout the world or in deep water, and these  persons cannot feasibly be recovered using technology available today.  DPMO estimates that almost 40,000 of World War II missing persons  were lost over deep water and are not recoverable. These officials  emphasized that this number is an estimate, and that until they do further  analysis they will not be able to determine whether missing persons in an  aircraft fell on land, shallow water, or deep water; and ultimately, which of  the missing persons have the potential to be recovered.

DPMO officials told us that while they have enough information to support  the conclusion that large numbers of unaccounted-for persons are not  recoverable by means of current technology, they are concerned about  the reactions this conclusion might elicit from relatives of the missing  persons and from veterans and family organizations. Expressing their  empathy with such family members, these DPMO officials told us that  some family members hold out hope that the remains of their loved ones  can still be recovered, and that family members sometimes challenge  information presented to them, even when the information positively  identifies the remains. Officials from some family and veterans  organizations, however, told us that they would find it preferable for DOD  to use a smaller and more realistic number for estimating those missing  persons who are potentially recoverable, rather than the 83,000 figure the  department currently cites. JPAC officials told us that DPMO is  responsible for developing criteria that prioritizes cases, and that such  criteria would help JPAC to determine those cases having the best  potential for recovery and improve their ability to evaluate their  performance. Until DOD establishes criteria that can be used to prioritize  and determine the number of recoveries the department can reasonably  expect, the accounting community will remain unable to accomplish its  efforts to account for missing persons in the most efficient and effective  way possible.

section_title: Some Communication Efforts Are Ad Hoc, and Required Personnel Files Have Not Been Fully Developed
paragraphs: While efforts have been made to improve communication among the  accounting community members, some communication efforts are still ad  hoc, and the accounting community has not fully developed personnel  files, as required by statute, to share information within the community.  We have previously reported that frequent communication among  collaborating agencies is a means to facilitate working across agency  boundaries and to prevent misunderstandings.

Members of the accounting community have credited the current  DASD/DPMO Director with taking some recent steps to build trust and  cooperation through increased and improved communication among  accounting community members, but some of the new communication  efforts have not been formalized. For example, community-wide monthly  meetings and two week-long conferences have been broadly supported  by the accounting community as positive steps toward building unity and  have resulted in greater collaboration among community members.  Similarly, JPAC has involved DPMO in the development of JPAC’s fiscal  year 2014 operational plan, and various officials within the community  said that JPAC has also begun sharing its completed operational plans  with other community members. Several community members stated that  having access to JPAC’s operational plan has helped them in planning  and managing their work. Further, JPAC’s Central Identification  Laboratory began giving service casualty offices earlier notification of  pending identifications. Service casualty officials explained that this has  allowed them to start researching and updating next-of-kin contact  information in advance, thereby expediting notifications to the next of kin  after JPAC’s Central Identification Laboratory completes the identification.

These improvements among the accounting community over the past  year represent an important step toward better collaboration among a  group of organizations that have been hampered by longstanding  conflicts among key leaders and organizations. However, it is unknown  whether these ad-hoc communication improvements within the  accounting community would be sustained after a change in leadership,  because DOD has not established a mechanism to sustain them, such as  the community-wide plan or other accounting community documents.  Until the accounting community institutionalizes mechanisms for  communication among the different community members, the community  is at risk of losing recent gains made in communication, and the  community could revert to an atmosphere of dissension and lack of  collaboration.

Furthermore, the Army service casualty office worked with the Armed  Forces DNA Identification Laboratory to link their computer systems to  better communicate about the status of family reference samples.  Generally, to obtain family reference DNA samples, the service casualty  offices will first request a genealogy report to identify potential DNA  donors; then contact family members to request that they submit a DNA  sample, and follow up with family members to help ensure the sample is  provided; and finally communicate with the laboratory to determine  whether it has processed the sample. Some service casualty officials  explained that they did not have visibility over the status of family  reference sample requests unless they looked up each case in the  laboratory’s system. According to Army officials, for services with a large  number of missing persons this level of individual case management was  difficult and hindered their ability to set priorities and manage their  workload. However, Army officials stated that they have been working to  link the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory’s system with that  used by all four of the service casualty offices, so that the Army and the  other service casualty offices will receive an automated download of  family reference sample information. An Army official said that the  agreement to transfer the data was approved by all parties in February  2013, but that the laboratory is currently working on a means to correct  some data discrepancies. They expect the data file transfers to become  routine by June 2013 or soon thereafter. This ability to easily  communicate about the status of family reference samples will help all of  the service casualty offices ensure that the samples are obtained in a  timely manner, explained DNA laboratory officials, so that a potential  identification is not delayed due to the absence of a family reference  sample.

Notwithstanding these positive steps toward improving communication  and collaboration, the accounting community has not yet established a  personnel file for all persons unaccounted-for, as required by statute.  DOD is required to ensure that the personnel files contain all relevant  information pertaining to a missing person and are readily accessible by  all elements of the department involved in the effort to account for the person. After passage of the law that established this requirement,DPMO initiated efforts to convert a case management system under  development for personnel recovery efforts for additional use in missing  persons accounting efforts. More than $4.8 million was spent in  developing this system, but DPMO told us that the effort was ultimately  terminated due to such problems as adapting to the changed focus and  managing and funding the increased size and scope of the program.  Further, according to DPMO officials, the effort was unsuccessful  because it was developed without input from or collaboration with any  members of the accounting community. DPMO officials told us that  DPMO is currently looking for a system that can be used for this purpose,  and that DPMO intends to request funds for this effort as part of its  budget submission for fiscal years 2015 through 2019. According to  DPMO officials, digital case files already exist for all missing persons from  the Vietnam and Korean Wars. They said that DPMO, in partnership with  the Army and JPAC, has contracted to digitize all of the World War II  deceased personnel files, and this effort is expected to be completed in  September 2015, although the contract may be extended if needed.  Digitizing the World War II records is a large and time-sensitive  undertaking due to the large volume of World War II records and the fact  that some of these records are stored on media that are at risk of  decaying within the next several years, according to DPMO officials.  DPMO officials also observed that many other historical records were in  danger of loss due to age and decay, and that preservation of such  material was critical to building case files and future accounting efforts.

The officials said that these digitized files will serve as the starting point  for the required personnel files for World War II missing persons. JPAC  officials told us that JPAC is also undertaking efforts to digitize its records  and other information. Until such personnel files for all unaccounted-for  missing persons are developed and made readily accessible, as required  by law, the community’s efforts to collaborate on cases will be hindered  by lack of information visibility among community members, which could  lead to overlapping or duplicative research and analysis efforts as well as  incomplete information provided to families.

section_title: Accounting Community’s Fragmented Organizational Structure Exacerbates Weaknesses in Leadership
paragraphs: The accounting community’s fragmented organizational structure has  exacerbated the weaknesses in its leadership, and a majority of  accounting community and DOD stakeholder organizations believe that  alternative structures would be more effective. With each accounting  community organization reporting under a different line of authority, as  shown in figure 4, no single entity has overarching responsibility for  community-wide personnel and resources—important levers for providing  the capacity to reach DOD’s accounting-for goal. As a result, no single  entity can implement or enforce decisions without obtaining widespread  consensus. We have previously reported that having a single designated  leader is often beneficial because it centralizes accountability for  achieving outcomes and can accelerate decision-making.

Concerns have risen over the years, both within and outside of DOD, with  regard to whether DOD’s missing persons accounting community’s  current organizational structure enables it to most effectively meet its  mission. For example, we previously reported that DPMO’s 2005 strategic  plan specified a goal of implementing an organizational structure that  would unify missing persons accounting efforts, and that DPMO had also  drafted an update to its charter directive consistent with this strategic plan  goal that would give DPMO control over the entire process of recovering  missing persons. We reported that reactions to early versions of the  draft were mixed, with some organizations expressing concern that  DPMO would assume more of an operational role than it had previously  played. When our 2005 report was issued, the draft charter directive had  not yet been finalized but had been revised to scale back DPMO’s role—a  revision that was sustained when the directive was ultimately issued.

In addition, a 2006 Institute for Defense Analysis study conducted at the  request of DPMO analyzed organizational changes that could improve the  effectiveness and efficiency of the accounting community. This study  concluded that significant improvements could be made by increasing the  lines of coordination in the accounting community and by recommending  that the community acknowledge DPMO as the leader in the accounting  effort. The study also described some of the problems associated with the  current organization; for example, that DPMO does not have tasking  authority over the other organizations, and that while there are multiple  lines of authority, no one organization has effective authority over  execution of the entire mission. Furthermore, the December 2009 memo  from the Deputy Secretary of Defense, directing the DASD to begin  planning a response to the accounting-for goal, noted that reorganizing  the personnel accounting community to improve efficiency could be  included as part of the planning process. In May 2011 CAPE conducted a  study on the proposal to transfer the mission, function, and resources of  DPMO from USD Policy to USD Personnel and Readiness. As part of its  study, CAPE solicited the opinions of several organizations, and  concluded that the mission was being met under the current  organizational structure and that no significant efficiencies would be  gained from the transfer. During the course of our review, DPMO officials  told us that concerns are still being raised about the organization of the  accounting community, both within DOD and externally, and that the  entire accounting community continues to struggle with efforts to achieve  consensus and to establish a structure that will enable the department to  most efficiently and effectively achieve the mission.

We found that a majority of accounting community and DOD stakeholder  organizations believe that an alternative organizational structure for the  accounting community would be more effective. We administered a  questionnaire asking representatives from each accounting community  organization whether various options could improve the ability of the  community to meet its mission. One question asked respondents to rank  five organizational options that would best enable the accounting  community to meet its mission. We found that 12 of the 13 survey  respondents who answered the question ranked an option with a more  centralized chain of command as the most effective in enabling the  accounting community to achieve its mission. Ten of these 12  respondents ranked the current organizational structure as the least  effective or second least effective option for achieving the mission of the  accounting community. For example, the Life Sciences Equipment  Laboratory stated that the current system is fragmented and inefficient  due to different reporting chains and is not conducive to community  involvement or to establishing standard community policies and  procedures, and that having a single leader would better enable the entire  accounting community to achieve its mission. Moreover, the Army service  casualty office stated that the current structure does not allow for senior  leadership involvement, and that having unity of command would allow  leaders to focus on the right issues instead of spending time resolving  disputes.

Responses to our questionnaire also demonstrated a lack of confidence  about the current organizational structure among many community and  DOD stakeholder organizations. We asked respondents to rate the  various organizational options with regard to several characteristics that  we have previously reported would benefit collaborating organizations,  such as defining an overarching mission with clear priorities; limiting  areas of overlap or duplication; communicating and operating across  agency boundaries; collectively determining necessary resources;  defining and agreeing on roles and responsibilities; monitoring progress,  evaluating efforts, and identifying areas of improvement; and enabling  appropriate involvement of senior leadership. In their responses to each  of our seven questions on these issues, at least 10 respondents  expressed a lack of confidence in the current organizational structure. For  example, at least 12 of the survey respondents indicated that the current  organizational structure did not enable or only somewhat enabled the  community to develop the mandated capability and capacity, or to  collectively determine necessary resources. In addition, nine respondents  indicated that the current organizational structure did not at all enable the  accounting community to define and agree on their respective roles and  responsibilities. The organizations provided detailed comments to  elaborate on their responses to the survey questions. For example, the  Armed Forces Medical Examiner System stated that the status quo, in  any form, is inefficient and promotes a disjointed and disunified effort and  that the only way to potentially meet the accounting-for goal would be  through unity of effort and clear command and control channels. The  Navy POW/MIA Branch stated that a more integrated model would allow  for a single agency with increased authority within DOD to create the plan  for developing the capability and capacity to account for 200 missing  persons per year. The Air Force casualty and mortuary affairs offices  stated that an integrated structure would provide a single lead for policy  oversight and would eliminate the duplication of operations among  accounting community organizations, and that transferring operational  missions from a combatant command would eliminate the need for  memoranda of agreement between each of the commands for operations  and would eliminate the need for JPAC’s budget request to compete for  resources with those of other PACOM missions.

In contrast, not a single organization ranked the current organizational  structure as the most effective organizational option, and only three  organizations—USD Policy, PACOM, and JPAC—ranked the current  organizational structure as the second most effective organizational  option. Illustrating a disconnect between leadership’s perspective and the  rest of the community, only two organizations—USD Policy and PACOM,  the two existing top-level leadership organizations in the accounting  community—responded that the current structure greatly enables  appropriate senior leadership involvement. PACOM and USD Policy  stated that all of the organizational options, including the current  organizational structure, offer access to DOD senior leadership. In  addition, senior officials from these offices questioned whether the benefit  of reorganization would result in real change and would be worth  undergoing turmoil in the organization. While we recognize that a  reorganization may pose challenges, such as creating the potential for  short-term impacts on operations due to disruption, our findings show  that the majority of accounting community members and other  stakeholders lack confidence in the status quo, and we believe that the  potential benefits of reorganizing and/or clarifying roles and  responsibilities could outweigh those challenges.

The accounting community’s current organizational structure has  contributed to the community’s lack of collaboration, which in turn has  contributed to the deficiencies related to planning, roles and  responsibilities, requirements, and communication discussed above. Until  the Secretary of Defense ensures that activities associated with the  accounting mission are efficiently and effectively carried out with unity of  command and effort, the inefficient and potentially avoidable overlap and  disagreements among the community members may continue, and  recovery operations could be hindered by unexpected operational  concerns and a lack of standard procedures. Further, if the recent positive  gains are lost, the community could revert to an atmosphere of dissension  and lack of collaboration.

section_title: Conclusions
paragraphs: More than 3 years have passed since Congress directed DOD to increase  its capability and capacity to account for missing persons and established  the accounting-for goal, but the department has yet to establish a  community-wide plan to meet these goals in a unified manner by 2015.  The lack of involvement by top-level departmental leadership—above  DPMO and JPAC—to direct actions to foster unity and agreement in  reaching a plan has enabled the organizational disputes that have  plagued the department for well over two decades to obstruct progress in  developing a community-wide plan. This discord has also contributed to  the department’s inability to clarify the roles and responsibilities of the  members of the accounting community regarding fundamental functions  such as artifact analysis, research and analysis, investigations, and family  outreach. While there have been some indications of progress being  made by the accounting community, the department’s efforts continue to  be thwarted by organizational fragmentation and discord. DOD’s inability  to establish criteria that can be used to prioritize and determine the  number of recoveries the department can reasonably expect further  hinders the department’s overall progress to achieve its mission.

In addition, without agreements among the combatant commanders for  conducting operations to find missing persons outside of the PACOM’s  area of responsibility, future missing persons operations may be  adversely affected due to unexpected operational or diplomatic concerns.  While efforts have been made to improve communication among the  accounting community members, some communication efforts have not  been incorporated in DOD guidance and the accounting community has  not developed personnel files to share information, as required by statute.  Until DOD incorporates mechanisms for communication in its guidance  governing the accounting community, the department remains at risk of  losing the recent gains attributable to these efforts and of reverting to an  atmosphere of dissension and lack of collaboration. Overall, the  accounting community’s current organizational structure has contributed  to these deficiencies, and the majority of accounting community members  and other stakeholders lack confidence in the organizational status quo of  the accounting community. Until the Secretary of Defense ensures that  activities associated with the accounting mission are efficiently and  effectively carried out, the inefficient and potentially avoidable overlap and  disagreements among the community members may continue.  Collectively, these weaknesses jeopardize DOD’s capability and capacity  to accomplish the statutory goals of accounting for missing persons, and  to provide some measure of closure to those families whose loved ones  are still missing as a result of their service to their country.

section_title: Recommendations for Executive Action
paragraphs: To enhance DOD’s capability and capacity to accomplish the missing  persons accounting mission, we are making the following nine  recommendations to the Secretary of Defense.

To help unify the accounting community’s fragmented organizational  structure, we recommend that the Secretary of Defense examine options  for reorganizing the accounting community, and as part of that  examination, consider organizational options that provide a more  centralized chain of command over the accounting community’s mission.

To clarify the specific roles and responsibilities of the accounting  community members to help minimize unnecessary overlap and  disagreement among community members: direct the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (Policy) to  revise DOD Directive 2310.07E and finalize and issue the new  related DOD instruction to supplement this directive. Clarification  of roles and responsibilities should be made particularly with  respect to the following four functions: equipment and artifact  identification and analysis; research and analysis; investigations;  and family outreach and external communications. direct the Secretary of the Air Force and direct the Commander,  U.S. Pacific Command, or the appropriate departmental entity in  light of any reorganization, to negotiate a new memorandum of  agreement between the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory and  JPAC. The memorandum should specify which conflicts’ artifacts  JPAC should send to the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory for  analysis, the type of artifacts sent, and the priorities according to  which the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory should analyze  resolved cases.

To more efficiently and effectively develop the capability and capacity to  account for missing persons, direct the Office of the Under Secretary of  Defense (Policy), or the appropriate departmental entity in light of any  reorganization, to take the following actions:  finalize the community-wide plan to develop the increased  capability and capacity required by statute, with the support and  participation of all community members. The initiatives and  resources of all members of the accounting community should be  integrated within the community-wide plan, including changes in  planned operations and in the extent to which disinterments will be  performed. establish criteria that can be used to prioritize missing persons  cases to reflect feasibility of recovery, in order to better allocate  resources and prioritize the department’s efforts to account for  missing persons. establish a mechanism for community-wide communication to help  sustain the positive gains that have recently been made with  respect to communication.  formalize the communication procedures for the JPAC Central  Identification Laboratory to provide the service casualty offices  with advance notification of pending identifications, to better  expedite families’ notification of identifications. ensure that DPMO, in coordination with all members of the  accounting community, develop personnel files for all  unaccounted for persons as required by statute, in order to help  avoid potential overlap or unnecessary duplication of effort and to  ensure better communication among community members with  respect to missing persons cases.

To help avert unexpected operational or diplomatic issues that might  hinder missing persons operations, direct the Commander, U.S. Pacific  Command, and Commander, Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action  Accounting Command, or the appropriate department entities in light of  any reorganization, to develop memoranda of agreement or other  appropriate mechanisms with the other combatant commands in whose  area of responsibility JPAC is likely to operate.

section_title: Agency Comments and Our Evaluation
paragraphs: We provided a draft of this report to DOD for review and comment. In  written comments, DOD concurred with eight of our nine  recommendations and partially concurred with the remaining  recommendation. DOD also provided a number of technical comments  that we considered and incorporated, as appropriate. DOD’s comments  are reprinted in their entirety in appendix V.

In agreeing with our first eight recommendations, DOD stated that it: needs to examine options to unify the personnel accounting  community’s fragmented organizational structure; will clarify the roles and responsibilities of members of the accounting will negotiate a new memorandum of agreement between JPAC and  the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory; will finalize its community-wide plan to develop increased capability  and capacity to account for missing persons; will establish criteria that can be used to prioritize efforts to recover will establish a mechanism for community-wide communications; needs to formalize communication procedures for the organizations  identified by the GAO; and will develop personnel files for all unaccounted-for persons.

We believe that DOD’s stated intent to focus any reorganization efforts on  DPMO and JPAC and possibly the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory,  and to examine options that would place the consolidated organization  under a non-geographic combatant command, would meet the intent of  our recommendation. Considering that families have been waiting for  decades to discover the fate of their loved ones, and in light of the  upcoming 2015 date for attaining the accounting-for goal, we believe that  DOD’s examination should be completed as quickly as possible. In  addition, we are encouraged that the draft directive is now in formal  coordination and the draft instruction has been amended to clarify the  areas we identified. In the event that the department decides to  reorganize in response to our first recommendation, we note that the  department would then have to revise its guidance on roles and  responsibilities to reflect any reorganization.

With regard to our ninth recommendation, that the department develop  memoranda of agreement with the other combatant commands in whose  area of responsibility JPAC is likely to operate, DOD partially concurred.  The department stated that it concurs that there is a need for a formal  mechanism to ensure that DPMO and JPAC have the appropriate  authorities to operate across combatant commands. However, DOD said  that the best mechanism or overarching document may not be a  memorandum of agreement, noting that the current and future DOD  Directive 2310.07E directs the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to  operationally implement this directive. DOD stated that the best  mechanism is through procedures available to the Chairman of the Joint  Chiefs of Staff and the Joint Staff, rather than using memorandums of  agreement. DOD said that DPMO will support action by the Joint Staff to  carry out that direction. We recommended the development of  memoranda of agreement with all geographic combatant commands  because that was the vehicle that JPAC used with U.S. European  Command, as we discuss in our report, and the agreement with U.S.  European Command contained detailed processes governing JPAC’s  operations within that command’s area of responsibility that we  considered would be beneficial to develop similar agreements with all of  the geographic combatant commands. However, if the department  believes that a more uniform approach for all of the combatant commands  could be developed through guidance or some other mechanism, we  agree that it is possible that the intent of our recommendation could be  met by a mechanism other than memoranda of agreement with each of  the combatant commands. As a result, we are modifying our  recommendation to provide the department with the flexibility to consider  other appropriate mechanisms that could achieve this outcome.

We are sending copies of this report to appropriate congressional  committees, the Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of  Staff, the Secretaries of the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force, and the  Commandant of the Marine Corps. The report also is available at no  charge on the GAO website at http://www.gao.gov.

If you or your staff have any questions about this report, please contact  me at (202) 512-3604 or farrellb@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices  of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last  page of this report. GAO staff who made key contributions to this report  are listed in appendix VI.

section_title: Appendix I: Questionnaire to Accounting Community Members
paragraphs: We administered a questionnaire to the accounting community member  organizations and several DOD stakeholder organizations regarding their  views on alternative options for organizing the accounting community. We  received a total of 14 responses out of the 17 questionnaires we  distributed. All of the accounting community organizations submitted  survey responses. Some organizations did not respond to all questions.  For example, of the 14 organizations that provided responses, 13  responded specifically to the question on the option that enables the  accounting community organizations to define and articulate an  overarching mission with clear priorities. The following summarizes the  responses we received from each of the survey respondents. The  numbers in the boxes represent the number of organizations that selected  the particular response.

section_title: Appendix II: Scope and Methodology
paragraphs: To assess DOD’s capability and capacity to accomplish the missing  persons accounting mission, we analyzed relevant statutes related to  DOD’s missing persons accounting program, including the National  Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 and Chapter 76 of Title  10 of the United States Code, as well as DOD directives, instructions,  memoranda of agreement, standard operating procedures, and other  guidance. We also interviewed officials from a wide range of DOD  organizations. We reviewed proposed and funded plans to address the  accounting-for goal developed by members of the accounting community  to address this goal, and discussed with officials the circumstances  surrounding the development of these plans. We also discussed with the  different community members their different processes for requesting  resources and we reviewed budgetary and other documents regarding  what additional resources the community members had requested or  planned to request to meet the goal, and the outcome of those resource  requests. To identify the department’s total spending on the missing  persons accounting program, we obtained information on obligations for  fiscal years 2008 through 2012 for all members of the accounting  community.

We analyzed relevant statutes and DOD directives, instructions,  memoranda of agreement, standard operating procedures, and other  guidance and documentation to identify potential areas of duplication,  unnecessary overlap, or fragmentation among the activities of the  accounting community members. We interviewed the relevant officials in  the accounting community to discuss the areas where these roles and  responsibilities were vague or overlapping, and discussed potential  benefits and drawbacks of the lack of clarity in roles and responsibilities  and associated areas of overlapping responsibilities for DOD’s missing  persons accounting mission. We did not evaluate whether overlap would  have positive or negative effects. We also discussed guidance available  to accounting community members for potential operations outside of  PACOM’s area of responsibility, and examined the extent the community  had established criteria for prioritizing potentially recoverable missing  persons . We discussed and reviewed communication efforts, and  determined the status of a statutory requirement to establish personnel  files for all unaccounted for persons.

During the course of our review, we interviewed officials at a wide range  of agencies and offices, including all members of the missing persons  accounting community as well officials from top-level leadership offices  and other stakeholder organizations, to obtain their perspectives on  DOD’s missing persons accounting efforts and the organization of the  accounting community. Specifically, we interviewed officials from all of the  statutory members of the missing persons accounting community,  including Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for Prisoner of  War/Missing Personnel Affairs; Defense Prisoner of War/Missing  Personnel Office (DPMO); Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action  Accounting Command; Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory; Life  Sciences Equipment Laboratory; the Army Casualty and Mortuary Affairs  Operations Center; the Navy POW/MIA Branch; the Air Force Past  Conflicts Branch; the Air Force Missing Persons Branch; and the Marine  Corps Casualty Office. In addition, we interviewed officials from top-level  leadership offices and other stakeholder organizations, such as the Joint  Staff, the Office of the Secretary of Defense (Policy), the Office of the  Secretary of Defense (Personnel and Readiness), U.S. Pacific Command,  the Defense Intelligence Agency, and DOD’s Office of Cost Assessment  and Program Evaluation, to discuss the department’s missing persons  accounting efforts and the organization of DOD’s missing persons  accounting community. Further, we interviewed officials from several  veterans and family organizations to obtain their perspectives on DOD’s  missing persons accounting efforts and the role these organizations play  in these efforts. Specifically, we spoke with officials from the American  Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, National League of POW/MIA  Families, and Korea-Cold War Families of the Missing. We also  interviewed officials at the Department of State during the review before  making the decision to limit the scope to DOD because State did not have  a central focal point for these efforts, and State officials did not express  concerns about DOD’s coordination with State on its missing persons  accounting efforts.

Although we found some discrepancies in DPMO’s data, we found the  data to be sufficiently reliable to enumerate the numbers of unaccounted- for persons for background and illustrative purposes and to describe the  estimated magnitude of missing persons who have been accounted for  over the years broken out by military service, conflict, and geographic  location. The numbers also relate to our discussion on DOD’s efforts to  establish criteria to prioritize potentially recoverable missing persons.

Furthermore, we assessed the existing organizational structure of the  accounting community, by reviewing organizational charts and DOD  directives, instructions, and other guidance. In addition, we reviewed prior  assessments of the organization and members of the missing persons  accounting community. To understand the extent to which alternative  organizational options could help improve the accounting community, we  administered a questionnaire to the accounting community member  organizations and several DOD stakeholder organizations regarding their  views on alternative options for organizing the accounting community.  These options included maintaining the status quo, adding a board of  advisors to the status quo, and integrating DPMO and JPAC under a  single leadership structure with some variations on which organization  should lead that structure. We conducted a pretest of the questionnaire  and made appropriate changes based on the pretest. This questionnaire  is reprinted in appendix I, along with a summary of the responses.

We administered the questionnaire to the universe of 17 organizations  identified within the scope of this engagement, and requested one  response from each respondent to serve as an organizational response.  The respondents included all of the accounting community organizations:  DPMO, JPAC, the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory, the Life  Sciences Equipment Laboratory, and the casualty and mortuary affairs  offices of the military departments. In addition, we distributed the  questionnaire to several DOD stakeholder organizations, including the  Defense Intelligence Agency (Stony Beach), JPAC’s Central Identification  Laboratory, USD Policy, USD Personnel and Readiness, the Joint Chiefs  of Staff, Armed Forces Medical Examiner, U.S. Pacific Command, U.S.  European Command, and DOD’s Office of Cost Assessment and  Program Evaluation. We selected these organizations based on their  involvement in the missing persons accounting mission. We administered  the questionnaires via e-mail. We received a total of 14 responses out of  the 17 questionnaires distributed, and followed up with all of the non- respondents. All of the accounting community organizations submitted  survey responses. We qualitatively analyzed the open-ended responses  and quantitatively analyzed the closed-ended responses from the  questionnaires to identify trends in responses and gain insight into the  accounting community organizations’ and DOD stakeholders’ views on  the issues identified in the questionnaire.

The survey used was not a sample survey in that it included the universe  of respondents. Therefore, the survey has no sampling errors. However,  the practical difficulties of conducting any survey may introduce other  types of errors, commonly referred to as nonsampling errors. For  example, differences in how a particular question is interpreted, the  sources of information available to respondents, or the types of people  who do not respond can introduce unwanted variability into the survey  results. We included steps in the development of the survey, the data  collection, and the data analysis to minimize these nonsampling errors  and help ensure the accuracy of the answers that were obtained. For  example, a social science survey specialist designed the questionnaire, in  collaboration with GAO staff with subject matter expertise. The survey  asked a combination of questions that allowed for both open-ended and  close-ended responses. We pretested the content and format of the  questionnaire. During the pretests, we asked questions to determine  whether (1) the survey questions were clear, (2) the terms we used were  precise, (3) the questionnaire did not place an undue burden on the  respondents, and (4) the questions were unbiased. We received input on  the survey and made changes to the content and format of the final  questionnaire based on our pretest results.

The questionnaire was also reviewed by an independent GAO survey  specialist. Data analysis was conducted by a GAO data analyst working  directly with GAO staff with subject matter expertise. A second  independent analyst checked all of the computer programs for accuracy.  The survey was conducted using self-administered electronic  questionnaires. All data were double-keyed during the data-entry process,  and GAO staff verified a sample of the resulting data to ensure accuracy.

We compared the results of our analyses to several practices we have  identified in prior work that can benefit collaborating agencies, including  (1) having overarching plans to align activities and resources; (2) clearly  defining roles and responsibilities; (3) articulating agreements in formal  documents; (4) communicating frequently; and (5) having a single- designated leader.

We conducted this performance audit from June 2012 through June 2013  in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.

Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain  sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our  findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that  the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and  conclusions based on our audit objectives.

section_title: Appendix III: Noninteractive Graphic and Text for Figure 1
paragraphs: Missing persons: Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) is  responsible for maintaining the lists of missing persons. Service casualty  offices serve as the primary point of contact for families and brief them on  case status and developments through regularly scheduled updates,  annual government briefings, and as requested.

Research and analysis: DPMO and the Joint POW/MIA Accounting  Command (JPAC) conduct archival and other research about loss  incidents to develop background information and other details for missing  persons cases from past conflicts.

Investigation: If a case is determined to be sufficient after the research  and analysis phase, DPMO and JPAC conduct investigations to locate  and correlate information to a specific geographic location using case- specific experts such as historians and case analysts.

Remains recovery: If it is determined that a sufficient correlation exists  between the investigated case and the geographic location, the recovery  mission to locate and excavate a crash or burial site and gather all  remains and artifacts for analysis begins. JPAC’s Central Identification  Laboratory conducts remains recovery operations. The recovery team  typically includes anthropologists, archaeologists, life support  investigators, and photographers. Remains recovery can also occur  through unilateral turnover by foreign countries and through disinterment  of unknown remains in U.S. national cemeteries.

Identification: JPAC’s Central Identification Laboratory analyzes skeletal  and dental remains and analyzes materiel evidence, and life support  equipment. DNA samples are sent to the Armed Forces DNA  Identification Laboratory for analysis. The Life Sciences Equipment  Laboratory is sometimes consulted to assist with analysis of aircraft  wreckage and life support equipment.

Family acceptance: Service casualty or mortuary affairs office personnel  notify the primary next of kin of an identification and present the case  information to the primary next of kin to gain the family’s acceptance of  the identification. They also assist families with funeral arrangements  Accounting: Upon receipt of the casualty report from the service casualty  office, DPMO removes name of identified person from list of missing  persons and issues press release.

section_title: Appendix IV: Noninteractive Graphic and Text for Figure 4
paragraphs: Under Secretary of Defense (Policy) is responsible for developing,  coordinating, and overseeing the implementation of DOD policy to  account for personnel unaccounted for as a result of hostile acts.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for Prisoner  of War/Missing Personnel Affairs is responsible for, among  other things, exercising policy, control, and oversight for the  entire process of accounting for missing persons; monitoring  and advocating for program funding requirements and  resources for the mission; and leading and coordinating related  communications efforts, such as the public outreach program.

Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) was  established within DOD in 1993 to provide centralized  management of POW/MIA affairs in order to enhance the  efficiency, effectiveness, and responsiveness of DOD’s  efforts in addressing these issues. DPMO’s mission is to  lead the national effort to account for personnel, including  members of the armed forces on active duty, DOD civilian  employees, or employees of a DOD contractor, missing as a  result of hostile action, and establishes the conditions  necessary to recover those who become isolated during  operations. DPMO is responsible for, among other things,  overseeing archival research and standardizing procedures  for methodology and prioritization; rendering final analytic  judgments as to what constitutes fullest possible accounting  for each case by identifying possibilities for future action , or  determining when no further pursuit is possible; and defining,  maintaining and enumerating accounting lists. The DPMO  Director is responsible for overseeing the execution of  DPMO’s mission and duties. In addition, the DASD for  Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Affairs serves as the  DPMO director and reports to the Under Secretary of  Defense-Policy in that capacity as well.

Department of the Army The Secretary of the Army serves as the  Executive Agent for mortuary affairs for the Department of Defense.

U.S. Army Human Resources Command  Casualty and Mortuary Affairs Operations Center serves  as the primary liaison for families concerning personnel  recovery and accounting. Officials from this office also assist  families and help explain the methods used to account for  their missing loved ones. Additional activities include  gathering family DNA reference samples and coordinating  responses to family inquiries and concerns and maintaining  family contact information.

Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory  conducts DNA analyses of remains of missing  persons from past military conflicts for the Joint  POW/MIA Accounting Command and its  laboratory component, the Central Identification  Laboratory, and maintains the past conflict  accounting family reference sample database,  to include processing of all DNA references.

The Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory  provides technical and analytical support to the  accounting community, and is primarily tasked by  the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command’s  Central Identification Laboratory to analyze and  identify life science equipment-related artifacts  that have been recovered and may potentially be  related to missing persons cases.

Air Force Missing Persons Branch serves as liaison  for families concerning personnel recovery and  accounting, particularly relating to primary next of kin  issues.

Past Conflicts Branch serves as liaison for families  concerning personnel recovery and accounting,  particularly for issues relating to the “person authorized  to direct disposition,” and to mortuary affairs. Additional  responsibilities include gathering family DNA reference  samples.

Navy POW/MIA Branch serves as the primary liaison  for families concerning personnel recovery and  accounting. Officials from this office also assist families  and help explain the methods used to account for their  missing loved ones. Additional responsibilities include  gathering family DNA reference samples and  coordinating responses to family inquiries and  concerns and maintaining family contact information.

Marine and Family Programs Division  Marine Corps Service Casualty Office serves as the  primary liaison for families concerning personnel  recovery and accounting. Officials from this office also  assist families and help explain the methods used to  account for their missing loved ones. Additional  responsibilities include gathering family DNA reference  samples and coordinating responses to family inquiries  and concerns and maintaining family contact  information.

Joint Chiefs of Staff is responsible for monitoring program funding  requirements and resourcesfor the execution of the personnel  accounting mission, and for supporting joint manning requirements  for joint accounting organizations in coordination with the PACOM.

U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM)

Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) is  responsible for conducting operations in support of achieving  the missing persons accounting mission. In 2003 JPAC was  established as a Joint Command by the merger of the Joint  Task Force-Full Accounting and Central Identification  Laboratory – Hawaii in order to achieve unity of command,  permanence of operational elements, and efficiency and  effectiveness in the use of DOD’s resources, as well as to  strengthen the command and control of military forces in  achieving the fullest possible accounting. JPAC’s functions  include analysis, archival research,  investigations, recoveries,  repatriations, identifications, and reporting.

Central Identification Laboratory (CIL) is the laboratory  component of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command.

Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence coordinates with  other non-DOD intelligence organizations and agencies and  appropriate DOD agencies as necessary to promote intelligence  information-sharing and to support missing persons accounting  operations.

Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Military Community and Family Policy Casualty, Mortuary Affairs and Military Funeral  Honors coordinates casualty matters among the military  services, other federal agencies, non-profit  organizations, and family support groups. In addition, this  organization also provides policy guidance to the military  services and other agencies on casualty reporting,  recording, notification, and legislation affecting casualty  matters and develops issuances on mortuary affairs.  Additionally, this organization develops policy requiring  personnel recovery in DOD component education and  training programs.

section_title: Appendix V: Comments from the Department of Defense

section_title: Appendix VI: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments
subsections: section_title: GAO Contact

section_title: Staff Acknowledgments
paragraphs: In addition to the contact named above, Margaret Best (Assistant  Director), Renee Brown, Terry Richardson, Leigh Ann Sennette, Amie  Steele, Cheryl Weissman, Allen Westheimer, and Michael Willems made  major contributions to this report.


Question-summary annotations: questions: question: Who holds responsibility for the accounting mission?
answer: Statute and DOD guidance assign responsibility for the accounting mission to many organizations and each reports through a different line of authority. Thus, no single entity is responsible for communitywide personnel and resources.
child_questions: question: How has this fragmented leadership affected the accounting mission?
answer: This fragmented organizational structure has exacerbated weaknesses in leadership, and most community organizations GAO spoke to believe alternative structures would be more effective.
child_questions: question: To what extent will this hinder the mission?
answer: Until top-level leaders at USD Policy and PACOM can ensure that all mission activities are carried out with unity of effort, inefficient and potentially avoidable overlap, unexpected operational concerns, and disagreements among members could continue to hinder the mission.

question: How do community members feel about the organizational structure?
answer: A majority of community members GAO surveyed conveyed a lack of confidence about the organizational structure. For example, 12 out of 13 survey respondents ranked an option with a more centralized chain of command as the most effective in enabling the accounting community to achieve its mission.

questions: question: What organizations are responsible for accounting for missing persons from wars?
answer: Several DOD organizations, known as the accounting community, have a role in accounting for the missing.
child_questions: question: What quantity of people are missing from these wars?
answer: DOD reports that more than 83,000 persons are missing from past conflicts in Vietnam, Korea, the Cold War, the Persian Gulf, and World War II.

question: What progress is DOD making in accounting for these missing persons?
answer: Between 2002 and 2012, DOD accounted for an average of 72 persons each year.

question: What did Congress mandate regarding missing persons in 2009?
answer: In 2009, Congress mandated DOD to increase its capability and capacity such that the community could account for at least 200 missing persons annually by 2015.
child_questions: question: How did the law affect WWII missing persons counts?
answer: The law also added all World War II losses to the list of conflicts for which DOD was responsible, thus increasing from about 10,000 to 83,000 the number of missing persons for whom DOD must account.

question: What did GAO assess?
answer: GAO assessed DOD's capability and capacity to accomplish the missing persons accounting mission.
child_questions: question: What data did GAO collect for this assessment?
answer: In doing so, GAO analyzed guidance and requirements, discussed accounting efforts and the structure of the community with community members, and surveyed accounting community members and related entities.

question: What mandated GAO to review DOD’s efforts in the first place?
answer: A committee report accompanying the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 mandated GAO to review DOD's efforts to address the accounting-for goal.