Prepositioning is an important part of DOD’s overall strategic mobility framework. It allows DOD to field combat-ready forces in days rather than the weeks it would take if the forces and all necessary equipment and supplies had to be brought from the United States to the location of the conflict. The U.S. military can deliver equipment and supplies in three ways: by air, by sea, or by prepositioning. While airlift is fast, it is expensive to use and impractical for moving all of the material needed for a large-scale deployment. Although ships can carry large loads, they are slower than airlift. Prepositioning lessens the strain of using expensive airlift and reduces the reliance on slower sealift deliveries. Concerned about the reduction in U.S. forces overseas and their ability to move forces in the time required to resolve potential conflicts quickly, the services have expanded prepositioning programs ashore and on ships in potential areas of conflict. The military services have prepositioning programs to store combat or support equipment and supplies near areas with a high potential for conflict and to speed response times and reduce the strain on other mobility assets. The Defense Logistics Agency prepositions food and bulk fuel to support a range of contingency operations and training exercises. The Special Operations Command relies on the military services to preposition common support items for its forces, such as base support items and vehicles. The Army’s program involves three primary categories of stocks: combat brigade sets, operational projects, and war reserve sustainment stocks stored at land sites and aboard prepositioning ships around the world. The Marine Corps also prepositions equipment and supplies aboard prepositioning ships and at land sites in Norway. The Navy’s prepositioning efforts are comparatively small, used mainly to support the Marine Corps’ prepositioning program and deploying forces. The Navy prepositions equipment and supplies at land sites and aboard the maritime prepositioning ships. The Air Force prepositions stocks of war reserve equipment and supplies to meet initial contingency requirements and to sustain early deploying forces. The Air Force’s prepositioned war reserve stocks include bare base sets; vehicles; munitions; and a variety of consumable supplies, such as rations, fuel, support equipment, aircraft accessories, and medical supplies. DOD’s prepositioning programs are briefly described in the table below. The military services preposition these stocks of equipment and supplies at several land sites and aboard prepositioning ships around the world. Most of the military services preposition equipment and supplies in southwest Asia, the Pacific theater, Europe, and aboard prepositioning ships. Figure 1 shows the locations of DOD’s prepositioned stocks. DOD faces some near-term operational risks should another large-scale conflict emerge due to inventory shortfalls and poor maintenance condition of some of its prepositioned stocks. For example, the department has drawn heavily on its prepositioned stocks to support ongoing operations in Iraq and relatively little has been reconstituted. In addition, while remaining stocks provide some residual capability, many have significant inventory shortfalls and in some cases, maintenance problems. Combatant commanders rely on prepositioned stocks being available and in good maintenance condition; otherwise U.S. forces must bring needed stocks with them or spend valuable time repairing equipment. Since these stocks are typically used in the early stages of a conflict, it is important for DOD to determine the operational risk associated with any shortfalls. Operation Iraqi Freedom revealed significant issues with the status of prepositioned stocks, such as shortages in spare parts and less-than-modern equipment. The same problems continue to exist today in some programs. The Army is currently reporting low inventory fill for the combat brigade sets, operational project stocks, and sustainment stocks that comprise its prepositioning program, and some stocks not used in recent operations are in poor maintenance condition. For example, the Army used much of the equipment and supplies associated with the combat brigade sets stored at land sites in Kuwait and Qatar and aboard prepositioning ships afloat near Diego Garcia to support operations in Iraq. In addition, the Army used some equipment from its other prepositioned stocks in Europe, South Korea, and from other prepositioning ships located near Guam/Saipan. The Army is also reporting low inventory fill for its operational projects and sustainment stocks. The Army has a total of 14 operational projects that contain equipment and supplies needed for unique mission requirements, such as special operations forces, mortuary operations, and prisoner handling. Sustainment stocks provide replacement equipment and supplies, such as repair parts, petroleum items, and tracked vehicles, until normal resupply channels are established. The Army is reporting inventory fills for operational projects and sustainment stocks— approximately 26 percent and 20 percent respectively—that are considerably lower than the program requirements. Some of the Army’s shortfalls have been long-standing, however, including shortfalls in critical areas like spare parts, and are not attributable to the war in Iraq. For example, we reported in 2003 that DOD experienced equipment readiness problems because of a lack of key spare parts. Table 2 provides an overview of the inventory levels, maintenance condition, and operations and maintenance funding of the Army’s prepositioned stocks. Some stocks that were taken from prepositioned storage locations and used during operations in Iraq are either still in use, or have experienced extreme wear and tear. For example, the Army continues to use equipment taken from prepositioned stocks to support its units in Iraq, delaying the reconstitution and redistribution of the equipment. According to Army officials, this equipment may not be returned to the prepositioned stocks because the Army is giving priority to transforming its forces into more deployable and expeditionary brigade-based formations and may use formerly prepositioned equipment to fill additional equipment requirements associated with the new formations. Importantly, this heavy stress on equipment is a problem across much of the Army’s equipment that has been used in Iraq, not just the equipment taken from prepositioned stocks. We also found that some other prepositioned stocks in storage were in poor maintenance condition, even though they had not been used in Operation Iraqi Freedom. For example, during a March 2005 visit to Camp Carroll, South Korea, we found that some of the Army’s prepositioned stocks at this location were in poor maintenance condition and that much of the equipment was overdue for periodic maintenance. Army officials confirmed that required cyclic maintenance had not been performed on the equipment in the brigade set, operational projects, and sustainment stocks for several years. To address this, the Army has stepped up its maintenance efforts by bringing in contractor support and setting up temporary maintenance facilities to assist in repairing the equipment to standard. Moreover, as shown in figure 2, certain stocks were stored outside and had been for many years and corrosion was evident on some pieces of equipment. Corrosion can significantly affect the readiness of prepositioned equipment: DOD spends an estimated $20 billion each year to repair the damage to military equipment and infrastructure caused by this problem. In this regard, we have called for improvements to DOD’s long-term corrosion strategy, including better planning and establishment of a long-term funding mechanism. Because of continuing concerns over corrosion, we are currently conducting a congressionally directed review of its impact on DOD’s overall prepositioned assets. The Army also maintains European prepositioning storage sites in Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. However, few stocks remain there because they have been drawn out to support operations in other locations, including Bosnia and Iraq. The mission in Europe has steadily declined since the European drawdown of the early 1990s, and the remaining sites are the last remnants of the Army’s large-scale prepositioning program developed during the Cold War. Army officials told us that they are currently using the local national workforce at these locations to perform other maintenance workloads, including fixing equipment from Iraq. In past reports, we have recommended that the Army align its workforce and facilities to meet the reduced post-Cold War mission in Europe. Officials told us that they have reduced infrastructure in response to our recommendations, and are contemplating further reductions. In Italy, however, the Army has requested about $55 million to construct new storage and maintenance facilities that it has said will become the centerpiece of its land prepositioning in the region. This region still receives considerable funding, as shown in table 2. The Army spent nearly $290 million during fiscal years 2000-2004, even though the sites have had an uncertain mission and reduced stocks for much of that time. The Marine Corps has offloaded about 75 percent of the major end-items stored on 5 of its 16 prepositioning ships to support combat operations in Iraq. The remaining 11 prepositioning ships are reporting inventory fills of 95 percent or greater and good maintenance condition for major end-items and sustainment stocks. The Marine Corps also used some of its prepositioned major end-items stored at several land sites in Norway to support operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and to fill shortfalls at Marine Corps bases and on some of the prepositioning ships. As a result, these sites are currently reporting an inventory fill of about 71 percent. It is unclear when this equipment will be returned to prepositioned stocks because, according to a Marine Corps official, a large portion of the Marine Corps’ equipment offloaded from prepositioning ships to support the deployment of the I Marine Expeditionary Force to Iraq is currently being kept in Iraq to support the rotation of the II Marine Expeditionary Force. In a recent congressional testimony on the status of its military equipment, a Marine Corps official reported that in addition to higher usage rates, equipment is being used under extreme conditions which have increased the maintenance requirements. For example, to date, more than 1,800 equipment items have been destroyed and an additional 2,300 damaged equipment items will require depot maintenance. For the Norway stocks, the Marine Corps is in the process of updating the requirements for its program there so that it will be capable of providing a global response capability to any regional combatant commander. During our September 2004 visit to the prepositioning sites in Norway, we discussed this change in the scope of the program and Marine Corps officials confirmed that the facilities in Norway can support any combatant commander and the stocks are globally deployable via air, rail, and sea. This shift in scope is in response to concerns about the continued relevance of land stocks in Norway. According to Marine Corps officials, however, these stocks are important to Norway, cost relatively little to maintain (about $3.9 million in operational costs per year), are stored in excellent facilities, and can be taken out to respond to crises as needed. The Navy is reporting high inventory fill for its prepositioned assets. According to Navy officials, most of its equipment used to offload the maritime prepositioning ships was not used in direct combat and has not required extensive reconstitution, and other equipment was available to backfill the field hospitals and construction forces deployed to support operations in Iraq. The Air Force has used a considerable amount of its prepositioned equipment and supplies to support combat operations in Afghanistan and Iraq and, as a result, the inventory fill of many of these stocks is low. For example, it used approximately 43 percent of the total number of its prepositioned bare base sets to support Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, and due to the extreme desert conditions, many of these sets will have to be replaced. A U.S. Central Command, Air Forces, official told us that the command is continuing to issue prepositioned base operating support equipment and vehicles to forces that have been deployed to the area of responsibility. While the Air Force is working on refilling its prepositioned equipment and supplies, if a conflict arises in the near term, these stocks may not be available for use as it is unclear when these stocks will be refilled. In addition, the Air Force is experiencing shortfalls in its inventory of fuel bladders. These bladders are used to store fuel for Air Force aircraft at austere operating locations. Air Force officials stated that to support combat operations in Iraq, Central Command, Air Forces, has used a considerable number of its prepositioned war reserve fuel bladders. As combat operations continue, the Air Force is depleting its supply of these bladders, and officials have characterized the impact of potential shortfalls in these bladders as its “highest operational risk.” At the same time, the Air Force is undergoing an initiative to modernize its fuel support equipment, including its fuel bladders. As part of this initiative, the Air Force requested that Central Command, Air Forces, officials not purchase the type of fuel bladders that had previously been used. To mitigate the risk, the Air Force has allowed Central Command, Air Forces, to purchase some replacement fuel bladders; however, it is unclear when its modernization initiative will be fully implemented. During our review, we were also told that some bare base sets that the Air Force prepositions at Andersen Air Force Base on Guam are in poor maintenance condition and are unusable. According to a Pacific Air Forces official, the sets stored at Andersen Air Force Base have deteriorated due to a lack of required maintenance. Air Force maintenance personnel are responsible for the war reserve stocks prepositioned at this location as an additional duty to the maintenance of operating stocks also stored at the base. The official told us that the quality of maintenance performed by Air Force personnel on the war reserve bare base sets has been a long- standing problem at this location. Air Force officials told us that bare base sets stored in Southwest Asia and South Korea did not have these same maintenance problems because contractors have been hired to maintain these sets. When we discussed these issues with Air Force officials, they told us that they believed they could overcome shortfalls and any maintenance problems in the event of a conflict by using supplemental funding or cross- leveling equipment from other theaters. Additionally, Pacific Air Forces officials told us that they would be able to obtain some vehicles from countries where they will operate by using contracts already in place. The Army, Air Force, and Navy preposition common support equipment and supplies for use by their special operations forces. However, the services have traditionally underfunded these stocks and, as a result, inventory shortfalls exist in most of these stocks. Lessons learned from recent military operations in Iraq further highlighted the need for special operations forces to have stocks of prepositioned equipment and supplies to support these forces in multiple austere environments. Special Operations Command officials told us that special operations forces are often among the first units to deploy and, therefore, have a need to draw prepositioned stocks. The department recognized this and recent guidance issued by DOD directs the military services to fully fund inventory shortfalls in these stocks of common items prepositioned to support special operations forces. The military services have agreed to provide funding for prepositioned stocks for special operations forces beginning in fiscal year 2006. Since prepositioned stocks are integral to the military’s war plans, shortfalls in these programs create risks that combatant commanders would have to mitigate in the event of a new conflict. It could cost time or manpower to fill shortages or fix equipment. Since these stocks are typically used in the early stages of a conflict, it is important for DOD to determine the operational risk associated with any shortfalls. The military planners we spoke to told us that they would find a way to work around the shortfalls, but offered little in the way of concrete plans. Operation Iraqi Freedom revealed significant lessons for DOD’s prepositioning managers, especially in the Army, such as shortages in spare parts and less-than-modern equipment. Prior to the onset of combat operations in Iraq, the Army had significant shortages in its prepositioned stocks, especially in spare parts. The Army overcame these shortfalls by having the units that were drawing the prepositioned stocks bring their own spare parts, in addition to obtaining spare parts from nondeploying units. However, according to the Army’s after-action assessments of the war, the Army had shortages in these and other items, including food, water, fuel, construction materials, and ammunition. The available stocks of these supplies were insufficient to meet sustainment requirements at the outset of the deployment and it took the supply chain months to respond. At the time of our work, we found that many of the same shortfalls that existed in the Army’s program are still evident, and may be getting worse. For example, as of mid-March 2005, the Army had only 21 percent of its authorized prepositioned repair parts on hand in South Korea. According to Army officials, if a military conflict should arise there, their strategy to mitigate these shortfalls would be to cross-level required parts from available sustainment stocks as needed. Although the precise operational risks created by shortfalls in the Marine Corps and Air Force’s prepositioned stocks are difficult to assess, officials from these services told us that these risks can be managed. This is because the Marine Corps has kept about two-thirds of its prepositioned combat capability available for potential contingencies and that equipment is reported to be in good condition. Moreover, Air Force officials stated that if a conflict arises, they will be able to fill shortfalls and repair equipment as needed by using supplemental funding and obtaining some vehicles and other stocks in other countries through contracts already in place. Air Force officials stated, however, that this presumes that they will have the time and necessary funding available to address the shortfalls. Combatant commanders rely on prepositioned stocks being available and in good maintenance condition. Prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom, the combatant commander built up the required forces over a period of months, and had time to overcome any inventory shortages in the prepositioned stocks or resolve any maintenance issues with prepositioned equipment. However, should a new conflict arise in the near term—especially one where U.S. forces did not control the timing—the combatant commander would likely face even more difficult operational challenges. During our visit to South Korea, officials told us that their strategy to mitigate maintenance issues with the Army’s prepositioned stocks stored there, should a conflict arise, would be to surge maintenance personnel as needed to fix equipment, use arriving personnel to assist in maintenance execution, and cross-level required parts from available sustainment stocks. Officials acknowledged, however, that it could take longer than planned to get the equipment ready in the event of a conflict. Another factor making it difficult to assess the potential operational risks is the lack of sound information available to assess and manage DOD’s prepositioning programs. Such programs need valid inventory requirements that meet the needs of the war fighters, and reliable information about inventory levels and maintenance condition for those requirements. These long-standing management problems are discussed in the next section of this report. Oversight over prepositioning programs by DOD and the military services has been insufficient, despite the importance of prepositioning to the military. This inattention has allowed long-standing problems to linger. Management principles, such as those embraced in the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993, provide federal agencies a framework for effectively implementing and managing programs. Management principles include sufficient information to support sound decision making and enable Congress to provide proper oversight. However, DOD has not adhered to its directive on war reserve materiel policy that could provide oversight over its prepositioning programs. In addition, service oversight has been inadequate, particularly in the Army’s processes for determining requirements and the Army and Air Force processes for assessing inventory shortfalls and maintenance condition. This limited oversight unnecessarily leaves the programs at risk of being unavailable when required and lacking the right mix of equipment and supplies to support the war fighter. The overarching departmental guidance is contained in DOD directive 3110.6, updated in December 2003, which provides policy guidance on the department’s war reserve materiel program and assigns oversight and accountability responsibilities within the department. The secretaries of the military departments, directors of defense agencies, and the combatant commands are responsible for setting program requirements and the Defense Logistics Agency has responsibility for storage and distribution of the stocks. At the department level, their responsibilities are as follows: The Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics is required to assess the adequacy of war reserve stocks annually. The Undersecretary of Defense for Policy is required to provide planning guidance that includes war reserve requirements. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is required to validate the operational requirements of the geographic combatant commands. A provision of the directive related to oversight states that the department is to assess the adequacy of its war reserve stocks. In order to assess adequacy, the directive requires the secretaries of the military departments and the directors of defense agencies to submit annual reports on war reserve materiel levels to the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics within the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Officials within the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Supply Chain Integration told us that this oversight responsibility had been delegated to their office. However, the directive has not been implemented and, therefore, the reporting requirement contained in the directive has not been enforced. Neither the services nor the Under Secretary’s office could provide us with copies of these reports. Officials told us that they had suspended this reporting requirement in 2002; however, the directive had been updated in late 2003 and the reporting requirement was maintained. Officials also stated that although they had been given responsibility for implementing the oversight provisions of the directive, since their office primarily deals with only sustainment issues, they did not have sufficient authority or personnel to meet the requirements stated by the directive, specifically to assess the adequacy of the services’ prepositioning programs. Officials further told us they did not believe the reporting requirement in the directive was necessary because they were able to provide adequate oversight of the department’s prepositioning programs through other mechanisms, such as reviewing the services’ budget submissions and quarterly readiness assessments. Quarterly readiness reviews and integrated priority list submissions allow the combatant commanders and others to identify issues that have reached critical thresholds that may limit war-fighting capabilities. These assessments, some of which have included issues related to prepositioned stocks, are briefed to DOD’s senior leadership and may be included in a legislatively mandated quarterly readiness report to Congress. However, we have previously reported that these reports provide a vague and broad description of readiness problems and, therefore, are not effective as an oversight tool. Furthermore, officials at one combatant command told us that these assessments do not provide a sufficient mechanism to determine the inventory readiness of stocks prepositioned in their area of responsibility. Also, a DOD official told us that they review the budget submissions from the military services and approve how much the services allocate to their prepositioning programs. In our view, while such mechanisms provide the department with important information on gaps in capabilities and resource allocation, they do not constitute sufficient, sustained program oversight. Such oversight problems have existed for years and several prior reports have cited the lack of centralized oversight and direction in the department’s prepositioning programs, particularly in the Army. For example, the Institute for Defense Analyses concluded in a 1997 report that the military services do not coordinate their war reserve planning among themselves or with the combatant commanders. The report specifically called on the Army to reinvent the entire war reserve process, and work with the unified combatant commands and other Army commands to build credible requirements and better planning factors. The Army Materiel Command Inspector General also reported in 2001 that the Army and the combatant commands had not uncovered, mitigated, or elevated issues about the readiness of the Army’s prepositioning programs to the department level. Further, the report stated that the lack of centralized oversight fostered inefficiencies and impacted the effectiveness of the Army’s prepositioning program. The Army does not have sound requirements for some of its prepositioning programs and both the Army and Air Force do not have sufficient information about inventory levels and maintenance condition, making oversight difficult. Without valid requirements underpinning the services’ prepositioning programs, it is impossible to reliably assess the impact of reported shortfalls or equipment in poor maintenance condition. As a result, the services cannot assess the overall readiness of their prepositioning programs, which potentially leaves war fighters at risk of not having needed stocks in the future. In addition, assessing the readiness of prepositioned stocks requires reliable information about inventory levels and maintenance condition. Inventory levels are measured against requirements set by the services, while maintenance condition describes whether on-hand items work well enough to perform their mission. Because prepositioned stocks are intended to be used in the early stages of a conflict, the stocks need to be completely filled and in working order. Otherwise, the purpose of prepositioning is likely defeated. Such problems with questionable requirements and insufficient information are long- standing, and make it difficult for the services and the department to assess readiness, provide oversight, and support sound decision making about where to make program investments. During our review, we found that the requirements underpinning some of the Army’s prepositioning programs are questionable, which may make the impact of shortfalls difficult to assess. Specifically, Army officials told us that the war reserve information system used to calculate the requirements for some sustainment stocks had not been successfully updated since 1999, although Army officials told us that they are required to compute these requirements on an annual basis. While the Army is planning on recalculating these requirements by the end of 2005, it is currently unclear what the requirements for these stocks should be. As a result, program managers cannot be sure what to buy because they do not know if inventory shortfalls are valid. We reported on the operational impacts of this problem in our March 2004 testimony on prepositioned stocks used during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Additionally, in our April 2005 report, we found that because the process used to determine requirements for Army war reserve spare parts had not been updated, the war reserve inventories for some spare parts were inadequate in Operation Iraqi Freedom and could not meet initial wartime demands. In addition, inaccurate and inadequately funded Army war reserve requirements contributed to shortages in other items, such as track shoes for Abrams tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles and lithium batteries. Additionally, we identified problems with DOD’s process for establishing requirements for prepositioned munitions. For example, during our visit to U.S. Forces Korea, officials told us that the command is not afforded the opportunity to proactively participate in the determination of either total munitions requirements or, more specifically, prepositioned munitions requirements. In October 2002, we reported that DOD’s munitions requirements determination process did not fully consider the combatant commander’s preferences for munitions and weapon systems that will be used against targets identified in projected scenarios. We recommended that the Secretary of Defense establish a direct link between the munitions needs of the combatant commands and the munitions requirements determinations and purchasing decisions made by the military services. In October 2003, DOD issued instruction 3000.4, which required that the munitions requirements developed by each of the military services address the operational objectives of the combatant commanders against potential threats. In addition, it directed the military services to work directly with the military service component and the combatant commands to develop near- and out-year munitions requirements. Finally, it directed combatant commanders to review the military services’ generated munitions requirements and report any issues needing resolution during the planning and programming process. We found that these requirements are not being met. Only the Air Force visits the command prior to developing total munitions requirements to support purchasing decisions. The other services do not coordinate with the command prior to generating munitions requirements. Further, U.S. Forces, Korea, officials told us that they do not have the opportunity to review the service-generated munitions requirements prior to purchasing decisions and have no input to what munitions will be prepositioned or where those munitions will be located. While officials in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and Joint Staff expressed skepticism about the way U.S. Forces, Korea, had developed their munitions requirements, they agreed that the proper coordination was not occurring. As a result, the needed linkage between the combatant command’s needs and the munitions purchases made by the services continues to be inadequate and raises questions as to whether combatant commands will have what they need should a conflict arise. We also found that the Army and Air Force lack reliable information on the inventory fill and maintenance condition for some prepositioned stocks. The lack of reliable inventory information may provide program managers with an unrealistic view on the preparedness of these programs. Army officials told us that its information management system does not provide reliable information on the inventory levels and maintenance condition of its operational projects and sustainment stocks. Army managers told us that this lack of inventory visibility has persisted for many years, and sometimes the only way to get reliable information is to contact the storage site directly. As recently as February 2005, the Army reported in the unclassified inventory information that it extracts from its main readiness reporting system that a high percentage of the combat brigade set prepositioned in South Korea was fully mission capable. However, in an October 2004 Army assessment, inspectors had found that a high percentage of the equipment reviewed was not mission capable. Air Force officials also told us that they do not have adequate information available to assess the overall readiness of their prepositioned stocks. While this information is decentralized and available in some cases to base and component commanders, information on inventory levels and maintenance condition is not available to Air Force managers overseeing the war reserve materiel program. Air Combat Command and Central Command, Air Forces, officials told us that in order to obtain information on the readiness of most prepositioned stocks, they had to contact the storage locations since this information is not readily available to them. Pacific Air Forces officials told us that they developed their own automated system to track the inventory levels and maintenance condition of the war reserve materiel prepositioned in their area of responsibility because the Air Force lacked a comprehensive system that provides reliable and timely readiness information on its war reserve program. The problems we found during our review with requirements determination and reliability of inventory information are not new. Our review of past reports going back to 1995 revealed that similar issues have been reported repeatedly, but have not been resolved. The findings from several past studies are described below, and appendix I provides a more comprehensive summary of the major findings from more than 30 past reports by us and the department’s own studies. Inventory management issues, and more recently supply chain management, have been considered high-risk areas by us since 1990. Specific to the prepositioning programs, we have previously reported numerous times on long-standing management problems. For example, we reported in our last review of prepositioning programs in 1998 that the Army and Air Force had poorly defined, outdated, and otherwise questionable requirements in their programs. Our 1998 report also noted that it was difficult for DOD to assess the readiness of its prepositioned stocks and the impact of any shortfalls due to the poor information the services used to manage these programs. We also reported in 2001 that, among other things, a potential mismatch existed between the Army’s methodology for determining spare parts requirements and the Army’s anticipated battlefield needs. And more recently, we reported in January 2005 that DOD does not have the ability to provide timely or accurate information on the location, movement, status, or identity of its supplies due to long-standing data accuracy and reliability problems within existing inventory management systems. The department’s own auditors and an Army command have also been sharply critical of program management, especially how program requirements have been determined. For example, the Army Materiel Command reported in 2003 that the requirements computation for war reserve stocks and stockage lists for prepositioned stocks did not accurately portray what was needed for Operation Iraqi Freedom. These stockage lists did not contain the most critical items needed to sustain combat equipment during the operation. In addition, the Army Audit Agency reported in 2004 that Army program managers had not reviewed the requirements for many of the operational projects it examined. As a result, some operational projects contained inaccurate, overstated, or questionable requirements. Of $1.5 billion in requirements examined, about $727 million were valid, $472 million were invalid, and about $280 million were questionable. In addition, the Air Force Audit Agency reported in May 2003 that Air Force personnel did not properly segregate certain war reserve requirements from peacetime operating spare parts requirements, resulting in more than $118.8 million of overstated requirements for peacetime. Past reports have also revealed problems with the reliability of inventory information. In 2001, Army auditors reported that the lack of reliable data on operational projects and sustainment stocks impeded the overall readiness capability of the Army’s prepositioning program. In addition, the Army reported that there was a general lack of confidence in the information management system used to provide information on inventory levels. More recently, the Army Materiel Command’s 2003 report on lessons learned in Iraq also found that different automated systems provided different inventory levels at the same storage location during operations in Iraq. Similarly, a June 2004 CNA Corporation after-action report on the Marine Corps’ prepositioning program in Operation Iraqi Freedom found that the Marine Corps did not have reliable information on the status of some prepositioned equipment used to support operations in Iraq. Specifically, due to a lack of automated tracking systems, the Marine Corps had to use manual methods for tracking equipment with hand counts and written reports. As a result, Marine Corps commanders did not have clear and accurate tools for determining where cargo was in the pipeline, and more importantly, forecasting when equipment would arrive and when integration would be complete. DOD has not developed a coordinated departmentwide plan or joint doctrine to guide the future of its prepositioning programs, despite the heavy use of prepositioned stocks in recent conflicts and the department’s plans to rely on them in the future. The 2005 National Defense Strategy specifically notes the importance of prepositioning in the future and indicates that prepositioning programs should be more innovative, flexible, and joint in character, but provides few details on how DOD plans to accomplish these goals. In addition, the independent Overseas Basing Commission recently echoed the continued importance of the department’s prepositioning programs in the future. In the absence of a departmentwide plan or joint doctrine to coordinate the reconstitution and future plans for these programs, the military services have been recapitalizing some stocks and developing future plans for their programs without a clear understanding of how they will fit together to meet the evolving defense strategy. Without an overarching framework that establishes priorities for prepositioning among competing initiatives and identifies the resources required to implement the future programs, DOD cannot provide assurances to Congress that the billions of dollars that will be required to recapitalize the stocks and develop future programs will ultimately produce programs that will operate jointly, support the needs of the war fighter, and are affordable. The most recent National Defense Strategy published in March 2005 states that to strengthen DOD’s capability for prompt global action and flexibility to employ military forces where needed, prepositioned stocks “will be better configured and positioned for global employment.” This overarching defense strategy establishes key goals for the future of defense capabilities such as the prepositioning of support materiel and combat capabilities in critical regions of the world and along key transportation routes, and a greater reliance on joint prepositioning capabilities that will be in accordance with other aspects of transformation. However, while such goals confirm that prepositioning will continue to play a key role in the evolving military strategy, the National Defense Strategy provides no specific details on how the department and the military services will accomplish them. In addition, the recently released report of the Overseas Basing Commission states that where DOD puts prepositioned stocks, what they are comprised of, and how they are maintained is central to the department’s operational capability. The report states that prepositioning is “imperative” for quick response of U.S. forces in areas of the world where access may be difficult, and calls for tight integration of service concepts, doctrines, and plans as a first step in ensuring the sustainability of prepositioning. Importantly, the Commission recommends that given the centrality of these stocks to the operational capability of U.S. forces, their high costs, and their anticipated heavy use over time, Congress should periodically review the status of prepositioned stocks. While it seems certain that DOD will continue to rely on prepositioning in the future, it is unclear how prepositioning will fit into its future plans since DOD currently has no department-level prepositioning plan that provides specific details on how the department and the military services will work together to plan the future of their prepositioning programs or joint doctrine for its prepositioning programs. DOD officials told us that the future of its prepositioning programs has not yet been determined, in part because the future is dependent on the outcome of several interrelated studies ongoing within the department. For example, DOD is currently reviewing the mobility capabilities required to meet the full range of mobility needs for all aspects of the national defense strategy. According to DOD officials, the recommendations from this study will likely have a significant impact on the services’ prepositioning programs since requirements for prepositioning are being factored into the mobility deliberations. In addition, in March 2003, the Secretary of Defense requested that the department develop a comprehensive and integrated presence and basing strategy for the next 10 years. This strategy will build upon multiple DOD studies and will use information from the combatant commanders to determine the appropriate location of the basing and associated infrastructure necessary to execute the U.S. defense strategy. DOD officials told us that the basing study will also likely have an impact on prepositioning as the services will need to determine where to preposition their stocks to support the new defense strategy. Although some preliminary results have been released, DOD officials stated that once these studies are completed, they will have a better understanding of how prepositioning will be able to support the war fighter. Similarly, DOD has not developed joint doctrine to guide the planning and employment of its prepositioning programs. DOD defines joint doctrine as the fundamental military principles that guide the employment of forces of two or more services in coordinated action toward a common objective. DOD’s transformation guidance states that part of the department’s transformation efforts is developing concepts to operate in a joint environment, and placing a continuing emphasis on the importance of expeditionary operations. DOD has published joint doctrine in a number of areas, including deployment and redeployment operations, multinational operations, and military operations other than war. However, in the absence of a departmentwide plan and joint doctrine for prepositioning, the military services currently plan and implement separate programs in an independent, service-centric manner. A service- centric approach to prepositioning potentially misses opportunities to achieve greater efficiencies where service programs overlap. In a 2003 Joint Staff-sponsored study on strategies for prepositioning, the Logistics Management Institute found that the military services continue to program for prepositioning materiel to meet individual service rather than joint requirements. As a result, the services may overstate operational requirements and put unnecessary burdens on limited transportation assets that would be required to move these prepositioned assets from their storage locations to the operational sites. For example, although the Army and Air Force have separate bare base programs, there is a lack of commonality among the design and components of these programs even though basic capabilities are the same. Moreover, this service-centric approach to prepositioning is out of step with DOD’s transformation guidance, which states that developing concepts to operate in a joint environment and a continuing emphasis on the importance of expeditionary operations is key to the department’s transformation efforts. Clearly prepositioning figures prominently in the department’s future plans, but the services do not have precise estimates of the costs and time required to reconstitute their prepositioned stocks since the services continue to use these stocks in Afghanistan and Iraq. In a recent report to Congress, DOD estimated that the costs to reconstitute the Army and Marine Corps’ prepositioned equipment will be between $4 billion and $5 billion. The report acknowledges, however, that these estimates may change depending on several factors, including the length of time the equipment is in use, the number of combat losses, and any changes in the future plans for its prepositioning programs. However, most of the costs required to reconstitute and recapitalize the Army and Marine Corps’ prepositioned stocks have not been budgeted for in the department’s baseline submissions or supplemental funding requests. In the absence of a departmentwide plan that coordinates the reconstitution of these programs with the future plans of the department’s prepositioning programs, the services are developing plans to reconstitute and recapitalize their prepositioned stocks without a clear understanding of how the future of these programs will fit together in support of the evolving defense strategy. According to Army officials, plans to reconstitute the equipment and return it to the combat brigade sets are uncertain because, in some cases, Army units are continuing to use prepositioned stocks to support operations in Iraq instead of bringing their own equipment. In addition, the Army is placing a higher priority for its resources on supporting ongoing operations and on its modular conversion initiative—restructuring its forces to make them more flexible and rapidly deployable. As a result of this initiative, the Army is planning to use combat equipment that was part of the prepositioned brigade sets to meet the increased equipment requirements. For example, over 11,000 pieces of prepositioned combat equipment used in Iraq—such as tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and armored personnel carriers—are slated to be repaired and turned over to active duty units. Furthermore, Army officials told us that decisions have not been made as to whether the sustainment and operational project stocks will be reconstituted because of the large investments required and the uncertainty of the future plans for the Army’s prepositioning program. DOD’s recent report to Congress estimates the costs to reset and reconfigure the Army’s prepositioned stocks to be more than $4 billion. According to the report, however, these costs are not currently captured in DOD’s baseline submissions or in any of its supplemental funding requests. The Marine Corps’ prepositioning programs are expected to have a reduced capability until 2008, at least. The department’s April 2005 report to Congress estimates the cost to reconstitute the Marine Corps’ prepositioned equipment is approximately $490 million. Of this amount, about half ($247 million) was requested in the department’s most recent supplemental request. In the past year, the Marine Corps considered its options to reconstitute the equipment stored aboard the prepositioning ships given its continuing commitment to support operations in Iraq. The Marine Corps recently decided to partially refill the five ships offloaded to support operations in Iraq; however, due to the limited availability within the Marine Corps of equipment needed, such as heavy cargo trucks and High Mobility Multi-purpose Wheeled Vehicles, the Marine Corps forecasts that these ships will have major end-item fill rates of less than 50 percent. Additionally, Marine Corps officials stated that the reconstitution of the stocks in Norway is scheduled to be completed by 2008, at which time the fill rate of these stocks is projected to be approximately 88 percent. Air Force officials stated that they do not know when they will be able to reconstitute prepositioned stocks and return them to storage. As part of its reconstitution effort, the Air Force is in the process of replacing or converting all of its existing bare base sets into a smaller and more modular configuration. However, it is uncertain when the new sets will be available. For example, the Air Force had budgeted approximately $320 million in fiscal year 2005 for procurement of the new bare base sets. However, according to an Air Force official, Congress reduced the Air Force’s budget by $53 million because it was concerned about the large increase in the Air Force’s procurement budget for that year. As a result, the official stated that the Air Force will not be able to procure all of the required sets. In addition, Air Force officials told us that they do not know when reconstitution for other categories of prepositioned stocks will be completed since much of this equipment is still in use. Each of the military services and the Defense Logistics Agency are planning the future of their prepositioning programs without the benefit of an overall plan or joint doctrine to coordinate their efforts. Thus, it is unclear to us how the programs will fit together to meet the evolving defense strategy. DOD officials representing the Joint Staff and the services shared our assessment and concerns. And, according to these officials, the Joint Staff has formed a working group that is focused on establishing common definitions for prepositioning as a first step in developing joint doctrine and setting a future plan for the department’s prepositioning programs. The future of the Army’s prepositioning program, the largest of DOD’s programs, is still unclear, and the Army acknowledges that it faces continuing funding challenges as it attempts to modernize, support ongoing combat operations, and reconstitute its prepositioned equipment, leaving the future direction of its prepositioning program uncertain. The Army has a major effort ongoing to transform its units into more flexible, rapidly deployable forces at the same time it is supporting ongoing combat operations. The Army’s future prepositioning strategy was being revised during our review, so we could not assess how this overall transformation—commonly called “modularity” by the Army—will affect the prepositioning program. In addition, the Army’s prepositioned stocks will have to be reconstituted due to their heavy use in Operation Iraqi Freedom. According to Army officials, however, the Army is nearing completion on a new strategy for its prepositioning programs. They told us that prepositioning will continue to be important in the future and that the prepositioned sets would be converted to the “modular” configuration by 2012 or sooner. While the Marine Corps and Navy have identified concepts for future prepositioning programs, they have not developed firm schedules and cost estimates for these programs. For example, the Marine Corps is planning on changing the focus of its prepositioned stocks in Norway from their Cold War configuration to a more global support capability. Additionally, the Marine Corps is considering a fundamental change to the future of its prepositioning program that would replace existing Maritime Prepositioning Force ships with an undetermined number of new ships with a wider range of capabilities. These ships are intended to be an integral part of a future Navy sea base. The seabasing concept provides maritime platforms capable of supporting at-sea arrival of forces, assembly of those forces, rapid movement ashore, and combat sustainment without reliance on shore facilities. While such seabasing is envisioned by DOD to be a joint service capability, it is not clear how this will be accomplished. Furthermore, the affordability of the program is in question—this new concept could cost billions of dollars. The Defense Logistics Agency began developing a global stock positioning strategy in 2004 to support its overseas customers for the items it manages. The strategy involves a combination of fixed-forward depots, a floating distribution center, and a deployable distribution depot. Fixed- forward stocking depots have been established at the following locations: Germersheim, Germany; Yokosuka, Japan; Pearl Harbor, Hawaii; Sigonella, Italy; Kuwait; Guam; and South Korea. The floating distribution center involves a mobile floating depot which will be capable of providing immediate distribution within the first 30 days of a contingency and could operate as part of the seabasing concept. The deployable distribution depot will be able to provide a full range of distribution capabilities in a theater of operations early in a contingency in developed or remote operating areas. These last two capabilities are still being developed and the Defense Logistics Agency does not yet have firm estimates for the costs of these capabilities. The Air Force is also planning changes for its prepositioning programs. It is transforming its bare base sets into a smaller, more modular configuration and is considering new prepositioning sites to support the new defense strategy. However, Air Force officials told us that it cannot make some decisions related to new storage sites for its prepositioned stocks until DOD’s basing study is complete. Without a plan or joint doctrine to guide their efforts, the services are planning for the future of their programs without an overarching framework that establishes priorities for prepositioning among competing initiatives, develops performance goals to measure success, and identifies resources to implement plans. Until the department determines how prepositioning fits into future military plans, it cannot provide assurances to Congress that the substantial investments required to recapitalize the stocks will be affordable. Prepositioning seems certain to be a key component of U.S. military strategy for years to come, but the department must make it a priority for it to overcome past management problems and ensure its future. In the near term, operational risks may exist should other military contingencies arise given the current inventory shortfalls and poor maintenance condition of some prepositioned stocks. However, the department has not developed concrete plans to overcome these challenges, even though inventory shortfalls and maintenance issues exist in the prepositioned stocks in potential trouble spots such as South Korea. Despite the importance of prepositioning to the military, however, long- standing management problems persist and the programs seem to have received little attention at the department level. Oversight mechanisms are in place, but they have been ineffective or ignored. Leadership and accountability begin at the top. Until DOD fully implements its own directive on war reserve materiel, oversight of its prepositioning programs will likely continue to be inadequate and the department will be unable to assess risks associated with any shortfalls in the programs. Moreover, DOD lacks reliable information in regard to its prepositioning programs and will be unable to make reliable assessments of the readiness of these programs. This could result in failure to obtain the right amount and types of equipment for the designated prepositioning locations, which could ultimately jeopardize the ability of U.S. forces to accomplish their war- fighting missions and leave them at risk. Congress is also concerned about these issues and directed the Secretary of Defense to submit a report on its prepositioning plans by October 1, 2005. Looking toward the future, without a coordinated plan and joint doctrine that identifies the role of prepositioning in the transformed military, the department cannot plan the future of its programs in a comprehensive manner. As a result, DOD cannot provide assurance to Congress that its prepositioning programs will be coordinated, effective, and affordable. Taking all these problems together—and considering them against the backdrop of growing operational and fiscal strains on the military—we believe the future of the prepositioning programs are at risk. Unless the department addresses long-standing management issues and sets a clear plan for the future, the department and Congress cannot make informed decisions about the significant investments needed to reconstitute or recapitalize the stocks. To address the risks and management challenges facing the department’s prepositioning programs and improve oversight, we recommend that the Secretary of Defense take the following five actions: Direct the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff, to assess the near-term operational risks associated with current inventory shortfalls and equipment in poor condition should a conflict arise. Direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics to provide oversight over the department’s prepositioning programs by fully implementing the department’s directive on war reserve materiel and, if necessary, revise the directive to clarify the lines of accountability for this oversight. Direct the Secretary of the Army to improve the processes used to determine requirements and direct the Secretary of the Army and Air Force to improve the processes used to determine the reliability of inventory data so that the readiness of their prepositioning programs can be reliably assessed and proper oversight over the programs can be accomplished. Develop a coordinated departmentwide plan and joint doctrine for the department’s prepositioning programs that identifies the role of prepositioning in the transformed military and ensures these programs will operate jointly, support the needs of the war fighter, and are affordable. Report to Congress, possibly as part of the mandated October 2005 report, how the department plans to manage the near-term operational risks created by inventory shortfalls and management and oversight issues described in this report. DOD provided written comments on a draft of this report. These comments are reprinted in appendix III. DOD partially or fully concurred with our recommendations. However, in its response, DOD disagreed with the implementation of two of our recommendations because it had already taken actions to address them. In subsequent discussions with DOD, officials indicated that this disagreement was not related to the substance of our recommendations. In fact, the department has already initiated several actions to address our recommendations including conducting an assessment of risk, improving requirements and inventory visibility, and conducting a departmental assessment on future prepositioning. Further, DOD agreed that oversight policy as discussed in its directive does not reflect appropriate oversight roles and responsibilities. To address this issue, DOD plans to clarify policy and roles and responsibilities for oversight. With respect to our recommendation to improve requirements determination and the reliability of inventory data, the initial efforts taken by the Army and Air Force represent progress, but the planned actions should address all categories of the Army and Air Force’s prepositioned stocks, as discussed in our report, and not just a portion of these programs. For example, the planned actions should also include the Army’s operational project stocks and the Air Force’s vehicle stocks, among others. Overall, we acknowledge the actions already taken by the department to address these issues, but DOD will need sustained management focus to resolve these deeply rooted and long-standing problems. As arranged with your office, unless you publicly announce its contents earlier, we plan no further distribution of this report until 30 days from the date of this report. At that time, we will send copies of this report to the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of the Army, the Secretary of the Air Force, the Secretary of the Navy, and the Commandant of the Marine Corps. We will also make copies available to others upon request. In addition, this report will be available at no charge on the GAO Web site at http://www.gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this report. If you or your staffs have any questions, please contact me at (202) 512- 8365. Key contributors to this report are listed in appendix IV. The Department of Defense’s (DOD) prepositioning programs have faced long-standing challenges including poor asset visibility; equipment excesses and shortfalls; and invalid, inaccurate, poorly defined, and otherwise questionable requirements. GAO, military service auditors, DOD’s Inspector General, and others have called attention to these problems in products issued over the years. In 1990, we identified DOD’s inventory management as high risk because inventory levels were too high and the supply system was not responsive to the needs of the war fighters. With the onset of Operation Iraqi Freedom, other supply chain issues related to inventory management have been reported as impediments. In a January 2005 update, we expanded this high-risk area to include DOD’s management of its entire supply chain, which includes distribution, inventory management, and asset visibility. Table 3 provides summaries of challenges identified in select GAO reports and testimonies issued between January 1995 and March 2005. Table 4 provides summaries of issues identified in select products released by other organizations during the same time period. To assess the near-term operational risk given the continuing use of prepositioned stocks, we obtained reports prepared by the military services on the inventory levels of their prepositioned stocks compared to program requirements. We also reviewed available maintenance reports or other data used by the services to measure the maintenance condition of the prepositioned stocks. We also observed the physical condition of materiel stored by the Marine Corps at its prepositioning locations in Norway and aboard a prepositioning ship at its maintenance facility located at Blount Island, Florida; and observed the maintenance condition of the Army’s prepositioned stocks at Camp Carroll, South Korea and Sagami Army Depot, Japan. We interviewed program managers at each of the military services to determine the impact of reported shortfalls and poor maintenance condition in the prepositioned stocks and discussed the time frames and costs needed to repair or replace prepositioned stocks used in recent military operations. To assess the sufficiency of the Department of Defense’s (DOD) and service-level oversight of these prepositioning programs, we discussed the processes used by DOD and the services to oversee their prepositioning programs with officials from the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff, and the military services. We reviewed relevant DOD directives and readiness reports prepared by the services and the Joint Staff to determine the extent to which the information contained in these reports could be used by DOD or the services to provide oversight. We also reviewed past reports prepared by GAO, the Army Audit Agency, the Air Force Audit Agency, the Army Materiel Command Inspector General, and the CNA Corporation that identified problems with the reliability of data regarding the preparedness of the services’ prepositioned stocks and problems with the requirements determination processes for some of these stocks. We discussed issues regarding the sufficiency of data on the preparedness of DOD’s prepositioned stocks with program managers from each of the services. To assess whether DOD has developed a coordinated plan for the future of its prepositioning programs that would meet the goals of the recently published defense strategy, we collected and analyzed information from the military services and the Defense Logistics Agency on the future plans for their prepositioning programs. We also reviewed the recently published National Defense Strategy and discussed the future direction of the department’s prepositioning programs with officials in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff, and the military services. We conducted our review from July 2004 through May 2005 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. We reviewed available data for inconsistencies and discussed the data with DOD officials. Our assessments of data reliability revealed significant concerns that are discussed in the report. We interviewed officials and obtained documentation at the following locations: U.S. Army Headquarters, Washington, D.C. U.S. Army Materiel Command, Ft. Belvoir, Virginia U.S. Army Field Support Command, Rock Island, Illinois U.S. Army Forces Command, Ft. McPherson, Georgia U.S. Army Special Operations Command, Ft. Bragg, North Carolina Eighth U.S. Army, Yongsan Garrison, South Korea Combat Equipment Battalion-Northeast Asia, Camp Carroll, South Korea Materiel Support Center-Korea, Camp Carroll, South Korea Sagami Army Depot, Camp Zama, Japan U.S. Marine Corps Headquarters, Arlington, Virginia Marine Corps Combat Development Command, Quantico, Virginia Blount Island Command, Jacksonville, Florida Frigaard Storage Facility, Norway Hammerkammen Storage Facility, Norway Vaernes Aviation Storage Facility, Norway Marine Corps Logistics Command, Albany, Georgia Chief of Naval Operations, Washington, D.C. CNA Corporation, Alexandria, Virginia Naval Facilities Engineering Command, Washington, D.C. Naval Special Warfare Command, San Diego, California Naval Audit Service, Falls Church, Virginia Naval Medical Logistics Command, Fort Detrick, Maryland Military Sealift Command, Washington, D.C. U.S. Air Force Headquarters, Washington, D.C. In addition to the contact named above, John Pendleton, Assistant Director, Harold Reich, Assistant Director, Aisha Cabrer, Katherine Chenault, Lee Cooper, Jeff Kans, Renee McElveen, John Nelson, Emmy Rhine, Enemencio Sanchez, Patricia Sari-Spear, Kimberly Seay, Robyn Trotter, Matthew Ullengren, Eddie Uyekawa, Hector Wong, and Ignacio Yanes also made key contributions to this report.

Summary: The importance of prepositioned stocks to the U.S. military was highlighted during recent operations in Iraq, as much of the equipment and supplies stored at land sites in the region and aboard prepositioning ships were used to support operations. Long-standing problems in the Department of Defense's (DOD) prepositioning program are systematic of the inventory management issues, and more recently supply chain management issues, that GAO has considered as high-risk areas since 1990. GAO was asked to review the risks facing DOD's prepositioning programs, including an assessment of (1) the near-term operational risk given the continuing use of these stocks, (2) the sufficiency of DOD and service-level oversight of these prepositioning programs, and (3) whether DOD has developed a coordinated plan for the future of the department's prepositioning programs that would meet the goals of the recently published defense strategy. DOD faces some near-term operational risks should another large-scale conflict emerge because it has drawn heavily on its prepositioned stocks to support ongoing operations in Iraq. And, although remaining stocks provide some residual capability, many of the programs face significant inventory shortfalls and in some cases, maintenance problems. For example, the Army has drawn equipment from virtually all of its prepositioned stocks to support operations in Iraq. Some of its storage sites have shortfalls of equipment and sustainment items, like spare parts, and some stocks are in poor condition. Additionally, the Marine Corps has used a significant portion of the stocks downloaded from 5 of its 16 prepositioning ships to support operations in Iraq and it is unclear when this equipment will be refilled. The Air Force is also continuing to use a considerable amount of its prepositioned stocks to support combat operations in Iraq and it is unclear when these stocks will be refilled. The precise operational risk created by these shortfalls is difficult to assess. However, should a new conflict arise in the near term, the combatant commander would likely face difficult operational challenges. The department and the military services have provided insufficient oversight over DOD's prepositioning programs. This inattention has allowed long-standing problems with determining program requirements and managing inventory to persist. DOD has not enforced its directive that could provide centralized oversight over its prepositioning programs. Officials told us they did not enforce this directive because they were able to provide adequate oversight through other mechanisms. Even if the department had enforced its directive, however, the requirements underpinning some of DOD's prepositioning programs are questionable and the services do not have sufficient information on the inventory level and maintenance condition of some prepositioned stocks. Without reliable information on requirements, inventory levels, and maintenance condition, DOD cannot provide sufficient oversight over its programs, which potentially leaves war fighters at risk of not having needed stocks in the future. DOD has not developed a coordinated departmentwide plan or joint doctrine to guide the future of its prepositioning programs, despite the heavy use of prepositioned stocks in recent conflicts and the department's plans to rely on them in the future. DOD's recently published defense strategy indicates that prepositioning programs should be more innovative, flexible, and joint. In the absence of a departmentwide plan or joint doctrine to coordinate the reconstitution and future plans for these programs, the services have been recapitalizing stocks and developing future plans without an understanding of how the programs will fit together to meet the evolving defense strategy. Without a framework that establishes priorities for prepositioning among competing initiatives, DOD cannot provide assurances to Congress that the billions of dollars that will be required to recapitalize the stocks and develop future programs will produce programs that operate jointly, support the needs of the war fighter, and are affordable.