For over 30 years, the United States has relied on an all volunteer force to defend the nation at home and abroad. Before that, the nation relied on the draft to ensure that it had enough soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen in wartime. Since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States, DOD has launched three major operations requiring significant numbers of military servicemembers: Operation Noble Eagle, which covers military operations related to homeland security; Operation Enduring Freedom, which includes ongoing military operations in Afghanistan and certain other countries; and Operation Iraqi Freedom, which includes ongoing military operations in Iraq and the Persian Gulf area. These operations have greatly increased overseas deployments. Moreover, they are the first long-term major overseas combat missions since the advent of the all volunteer force in 1973. To ensure that sufficient forces are available for the services to accomplish their missions, Congress authorizes an annual year-end authorized personnel level for each service component. To function effectively, the services must, among other things, access and retain officers at appropriate ranks and in the occupational specialties needed to enable its units to contribute to the services’ missions. The services rely on monetary and nonmonetary incentives, where needed, to meet their accession and retention needs. The careers of military officers are governed primarily by Title 10, which has incorporated the DOPMA legislation, giving the services the primary authority to recruit, train, and retain officers. Title 10 specifies the active duty and reserve service obligations for officers who join the military: graduates of the service academies must serve a minimum of 5 years on active duty; and up to an additional 3 years on active duty or in the reserves; ROTC scholarship recipients must serve a minimum of 4 years on active duty and an additional 4 years on active duty or in the reserves; and other types of officers have varying service obligations (for example, pilots must serve 6 to 8 years on active duty, depending on the type of aircraft, and navigators and flight officers must serve 6 years on active duty). Similarly, Title 10 authorizes the services to directly commission medical specialists and other professionals to meet their needs. The services generally met most their past needs for newly commissioned officers; but the Army faces some unique problems accessing enough officers to meet its needs and has not developed a strategic plan to address these challenges. The Marine Corps, Navy, and the Air Force generally met their needs for accessing newly commissioned officers in FYs 2001, 2003, and 2005. However, all services experienced problems recruiting enough medical professionals in FYs 2001, 2003, and 2005; and most had problems accessing racial and ethnic minorities to diversify their officer corps. Our analysis of documentary evidence confirmed the services’ reports that their accession programs generally met their officer needs in selected recent years, but each experienced some shortfalls in certain ranks and specialties. The services do not develop overall yearly goals for the total number of commissioned officers needed. Instead, they adjust the enrollment in OCS/OTS throughout the year to meet higher or lower than expected demands for newly commissioned officers by the various occupational specialty groups of importance to the service. The Army and the Marine Corps are increasing their numbers of newly commissioned officers because of their growing end strengths, whereas the Navy and the Air Force are accessing fewer officers because they are reducing their end strengths. The Army did not meet its overall accession needs for newly commissioned officers in FYs 2001 and 2003, though it met its needs in 2005. The Army has two distinct types of commissioned officers. Most officers are commissioned in its basic branches or specialty areas, such as infantry or signal, and are commissioned through major accession programs. The second type of officers are and those who are directly commissioned, such as medical professionals. In FY 2001, the Army needed 4,100 of these officers in its basic branches and instead it commissioned 3,791, in FY 2003 it needed 4,500 and instead commissioned 4,433. In FY 2005, it exceed it goal of commissioning 4,600 of and instead accessed 4,654 in it basic branches. During those years it was increasing the number of commissioned officers entering the service (see table 1). Specifically, the Army commissioned 5,540 officers in FY 2001, 5,929 in FY 2003, and 6,045 in FY 2005. In each of the examined fiscal years, the Army’s ROTC program accounted for around half of all newly commissioned officers, with nearly 1,000 of those officers being accessed annually into the Army despite not being awarded a scholarship. The Army increased total accessions from FY 2001 to FY 2005 by nearly doubling the number of officers commissioned through OCS. Our independent review and analysis of data and other materials from the commissioning sources found that the Army does not recruit officers to fill a specific specialty, and instead, officers are placed in general specialty areas based on the needs of the Army. Some general specialty areas are more popular than others, and the Army attempts to match an officer candidate’s preference to the needs of the Army. However, the service’s needs prevail, and some officers may be placed in specialty areas outside of their preferences if shortfalls are present. In contrast, the Marine Corps met its overall accession needs for newly commissioned officers for the examined fiscal years, while increasing the number of officers it commissioned in FY 2005 (see table 2). Increasing accessions by 241 from FY 2003 to FY 2005 represents about an 18 percent increase in the number of newly commissioned officers. Relative to the other services, the Marine Corps commissioned a larger percentage of its officers through programs other than the academy or ROTC program. For example, in FY 2005, 76 percent of the Marine Corps’s newly commissioned officers came from OCS or other sources. However, the Marine Corps has also been increasing the number of officers commissioned from USNA. The Marine Corps does not have a separate ROTC program and instead, commissions officers through the Navy ROTC program. Our independent review and analysis of data and other materials from the commissioning sources and Marine Corps headquarters identified some areas where the Marine Corps was challenged to access newly commissioned officers for some occupational specialties. While the Marine Corps officials stated that they were challenged in accessing enough naval flight officers because officer candidates were not familiar with the position (which involves assisting pilots with aircraft and weapons systems), the service still recruited the number it needed based upon our examination of the data. The Navy also reported meeting its overall needs for commissioned officers during FYs 2001, 2003, and 2005. Since FY 2001, the total number of newly commissioned officers decreased from 4,784 to 3,506, a decline of nearly 27 percent (see table 3). A large portion of that decrease was accomplished by reducing the number of officers being commissioned through OCS, the program that can most easily and quickly be altered to reflect changing demands for producing commissioned officers. Despite generally meeting its overall accession needs for newly commissioned officers, the Navy experienced accession challenges in some specialty areas. Our independent review and analysis of data and other materials from the commissioning sources, Navy headquarters, and accession programs identified some areas where there were gaps between the numbers of newly commissioned officers needed and the numbers supplied to specialties by some of the commissioning programs. For example, USNA did not meet its quota for submarine officers in FY 2005, but other commissioning programs were able to compensate for the shortfall. Like the Marine Corps, the Navy faced a challenge in accessing enough naval flight officers, but the Navy met its overall need for newly commissioned officers by shifting the number of officers sent to that specialty by some commissioning sources. For example, Navy ROTC met its goal for naval flight officers in FY 2005 but not FY 2001 and FY 2003. The Navy’s OCS made up the difference in those years. According to Navy officials, some officers who may previously have gone into this specialty because of poor eyesight have their vision surgically corrected and instead become pilots. Like the Marine Corps and the Navy, the Air Force generally met its overall officer accession needs for FYs 2001, 2003, and 2005. As with the Navy, the Air Force decreased the number of newly commissioned officers in FY 2005 (see table 4). Specifically, the Air Force commissioned over 1,000 fewer officers in FY 2005 than it did in FY 2003, and it is working toward a plan to have about 9,000 fewer officers servicewide by FY 2011. The recent decrease in the number of newly commissioned Air Force officers was largely accomplished by commissioning fewer officers from OTS. Overall, the Air Force relied on its ROTC scholarship program for most of its officers and provided scholarships for the vast majority of the ROTC officer candidates. Despite meeting its overall needs for newly commissioned officers, the Air Force encountered challenges in some specialties. Our analyses and discussions with Air Force accessions officials identified air battle manager as an area where the Air Force has been challenged. USAFA expected to provide the Air Force with 10 air battle managers in FY 2005, but instead, three USAFA graduates became air battle managers. The other seven positions were filled by Air Force ROTC. All of the services have experienced problems accessing enough medical professionals, including physicians, medical students, dentists, and nurses. The Army, Navy (which supplies the Marine Corps), and Air Force provide direct commissions to medical professionals entering the service. Physicians. All of the services had difficulties meeting their accession needs for physicians (see table 5) in at least 2 of the 3 fiscal years that we examined. The Army and the Navy achieved 91 or more percent of their goals in each year studied, while the Air Force achieved 47 to 65 percent of its goal during the same 3 years. For each year, the Air Force had a higher goal than the other two services but accessed fewer physicians. Our review of the numbers of medical students participating in the services’ Health Professions Scholarship Program showed that additional physician-accession problems may appear in future years (see table 6).