GAO has conducted various assessments related to DOD’s ISR enterprise including efforts assessing (1) unmanned aircraft system development, acquisition, and operations; (2) how new ISR requirements are generated; (3) the intelligence information processing, exploitation, and dissemination processes; and (4) other intelligence-related topics. DOD’s ISR enterprise consists of multiple intelligence organizations that individually plan for, acquire, and operate manned and unmanned airborne, space-borne, maritime, and ground-based ISR systems. The Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics oversees the space and unmanned aircraft systems acquisition programs. In addition to the intelligence branches of the military services, there are four major intelligence agencies within DOD: the Defense Intelligence Agency; the National Security Agency; the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency; and the National Reconnaissance Office. The Defense Intelligence Agency is charged with providing all-source intelligence data to policy makers and U.S. armed forces around the world and provides defense human intelligence. The National Security Agency is responsible for signals intelligence and information assurance and has collection sites throughout the world. The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency prepares the geospatial data, including maps and computerized databases, that are used by ISR systems necessary for targeting for precision-guided weapons. The National Reconnaissance Office develops and operates reconnaissance satellites. As figure 1 shows, DOD’s ISR enterprise is related to other elements of the U.S. national intelligence community. Spending on most ISR programs is divided between the defense intelligence budget, known as the Military Intelligence Program—totaling $27 billion in fiscal year 2010—and the national intelligence budget, known as the National Intelligence Program—totaling $53.1 billion in fiscal year 2010. The Military Intelligence Program encompasses DOD-wide intelligence programs and most intelligence programs supporting the operating units of the military services. The USD(I) is responsible for compiling and developing the Military Intelligence budget and issuing detailed procedures governing the Military Intelligence Program process and timelines associated with budget development. The agencies, services, and offices that are included in the Military Intelligence Program are: the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the military departments, the U.S. Special Operations Command, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, the National Security Agency, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the Defense Information Systems Agency, and the Defense Security Service. Each office, agency, and service designates a manager who is charged with responding to guidance from the USD(I) and managing programs and functions within the budget, among other things. The USD(I) guides and oversees the development of the Military Intelligence Program in coordination with the Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller), Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Director of the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s Office of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation. The national intelligence community, which primarily provides support to national decision makers, also supports DOD ISR activities. The line between military intelligence activities and national strategic intelligence activities has blurred as DOD’s tactical ISR supports strategic decisions and national intelligence collection informs military operations. The National Intelligence Program, which funds national intelligence activities, also funds a portion of DOD’s ISR activities to support military operations. The Director of National Intelligence (DNI) is responsible for compiling and reviewing the annual National Intelligence Program budget. To encourage integration of DOD’s ISR enterprise, in 2003 Congress required the USD(I) to develop a comprehensive plan, known as the ISR Integration Roadmap, to guide the development and integration of ISR capabilities. The law also required the USD(I) to report back to congressional committees on this effort. In response to this requirement, DOD issued an ISR Integration Roadmap in May 2005 and updated it in January 2007. However, we reported that this 2007 roadmap still did not meet all the management elements the USD(I) was required to address. In 2008, the House Committee on Armed Services restated the need for the USD(I) to address these requirements and provided the USD(I) with additional guidance for the roadmap. The USD(I) issued an updated roadmap in March 2010. In 2008, DOD began an effort to manage ISR capabilities across the entire department, rather than by military service or individual program. Under this capability portfolio management concept, DOD intended to improve the interoperability of future capabilities, minimize capability redundancies and gaps, and maximize capability effectiveness. The USD(I) was designated as the civilian lead office for the portfolio of ISR activities, which is known as the Battlespace Awareness Portfolio. As the portfolio manager for ISR investments, the role and authorities of the USD(I) are limited to two primarily advisory functions: (1) reviewing and participating in service and DOD agency budget deliberations on proposed ISR capability investments, and (2) recommending alterations in service or agency spending to the Secretary of Defense as part of the established DOD budget review process. Also in 2008, the Secretary of Defense established the ISR Task Force to increase ISR capacity in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as improve operational integration and efficiency of ISR assets across the services and defense agencies. The ISR Task Force’s primary focus was on regional capabilities and capabilities that could be delivered more quickly than in the standard DOD acquisition cycle. The task force is currently assisting the USD(I) and the services in deciding how to integrate into the long-term base budget more than 500 ISR capabilities that were developed to meet urgent operational requirements in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have previously reported on DOD’s challenges in improving the integration of ISR efforts, including difficulties in processing and sharing information that is already collected and developing new capabilities. We reported in 2010 that DOD’s efforts to make intelligence data accessible across the defense intelligence community have been hampered by not having integration of service programs and a concept of operations for intelligence sharing. The services have each pursued their own versions of a common data processing system to share information, the Distributed Common Ground/Surface System, which was initiated in 1998. Although the services can share limited intelligence data, their progress toward full information sharing has been uneven. Moreover, as we reported in March 2011, although DOD created the Joint Improvised Explosive Device (IED) Defeat Organization (JIEDDO) to lead and coordinate all of DOD’s counter-IED efforts, which include some ISR capabilities, many of the organizations engaged in the counter-IED defeat effort, such as the Army, Marine Corps, and Navy, continued to develop, maintain, and expand their own IED-defeat capabilities. Even though urgent operational needs include ISR capabilities, the USD(I) does not have a direct role in determining urgent operational needs. The USD(I) has the authority to exercise oversight responsibility over DOD’s ISR’s enterprise; however the broad scope and complex funding arrangements of DOD’s ISR enterprise make it difficult to manage and oversee. The scope of the ISR enterprise and capabilities include many different kinds of activities—from collection of information through dissemination of analysis compiled from multiple sources—conducted by multiple agencies. As a result, ISR activities may be funded through any of several sources, including the Military Intelligence Program, the National Intelligence Program, overseas contingency operations funding, and service appropriations, or by a combination of these sources. To manage DOD’s large ISR enterprise, the USD(I) serves as DOD’s senior intelligence official, responsible for providing strategic, budget, and policy oversight over DOD’s ISR enterprise. However, the USD(I) does not have full visibility into several budget sources that fund DOD’s ISR enterprise, such as national intelligence capabilities, capabilities used for ISR and non-ISR purposes, urgent operational needs, and military personnel expenses related to ISR. Figure 2 illustrates that the USD(I) does not have full visibility into many capabilities included in DOD’s ISR enterprise. The USD(I)’s inability to gain full visibility into all of DOD’s ISR financial resources may hinder efforts to develop an investment strategy for ISR, to consider tradeoffs across military services and programs, and to address potential duplication, fragmentation, and overlap. DOD’s ISR enterprise comprises many organizations and offices from both the defense intelligence community and the national intelligence community, which represents a challenge for DOD in integrating capabilities across the ISR enterprise. DOD relies on both its own ISR assets and national ISR assets to provide comprehensive intelligence in support of its joint warfighting force. DOD organizations are involved in providing intelligence information using their respective or joint ISR assets to both the defense and national intelligence communities. Determining the scope of the ISR enterprise precisely is difficult because the intelligence agencies and military services include different activities in discussing their ISR missions and priorities. Within DOD’s ISR enterprise, multiple organizations conduct strategic planning, budgeting, and data processing and analysis across intelligence disciplines in accordance with their own priorities. Within the Office of the Secretary of the Defense, the USD(I), and the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics have responsibilities for aspects of ISR that may overlap. Specifically, DOD has designated the USD(I) to manage ISR investments as a departmentwide portfolio. However, as the ISR portfolio manager, the USD(I) has only advisory authority and cannot direct the services or agencies to make changes in their investment plans.