On April 1, 2004, the President approved GPOI, a 5-year program to help address significant gaps in international peace operations, including a shortage of capable peacekeepers, limited national capabilities to train and sustain peacekeeping proficiencies, and a lack of mechanisms to help countries deploy peacekeepers and provide logistics support for them in the field. To support the development of peacekeeping capabilities of GPOI countries, the program incorporates and expands on the pre-existing Africa Contingency Operations Training and Assistance (ACOTA) program and the Enhanced International Peacekeeping Capabilities (EIPC) program. In 2004, the United States established GPOI as a $660 million, 5-year program with seven objectives to increase and maintain the capacity, capability, and effectiveness of peace operations worldwide. These objectives are to train and, when appropriate, equip 75,000 military peacekeepers by 2010; support efforts at the International Center of Excellence for Stability Police (COESPU) in Italy to increase the capabilities and interoperability of stability police to participate in peace operations; develop a program to procure and store peace operations equipment to facilitate the equipment’s quick mobilization for peace operations; develop a transportation and logistics support system to deploy and sustain peacekeeping in the field; enhance the capacity of regional and subregional organizations for provide a worldwide clearinghouse function for GPOI-related activities in Africa and globally; and conduct activities that support and assist partners in achieving self- sufficiency and maintaining the proficiencies gained from GPOI. State’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, in coordination with DOD’s Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Staff, is responsible for providing policy guidance; allocating resources; and coordinating GPOI programs, events, and activities. All GPOI allocations and program activities must be approved by the GPOI Coordination Committee (GCC), the formal decision-making body co-chaired by State’s Bureau of Political- Military Affairs and the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Participants of the GCC include the Joint Staff and, as required, other program implementers. GPOI implementers include the U.S. Combatant Commands, State’s regional bureaus, the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s regional offices, and U.S. diplomatic posts. The regional combatant commands are the lead implementers of GPOI activities throughout the world, with the exception of Africa, where State’s Bureau of African Affairs leads implementation of GPOI activities. Within the African Affairs Bureau, ACOTA is the lead implementer for the training and equipment portion of GPOI activities in Africa. State has designated 52 countries as partner countries eligible to receive funding for GPOI activities—38 for military peacekeepers, 3 for stability police, and 11 for both military peacekeepers and stability police, as of April 2008. As figure 1 shows, the majority are located in Africa (22 countries) and the remaining are in Asia, South and Central America, Europe, and the Near East and Central Asia. (See app. II for a list of all GPOI partners.) State has allocated $374 million, from fiscal year 2005 through fiscal year 2008, for GPOI activities worldwide, of which it has expended about $152 million for activities in four major categories: training, training equipment, deployment assistance, and skills and infrastructure. As displayed in figure 2, the majority—about $98 million—has been spent in Africa, followed by about $30 million in Asia and $12 million in South and Central America. In Africa, the majority has been spent on training and training equipment together followed by deployment assistance of equipment and transportation for deployed peacekeeping missions. In Asia, the majority has been spent on skills and infrastructure followed by training. In South and Central America, the majority has been spent on training equipment followed by activities for building skills and infrastructure. (App. II identifies the GPOI partner countries in these geographic regions.) Training of military peacekeepers under GPOI can be provided by contractors, U.S. military active duty personnel, or by trainers from neighboring countries in the region, and is focused on providing battalion- level training for peacekeeping missions. U.S. contractors provide the majority of training in Africa and, when available, U.S. military active duty personnel serve as mentors to African trainees. In Asia, U.S. military personnel provide the majority of training but use contractors to provide some of the training for military officers. In Central America, training is provided by other countries and by U.S. military personnel. The United States has funded the training of a few individuals in the Near East and Europe. U.S. military personnel may serve as mentors to trainees in these regions. Training has not yet occurred in Central Asia. GPOI training of stability police is provided at COESPU—Italy’s international training center for peace operations located in Vicenza, Italy, where the Italian Carabinieri train instructors of stability police units. State and DOD have made some progress in achieving GPOI goals in three principal areas: training and equipping peacekeepers, providing equipment and transportation for deployed missions, and building peacekeeping skills and infrastructure, but challenges remain in meeting these goals. Table 1 summarizes the status of GPOI activities for the three principal goals and seven objectives. First, State and DOD have trained about 40,000 military peacekeepers, predominantly in Africa, and supported the training of over 1,300 stability police, but it is unlikely that GPOI will meet its goal of training 75,000 military peacekeepers by 2010 due to the time it takes to expend program funds, and State and DOD have encountered delays in delivering nonlethal training equipment. Second, State has provided equipment to deployed missions in Lebanon, Somalia, Sudan, and Haiti; supports an equipment depot in Sierra Leone; and initiated a process for peacekeeping countries to request donor assistance for their transportation and logistics needs, but some efforts have been delayed. Third, State and DOD have trained more than 2,700 military peacekeeping instructors and conducted other activities. However, State faces delays in completing activities to build skills and infrastructure in Africa by 2010. In addition, State has targeted a smaller share of resources to build African peacekeeping skills and infrastructure than to train and equip African peacekeepers, compared to other regions. This is due in part to the needs and capabilities of the region and a focus on training peacekeepers in this region for current missions. The following sections provide more information about the progress made in these areas. The majority—92 percent—of military peacekeepers trained under GPOI are from African partner countries, while the remainder have been trained in Asia, Central America, and Europe. In addition, State has supported the training of over 1,300 stability police instructors at COESPU, providing about one-quarter of the school’s budget. However, State is not likely to train 75,000 military peacekeepers by 2010 and has not provided support for all requested staff positions at COESPU. Further, State has provided about $31 million of training equipment to military peacekeepers in 27 countries, predominantly in Africa. However, State has faced challenges in delivering training equipment to GPOI partner countries in a timely manner and accounting for equipment delivery. State and DOD have trained about 40,000 military peacekeepers as of April 2008—36,968 in Africa; 1,805 in Asia; 455 in Central and South America; and 289 in Europe (see app. IV for details on the number trained by region and country). State is not likely to complete the training of 75,000 military peacekeepers by the target date of 2010. As figure 3 shows, the actual number of troops trained is lower than State’s projections. State expects to reach its goal once it has spent all GPOI training funds, but this will likely not occur until after 2010 due to the time it takes to expend training funds. In commenting on a draft of this report, State asserts that it now expects that GPOI will train 75,000 peacekeepers by July 2010 based on new training rates. We were unable to validate State’s new projections since as recently as May 2008, program officials from the GPOI office in the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs and its GPOI evaluation team indicated that slow expenditure rates related to training rates would delay their efforts to reach the 2010 training goal. State has spent approximately $56 million to train military peacekeepers, as of April 2008. Figure 4 shows the expenditures of GPOI funds for training military peacekeepers by region. The majority of the funds, about $39 million, have been spent in Africa. In addition to these funds, some of the combatant commands have spent additional DOD funds to support the State-funded GPOI training. For example, U.S. Pacific Command officials identified that they spent an estimated $8 million of additional DOD funds to develop courses for peacekeeping training and support multinational training exercises held in Mongolia and Bangladesh. Based on current projections, COESPU has indicated that it is likely to meet its goal of training 3,000 stability police instructors by 2010. As of April 2008, State had expended $9 million of $15 million obligated for COESPU’s operations, directly supporting about one-quarter of COESPU’s budget. In 2005, the Italians requested assistance from the United States in filling six staff positions at COESPU in the areas of management, training, research, and publications. Since 2005, the United States has provided a military officer to serve in the deputy director position, but support has not been provided for the other requested staff positions at COESPU.