From the U.S. Government Accountability Office, www.gao.gov

Transcript for: Changes in Military Readiness

Description: While the U.S. has enjoyed a dominant military advantage
for decades, the Department of Defense says this superiority is being
challenged by potential adversaries--most notably China and Russia--and
by the strain of nearly two decades of conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan.
We get an update on the military's readiness from GAO's Diana Maurer.

Related GAO Work: GAO-21-279, Military Readiness: Department of Defense
Domain Readiness Varied from Fiscal Year 2017 through Fiscal Year 2019

Released: April 2021

[Intro Music]

[Diana Maurer:] Military readiness is at a critical juncture. Nearly two
decades of constant conflict has degraded the readiness of the military
services.

[Holly Hobbs:] Hi and welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report, your source for
news and information from the U.S. Government Accountability
Office--celebrating 100 years of fact-based, nonpartisan government
oversight. I'm Holly Hobbs.
While the U.S. has enjoyed a dominant military advantage for decades,
the Department of Defense says this superiority is being challenged by
potential adversaries--most notably China and Russia--and by the strain
of nearly two decades of conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan. 
Today we'll get an update on the military's readiness from GAO's Diana
Maurer--an expert on military strategy and readiness, and a director in
our Defense Capabilities and Management Team. Thanks for joining us
Diana! 

[Diana Maurer:] Thank you very much Holly! It's great to be here.

[Holly Hobbs:] So, Diana has military readiness improved or gotten
worse?

[Diana Maurer:] Well, it actually turns out to be a little bit of a
mixed bag. So in our report, we looked at trends in military readiness
over a three year period--so 2017, 2018 and 2019. And what we found was
that it improved in some areas but had gotten worse in others. So, for
example, in the ground domain--so Army and Marine Corps combat teams--we
found that readiness had improved and that was impart from the drawdown
in troupes out of Afghanistan and Iraq. However, in the sea domain, we
found that readiness had decreased. So the Navy had heavily used its
aircraft carries and submarines and cruisers and so forth over the last
20 years, increasing the need for maintenance and resulting, in part,
with very lengthy stays in dry docks for repairs--sometimes months
longer than planned. In the other domains--so air, space, and cyber. We
found that readiness improved in some aspects of those domains and had
gotten worse in others. 

[Holly Hobbs:] So what does military readiness mean, and how would you
even go about measuring it? 

[Diana Maurer:] So, very broadly speaking, readiness is the ability of a
military unit to successfully carry out its mission. For example, it
could be an air unit successfully refueling a bomber in flight or it
could be naval units keeping sea lanes open for the U.S. Navy or our
allies, or it could be a cyber unit defending against a cyberattack. DOD
and the services, generally speaking, measure readiness in two ways.
They look at inputs and they look at outcomes. So from the input
perspective,  they are looking at, does the unit have the right number
of people, are they adequately trained, do they have the amount of
equipment they should have, and is that equipment maintained and ready
to go--so are the helicopters and tanks and fighter jets ready to
execute a mission. And then from the outcome perspective, military
officers are doing a somewhat subjective but important assessment of
whether or not that unit can actually carry out its mission. And that's
a function not only of the inputs but also the capabilities of the
potential adversary. 

[Holly Hobbs:] So, if we've been in conflicts for the last two decades,
why wouldn't that make us more ready to go than if it were peace time? 

[Diana Maurer:] To some extent that's true. But, as it turns out, if you
are in extended, prolonged, ongoing conflict, what's happening is you're
losing people. Your equipment is becoming damaged or destroyed. Units
are not able to go to training because they're in combat or conflict.
They're not able to rest and recover and reconstitute. Ongoing or
sustained conflict is a drain on readiness and that's something that DOD
has seen over the course of the last two decades.

[Holly Hobbs:] Does the Department of Defense or the services, do they
set goals or measure for readiness so that they can improve performance?   

[Diana Maurer:] Absolutely. They definitely do that, and that has been
in part due to recommendations from some of our earlier work looking at
readiness. The good news there is that the Department has done that on a
service basis. They've established goals. One area where we think
there's still some work to do at DOD is what we call domain. For
example, there's something called the air domain, which is a reflection
of the fact that the Navy and the Marine Corps and the Air Force all
have fighter jets, and the Army has helicopters. So they're all
operating systems that fly. So we think that is important to report on
readiness, not just by service, but also by these domains. And that will
give a more accurate depiction, a more complete depiction of readiness. 

[Music]

[Holly Hobbs:] So it sounds like the Department of Defense knows that
there are challenges with military readiness, and that it sets goals for
readiness by service branch. But that DOD isn't measuring readiness at
the domain level. Diana, we've made recommendations to the DOD to look
at readiness by domain. Why haven't they done it?  

[Diana Maurer:] So when we talk to senior officials at DOD, they believe
that their current measures of readiness, which are focused on the goals
for military services, they believe that that is sufficient. We have a
respectful agreement to disagree with that. We believe that in addition
to reporting by service, it's also important to report by domain because
that is how the military actually functions. When it comes time to
execute an operation or engage in military conflict, it's never just the
Army. It's never just the Marine Corps. 

[Holly Hobbs:] And last question--what's the bottom line of this report?

[Diana Maurer:] The bottom line of this report is that right now
military readiness is at a critical juncture. Nearly two decades of
constant conflict has degraded the readiness of the military services,
and at the same time, our potential adversaries have greatly enhanced
their military capabilities. So it's important for DOD to focus on the
inputs of readiness as well as their ability to successfully execute
those missions against potential adversaries. And we'll continue to
perform oversight to help Congress keep an eye on how the military is
doing in improving overall readiness. That's important for the nation
and our ability to carry out our national security goals.

[Holly Hobbs:] That was Diana Maurer talking about GAO's recent review
of military readiness. Thank you for your time Diana! 

[Diana Maurer:] Thank you very much!

[Holly Hobbs:] And thank you for listening to the Watchdog Report. To
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