Defense Budget: DOD Should Further Improve Visibility and Accountability of O&M Fund Movements: NSIAD-00-18.

MILITARY budgets; PUBLIC spending; MILITARY readiness; PUBLIC finance; UNITED States. Dept. of Defense

The Defense Department's (DOD) single largest appropriation group--Operation and Maintenance (O&M)--funds training, maintenance, and other key readiness activities as well as other expenses not directly related to readiness. Congress has provided about $104 billion for all these activities in fiscal year 2000. Congress has raised concerns about the extent to which the funds that directly affect readiness--generally those in the operating forces' portion of the O&M budget--have been reduced to pay for other O&M expenses. This report (1) identifies the aggregated differences between the amounts that Congress initially designated for O&M subactivities (especially the readiness-related subactivities) and those DOD reported as obligated for the same subactivities, (2) identifies those O&M subactivities for which DOD obligated funds differently than recommended by Congress in each year of the five-year periods GAO examined (1994 through 1998), and (3) assesses the information available to Congress to track DOD's movement of funds among O&M subactivities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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