Department of Defense Initiatives on High Energy Lasers Have Been
Responsive to Congressional Direction (18-MAY-05, GAO-05-545R).
Congress directed the Department of Defense (DOD) to prepare a
master plan to develop laser technologies for potential weapons
applications in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal
Year 2000. In response to this legislation, the High Energy Laser
(HEL) Executive Review Panel was formed and issued the HEL Master
Plan on March 24, 2000. This plan recommended that DOD implement
a new management structure for HEL technologies and increase the
funding allocated to HELs to achieve a better balance between
large demonstration programs and the enabling science and
technology projects. Subsequently, in the Floyd D. Spence
National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2001, Congress
directed the Secretary of Defense to implement the management and
organizational structure specified in the Master Plan. Congress
asked us to review the extent to which DOD has implemented the
recommendations of the HEL Master Plan, by assessing (1) whether
DOD has achieved more balance between large demonstration
projects and the enabling science and technology base projects;
(2) whether the DOD funding process focuses on the most critical
HEL issues; and (3) what impact the new management structure has
had on the coordination and redundancy of HEL technology efforts
DOD-wide.
-------------------------Indexing Terms-------------------------
REPORTNUM: GAO-05-545R
ACCNO: A24320
TITLE: Department of Defense Initiatives on High Energy Lasers
Have Been Responsive to Congressional Direction
DATE: 05/18/2005
SUBJECT: Defense budgets
Defense capabilities
Investments
Military research and development
Program evaluation
Strategic planning
Weapons research and development
Program goals or objectives
Lasers
DOD High Energy Laser Technology Program
******************************************************************
** This file contains an ASCII representation of the text of a **
** GAO Product. **
** **
** No attempt has been made to display graphic images, although **
** figure captions are reproduced. Tables are included, but **
** may not resemble those in the printed version. **
** **
** Please see the PDF (Portable Document Format) file, when **
** available, for a complete electronic file of the printed **
** document's contents. **
** **
******************************************************************
GAO-05-545R
United States Government Accountability Office Washington, DC 20548
May 18, 2005
The Honorable Terry Everett
Chairman
Subcommittee on Strategic Forces
Committee on Armed Services
House of Representatives
The Honorable Silvestre Reyes
Ranking Minority Member
Subcommittee on Strategic Forces
Committee on Armed Services
House of Representatives
Subject: Department of Defense Initiatives on High Energy Lasers Have Been
Responsive to Congressional Direction
Congress directed the Department of Defense (DOD) to prepare a master plan
to develop laser technologies for potential weapons applications in the
National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2000.1 In response to
this legislation, the High Energy Laser (HEL) Executive Review Panel was
formed and issued the HEL Master Plan on March 24, 2000. This plan
recommended that DOD implement a new management structure for HEL
technologies and increase the funding allocated to HELs to achieve a
better balance between large demonstration programs and the enabling
science and technology projects. Subsequently, in the Floyd D. Spence
National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2001, Congress directed
the Secretary of Defense to implement the management and organizational
structure specified in the Master Plan.2
You asked us to review the extent to which DOD has implemented the
recommendations of the HEL Master Plan, by assessing (1) whether DOD has
achieved more balance between large demonstration projects and the
1Pub. L. No. 106-65, sec. 251. 2Pub. L. No. 106-398, sec. 242.
enabling science and technology base projects; 3(2) whether the DOD
funding process focuses on the most critical HEL issues; and (3) what
impact the new management structure has had on the coordination and
redundancy of HEL technology efforts DOD-wide. We briefed your staff on
October 20, 2004, on the interim results of our work, and, at that time,
we agreed to provide a briefing on the results of our work with a letter
summarizing our findings to follow. We provided the final briefing on
March 30, 2005. This letter summarizes and transmits the final briefing
itself (see encl. I).
In addition, the conference report that accompanied the Ronald W. Reagan
National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2005 directed the
Secretary of Defense to submit a report to Congress on the implementation
of the fiscal year 2001 legislation.4 The conferees required the Secretary
to provide this report by January 15, 2005, and also asked us to review
the report and provide our assessment of it to the congressional defense
committees by March 15, 2005. As of March 30, 2005, the Secretary had not
issued this report, and we were unable to review the report in time to
include our assessment in this correspondence. We will provide this
assessment to your staff and to the other defense committees in a separate
letter within 60 days after the Secretary issues the report.
The HEL Joint Technology Office (JTO) was formed in June 2000 as the
principal organization to implement the recommendations of DOD's HEL
Master Plan. It functions as the advocate for DOD's HEL technology
development and funds high priority science and technology efforts that
are expected to have significant impact on long-term laser weapon
requirements of the military services. In addition to the HEL projects
sponsored by the JTO, each of the military services, the Missile Defense
Agency, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency sponsor HEL
science and technology efforts. The Army,5 the Missile Defense Agency, and
the Special Operations Command are also working on large
3The large demonstration programs are system-specific programs, such as
the Airborne Laser or the Advanced Tactical Laser, while the enabling
science and technology base projects are somewhat independent of a
specific application.
4H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 108-767 at p. 520.
5The Army did not request funding for its HEL weapon program, the Mobile
Tactical High Energy Laser in its fiscal year 2006 budget request.
According to an Army official, the program's priority was insufficient to
compete favorably with other Army programs.
Background
scale HEL demonstration programs with the goal of fielding laser weapon
systems.
The HEL Master Plan recommended that the funding for HEL science and
technology be increased to achieve a better balance between large
demonstration programs and the enabling science and technology projects.
In discussing the imbalance between these projects, the plan stated that,
while the demonstration programs are desirable to demonstrate that the HEL
weapons can be fielded, there must be a corresponding level of science and
technology base funding to ensure the future growth of these programs and
the continuing exploration of other types of HEL technologies. Currently,
all DOD HEL activity, including the demonstration programs, is funded
within the science and technology budget category, which includes basic
research, applied research, and advanced technology development.
The Master Plan also recommended that DOD establish a new management
structure for HEL technologies. Therefore, the HEL Technology Council was
established, with the Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Science and
Technology designated chairman of the council and senior civilian official
for HEL projects. In addition, senior level executives of the services and
agencies were designated as the members of the Technology Council. The HEL
Technology Council provides oversight and approval authority over JTO
funding, while Technology Council executives represent their individual
service and agency needs and bring guidance to their respective service
based on the council's deliberations. The JTO consists of a director and
full-and part-time representatives of each service or agency, with
additional support provided by technical area working groups, which
provide recommendations and expert advice to the JTO on their projects.
We found that the Department of Defense has, in large part, implemented
the recommendations of the High Energy Laser Master Plan and has made the
following changes to increase the focus on critical high energy laser
issues:
o Since the High Energy Laser Master Plan and the 2001 Defense
Authorization Act, the overall investment in high energy laser efforts has
increased and the science and technology base has grown as a proportion of
total investment.
Results in Brief
o The Joint Technology Office has a process for establishing priorities
that is clearly defined, objective, and based on input from experts in the
high energy laser field. The services and agencies fund their high energy
laser projects according to their mission requirements.
o By implementing the management structure and recommendations of the
Efforts to Implement Congressional Directives
Master Plan, the Department of Defense has increased collaboration within
the high energy laser community and provided more opportunities for
coordination of high energy laser efforts.
The DOD had no comments on a draft of this report.
From a resource standpoint, DOD has achieved more balance between its
spending for large-scale HEL demonstration programs and the enabling
science and technology base projects. Since the HEL Master Plan was
written and the subsequent legislation implemented, the overall investment
in HEL efforts has increased and the science and technology base has grown
as a proportion of the total investment. In 1998, the HEL technology base
accounted for 17 percent of the total HEL spending ($66 million out of
$398 million, with the demonstration programs receiving $332 million). In
2004, it increased to 27 percent of total HEL spending ($263 million of
$983 million, with the demonstration programs receiving $720 million).
This 27-percent increase includes about $58 million to fund the JTO and
its projects as well as an increase in service and agency funding for HEL
science and technology base projects, from about $66 million in 1998 to
about $205 million in 2004. We did not attempt to determine what
constitutes the ideal spending balance between demonstration programs and
science and technology base projects, nor did we attempt to analyze the
projects for technical balance.
For the new money that the JTO has infused into enabling HEL science and
technology projects-ranging from about 20 to 40 percent of the total-the
funding process does track with identified HEL priorities. While the
individual services participate in this process, they fund their own
science and technology projects based on their specific needs. The JTO has
a process to evaluate projects that includes criteria for establishing
funding priorities for the most critical technical issues. These criteria
are clearly defined, objective, and based on input from a wide range of
experts in the HEL field. In deciding on which projects to fund, the JTO
uses the priorities established through this process. The JTO initiated
the process in 2000 and continues to follow it when allocating funding for
its laser projects. The JTO used four criteria to prioritize technology
projects critical to future HEL applications: the overall potential impact
on HEL
missions; whether the technology is sufficiently mature to benefit from
increased funding; whether the funding needed for the research matches the
expected JTO funds; and whether there are benefits to multiple
applications or multiple services. The HEL technology projects were then
evaluated by a wide-range of experts in the HEL field, prioritized and
grouped into seven technology thrust areas: beam control, solid-state
lasers, chemical lasers, free-electron lasers, advanced laser technology,
lethality science, and modeling and simulations. The JTO allocates its
funding, which has been between $50 million and $60 million each year
since fiscal year 2002, exclusively to projects in these seven thrust
areas. The priorities and the investment strategy are updated annually.
The services and agencies prioritize and fund their technology investments
according to their individual mission needs. However, they do so with the
knowledge of what the JTO and other organizations have underway.
By implementing the management structure and recommendations of the 2000
HEL Master Plan, DOD provides opportunities via the Technology Council and
the JTO's Technical Area Working Groups for more collaboration among the
HEL community as well as opportunities for key HEL experts from all of the
services to discuss goals and objectives and share project information.
The Technology Council provides specific direction to the JTO and some
direction to the services and agencies on their HEL-related activities.
The senior level executives on the Technology Council represent their
services' or agencies' HEL needs and issues to the council and take the
results of the Technology Council discussions and guidance back to their
own services. Finally, based on our review of selected projects, we found
no apparent duplication of HEL technology projects within the JTO projects
or among the JTO projects and service and agency projects. Even within the
same thrust area, the projects explore different aspects of the various
technologies. According to JTO officials, the office makes a conscious
attempt to avoid duplication with service or agency projects and instead
tries to address technology gaps and issues not being covered by the
services and agencies.
Agency Comments The Department of Defense reviewed a draft of this
report, but had no comments on the content. Their response is included as
Enclosure II.
and Our Evaluation
We reviewed the HEL Master Plan and the subsequent legislation as well
as other documentation concerning the implementation of the
recommendations in the Master Plan. We interviewed officials within the
Office of the Secretary of Defense to assess DOD's implementation of the
plan's recommendations. We interviewed HEL JTO officials and reviewed
documents to determine their role in implementing the Master Plan's
recommendations and to assess their criteria for prioritizing and funding
HEL technologies. We also interviewed Army, Navy, Air Force, Missile
Defense Agency, and Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
officials involved in HEL projects and reviewed pertinent documentation
to determine how the officials set their priorities and funding for HEL
projects and to solicit their views on the effectiveness of the JTO as the
focal point for HEL-related activities. We reviewed the active projects
the
JTO was sponsoring for possible duplication with those from the services
and other agencies. For those projects that seemed similar to other
projects, we then did a more in-depth analysis of the project and its
focus.
We conducted our review from August 2004 to April 2005 in accordance
with generally accepted government auditing standards.
Paul L. Francis, Director
Acquisition and Sourcing Management
Enclosures -II
Scope and Methodology
Enclosure I
Service Project Title Description
JTO Air Force Optical component Athermal subscale window
sponsor technology
Alternate HEL windows Evaluate a type of window
JTO Army sponsor material
JTO Navy sponsor Tactical conformal Fabrication of large tactical
window development conformal windows
High reflective Develop optical coatings that can
JTO Navy sponsor coating withstand high power
Air Force Airborne laser beam Refine beam control for airborne
control platforms
Investigate effects of aerosols,
Navy Beam control water vapor, and air turbulence
on laser beam in maritime
environment
Enclosure II: Comments from the Department of Defense
This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright
protection in the United States. It may be reproduced and distributed in
its entirety without further permission from GAO. However, because this
work may contain copyrighted images or other material, permission from the
copyright holder may be necessary if you wish to reproduce this material
separately.
GAO's Mission
Obtaining Copies of GAO Reports and Testimony
The Government Accountability Office, the audit, evaluation and
investigative arm of Congress, exists to support Congress in meeting its
constitutional responsibilities and to help improve the performance and
accountability of the federal government for the American people. GAO
examines the use of public funds; evaluates federal programs and policies;
and provides analyses, recommendations, and other assistance to help
Congress make informed oversight, policy, and funding decisions. GAO's
commitment to good government is reflected in its core values of
accountability, integrity, and reliability.
The fastest and easiest way to obtain copies of GAO documents at no cost
is through GAO's Web site (www.gao.gov). Each weekday, GAO posts newly
released reports, testimony, and correspondence on its Web site. To have
GAO e-mail you a list of newly posted products every afternoon, go to
www.gao.gov and select "Subscribe to Updates."
Order by Mail or Phone The first copy of each printed report is free.
Additional copies are $2 each. A check or money order should be made out
to the Superintendent of Documents. GAO also accepts VISA and Mastercard.
Orders for 100 or more copies mailed to a single address are discounted 25
percent. Orders should be sent to:
U.S. Government Accountability Office 441 G Street NW, Room LM Washington,
D.C. 20548
To order by Phone: Voice: (202) 512-6000 TDD: (202) 512-2537 Fax: (202)
512-6061
To Report Fraud, Contact:
Waste, and Abuse in Web site: www.gao.gov/fraudnet/fraudnet.htm
E-mail: [email protected] Programs Automated answering system: (800)
424-5454 or (202) 512-7470
Gloria Jarmon, Managing Director, [email protected] (202)
512-4400Congressional U.S. Government Accountability Office, 441 G Street
NW, Room 7125 Relations Washington, D.C. 20548
Public Affairs Paul Anderson, Managing Director, [email protected] (202)
512-4800 U.S. Government Accountability Office, 441 G Street NW, Room 7149
Washington, D.C. 20548
PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER
*** End of document. ***