Why The Pentagon Keeps Failing Its Audit
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Published 2021-12-28
The Pentagon has failed another audit this year. But with $770 billion expected to be budgeted for 2022, the Department of Defense says it is working on keeping track of all this money.
“It took the Department of Homeland Security a decade to pass its audit, and it’s a fraction of the size of the Defense Department,” said Mackenzie Eaglen, a senior fellow with the American Enterprise Institute. “There is a bit out there that just because the department can’t pass the audit, it doesn’t know where it’s spending its money. And it does. But what it doesn’t do well is track it at an enterprise level.“
Since 1988 the budget has grown from over $634 billion in 2020 dollars to over $724 billion in 2020. But, the defense budget as a percentage of the total gross domestic product has actually dropped in the same period, from 5.7% to 3.5%, according to a Congressional Research Service analysis of Office of Management and Budget historical tables.
One example of an item found in the recent audit was a Navy warehouse that was not on the Navy’s property records and that housed aircraft parts worth $126 million, according to the Government Accountability Office.
“The financial system that you have in DOD right now is set up to control taxpayers’ dollars to guarantee that there is not going to be unauthorized use of it. So every dollar and cent is accounted for,” said Frederico Bartels, a senior policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation. “And there, you can see that by the ADEA violations being extremely low at DOD, there are still some but that’s part of doing business, it’s still lower than most federal agencies.“
Old systems for tracking funds, a slow bureaucracy, and the sheer size of the U.S. Defense apparatus have kept audits from passing since they began in late 2017.
The size of the budget is constantly a subject of debate, but for lawmakers to make informed decisions they need good data.
“This is the Pentagon,” said Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif. “They’re responsible for the security of the United States. If, in fact, their audit systems are outdated, if ... they can’t do an audit and give us a picture of what they’re spending, I kind of worry about what they’re doing on the really important stuff.“
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Why The Pentagon Keeps Failing Its Audit
All Comments (21)
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It's unreal to me that a government agency can't pass an audit when it's got so much money to account for. If a publicly traded company didn't have it's reporting audit documents available for shareholders then it would be in a lot of trouble very quickly. How can a department have trillions of dollars to defend a country and not have an accurate record of what its assets and what its spending.
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Friend was in the military and did bookkeeping. $200 for "Walmart grade" toilet seats and $10 for low quality nuts and bolts were common. All military contractors need to be audited. They're inflating the prices and getting away with it just because they're "Defense contractors".
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good to know that the spending is as reckless as we thought
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The bigger question is; if the Pentagon can't pass an audit, why do we keep giving them billions of dollars?
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"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." - Dwight D. Eisenhower
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Depart of Defense: we dont have enough money, we need Billions of dollars more!! Also DOD: You cant expect us to track this much money...
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"Why the Pentagon keeps failing its Audit " Better question is "does the Pentagon even care for the audit knowing they'll get $700+ Billion/ blank cheque every year without push back? "
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It’s crazy, we were looking up to the stars to try to observe black holes while the DOD was just right in front of us all that time!
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Funny, if I fail an audit I go to jail. Why are they still giving these corrupt people billions?
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"We've investigated ourselves and have come to the conclusion that we've done nothing wrong, continue your financial support and full cooperation without any further inquiries."
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I’m not even an American but it really hurts seeing such a large amount of money being spent on defense. Did you guys know that NASA’s budget is about $20 Billion, might seem like a lot and yes it is. But it’s like peanuts when you consider the fact that the DoD spends that money in less than 2 weeks. NASA’s budget is less than the US Military’s budget for Air Conditioning.
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Imagine having half a decade to clean up your books. Public companies would be de-listed from exchanges for this.
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Lifetime politicians getting kickbacks is the problem. Old ways with no desire to change. Money talks.
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So they fail the audit, yet get more money? I fail an audit, the irs takes my money… Must be nice
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Like me with spending drunk on Amazon Edit:We should probably get rid of “use it or lose it budgets”
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I once asked why military booked flights were sometimes twice the amount paid by regular citizens and I was told that it was due to the fact that flights could change over night. For example, to fly from guam to the mainland it is about 1600-1800 if you book your flight a month in advance. If it is last minute, maybe 2100… what does the military pay for that same flight? 3100… There is so much spending that comes from the fact that it is the military but no one wants to talk about this….
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Simple answer : Corruption
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You can’t audit the auditor just like you can’t police the police. Corruption doesn’t take responsibility for itself
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That’s a shame that’s is tax money that goes missing. Especially when these numbers are coming from Feds monitoring feds I wonder what would the numbers look like if a private firm was auditing them.
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Fairfax, Loudon, Montgomery counties are the wealthiest counties in the country. All neighboring D.C. Nothing but contractors live in those areas.
