Army plan takes fire from Congress, DoD, GAO

[unhappycamper]

Army plan takes fire from Congress, DoD, GAO
By Kate Brannen - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Mar 11, 2010 20:55:07 EST

Why is the Army buying equipment that fared poorly in tests? That’s the question the chairman of the House Armed Services air and land subcommittee asked senior Army officials at a March 10 hearing.

“It does not seem like these things are going to be ready anytime soon,” Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) said after listening to Pentagon testing office officials, who outlined the problems demonstrated in last year’s testing of the first increment of the Army’s brigade combat team modernization program. “Why is there a budget request for procurement of this stuff in there? ...Why not just delay it for a year?”

~snip~

“In the first major acquisition decision for the Army’s post-(Future Combat Systems) initiatives, DoD and the Army — because they want to support the war fighter quickly — are proceeding with low-rate initial production of Increment 1 systems despite having acknowledged that systems are immature, are unreliable, and cannot perform as required,” GAO officials said in written testimony.

Originally developed under the FCS program, Increment 1 includes the Non-Line-of-Sight Launch System, Tactical and Urban Unattended Ground Sensors, the Class 1 Unmanned Aircraft System, the Small Unmanned Ground Vehicle and the Network Integration Kit.

“It will be a major challenge to correct all of the deficiencies,” said J. Michael Gilmore, director of operational test and evaluation in the Office of the Secretary of Defense.


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2010/03/army_hearing_defense_031010w/