This trend has been promoted by the expectation of Twelve Agencies exist in the Department today. This review has considered eleven. Preparedness Agency (DCPA), which is expected to be transferred from the Department by Presidential order, was excluded. The Agencies are shown in Table 1, in the order in which they gained official Defense Agency 'status. As the Agencies increased from two to twelve, their size, scope and policy influence grew steadily. The eleven Agencies under consideration have over 80 thousand civilian and eight thousand military personnel and operating budgets exceeding $3 billion. In FY 78 they expended or directly controled approximately $15 billion--50% of a Military Service budget--through their appropriations, revolving funds, and program management responsibilities. Table 2 shows the steady increase in the funds which are managed/controlled/directed by the Agencies during the past twenty years. The decrease from FY 75 to 78 is consistent with the reduction of the total defense budget in that period. The growth in the number and size of the Defense Agencies is also reflected in the number of personnel assigned to them as shown in Table 3. This quantum increase in resources controlled by the Agencies is indicative of an accompanying increase in their responsibilities and their influence over defense policy and programs. Considerable as it is, however, it does not in itself fully portray the magnitude of their responsibility and influence. The Agencies also have extensive audit/over of considerable significance to DoD top management. They are no longer the relatively minor organizations in the DOD that they once were considered. The development of Defense Agencies appears to be accompanied by a trend toward civilianization of their personnel. A probable cause is that civilian personnel manning is generally considered to be more economical than military. The percentage of civilian manpower in the Defense Agencies in contrast to the DoD-wide total percentage is shown in Table 4 for the period from 1962 to the present. Recommendations are being considered in DoD for consolidation of audio-visual, command/control, and postal functions and for expansion of DLA supply management to all consumable items. Studies are planned or in progress to address centralization of the transportation/traffic management, commissary, audit, and investigative functions. The JCS have assigned the responsibility for mobilization deployment planning to United States Readiness Command (USREDCOM). It is not clear whether the ultimate result of this trend will be a multiplicity of heterogeneous organizations covering the spectrum of support or a central support organization, such as a fifth Uniformed Service. OTHER COMMON SUPPORT ORGANIZATIONS. A wide variety of other common support and service organizations have proliferated in DoD. These organizations represent both alternative models to Defense Agencies and, in certain cases, supplements to the Defense Agency system. They include assign ments of Services as Single Managers, Executive Agents, and Lead Services; Delegations of Authority to Services; DoD Field Activities; and organizations reporting to the JCS. We were unable to locate a central repository of these responsibilities or official definitions of these terms. They are often used interchangeably, and the documentation for each specifies the responsibilities and authority. The Military Departments have provided listings of their assignments--which in some cases required several months to prepare--which we have consolidated at Appendix B. We have found 86 assignments of Services as Single Managers to include such critical functions as Conventional Ammunition (Army), Ocean Transportation (Navy), and Airlift Service (Air Force). There are 143 assignments of Services as Executive Agents, such as the Armed Forces Courier Service (Army), the DOD Computer Institute (Navy), and the Security Assistance Accounting Center (Air Force). The 103 assignments as Lead Services include the Tactical Shelter Program (Army), Electro-Magnetic Countermeasure Specifications and Standards (Navy), and Aerospace Systems Intelligence (Air Force). There are 150 delegations of authority which include Chemical Agents and Munitions (Army), the Automatic Text Message Handling System (Navy), and DoD Manager for Manned Space Flight Operations (Air Force). The six OSD Field Activities are: Washington Headquarters Services DoD Dependent Schools Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services (CHAMPUS) Tri-Service Medical Information System (TRIMIS) Office of Economic Adjustment Some joint support and service organizations report to the Secretary of Defense through the JCS. |