	Background

Many DOD organizations, collectively known as the missing persons  accounting community, have a role in accounting for the missing, as  discussed below. PACOM exercises authority over the Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in  Action Accounting Command (JPAC), which is responsible for  conducting operations in support of achieving the missing persons  accounting mission. The past conflict accounting section of the Armed Forces DNA  Identification Laboratory conducts DNA analyses of remains of  missing persons from past military conflicts for JPAC and its  laboratory component, the Central Identification Laboratory, and  maintains the past conflict accounting family reference sample  database, to include processing of all DNA references. Accounting Community’s Fragmented Organizational Structure Exacerbates Weaknesses in Leadership

The department’s response to the accounting-for goal established in the  National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 brought into  sharp relief longstanding disputes that have not been addressed by top- level leaders, and have been exacerbated by the accounting community’s  fragmented organizational structure. As I will describe in more detail later  in this statement, leadership from the Under Secretary of Defense for  Policy and Pacific Command have been unable to resolve disputes  between community members in areas such as roles and responsibilities  and developing a community-wide plan to meet the statutory accounting- for goal. Further, the accounting community is fragmented in that the  community members belong to diverse parent organizations under  several different chains of command. With accounting community  organizations reporting under different lines of authority, no single entity  has overarching responsibility for community-wide personnel and other  resources. DOD Guidance Does Not Clearly Articulate Roles and Responsibilities for All Accounting Community Organizations

While DOD is working to revise its existing guidance and develop new  guidance, the roles and responsibilities of the various members of the  missing persons accounting community are not all clearly articulated in  existing DOD directives or instructions. We have previously reported on  the need for collaborating agencies to work together to define and agree  on their roles and responsibilities. DOD has established several  directives and instructions related to the missing persons accounting  program. However, none of this guidance clearly delineates the specific  roles and responsibilities of all the organizations comprising the missing  persons accounting community in the four key areas that we examined for  our July 2013 report: (1) equipment and artifact identification and  analysis, (2) research and analysis, (3) investigations, and (4) family  outreach and external communications. Disagreements over roles and  responsibilities where the guidance is broad or vague enough to support  different interpretations has led to discord, lack of collaboration, and  friction among the community’s members, and particularly between  DPMO and JPAC. Development of Community-wide Plan Is Impeded by a Fragmented Approach to Planning and Disputes among Community Members

While DOD has made some progress in drafting a community-wide plan  to increase its capability and capacity to meet the statutory accounting-for  goal, as of June 2013 DOD had not completed a community-wide plan. We have previously reported that overarching plans can help agencies  better align their activities, processes, and resources to collaborate  effectively to accomplish a commonly defined outcome. However, our  July 2013 report found that community-wide planning to meet the  accounting-for goal established by Congress has been impeded by  disputes and by a lack of coordination among members of the missing  persons accounting community, with DPMO and JPAC developing two  competing proposed plans, neither of which encompassed the entire  accounting community. In response to a December 2009 memorandum  from the Deputy Secretary of Defense directing the Deputy Assistant  Secretary of Defense for Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Affairs to  begin planning to meet the accounting-for goal, USD Policy and PACOM  allowed the development of these two competing proposed plans for  obtaining additional funding and resources to meet the mandated  capability and capacity. As of May 2013, the  JPAC plan, which does not incorporate the larger accounting community,  is DOD’s only plan to increase capability and capacity to account for  missing persons. Moreover, there is no community-wide process to provide resources for  the missing persons accounting mission.
Why GAO Did This Study

This testimony discusses GAO's findings and recommendations about DOD's missing persons accounting mission from our recently issued report, DOD's POW/MIA Mission: Top-Level Leadership Attention Needed to Resolve Longstanding Challenges in Accounting for Missing Persons from Past Conflicts. DOD reports that more than 83,000 persons are missing from past conflicts in Vietnam, Korea, the Cold War, the Persian Gulf, and World War II. Since the early 1970s, DOD has identified the remains of and accounted for approximately 1,910 persons. Several DOD components and organizations, collectively known as the missing persons accounting community, have a role in accounting for missing persons. Between 2002 and 2012, DOD accounted for an average of 72 persons each year. In 2009, Congress established an accounting-for goal in Section 541 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010. This act required the Secretary of Defense to provide such funds, personnel, and resources as the Secretary considers appropriate to increase significantly the capability and capacity of DOD, the Armed Forces, and commanders of the combatant commands to account for missing persons, so that the accounting community has sufficient resources to ensure that at least 200 missing persons are accounted for annually, beginning in fiscal year 2015.The law also added all World War II losses to the list of conflicts for which DOD is responsible, thus increasing from about 10,000 to 83,000 the number of missing persons for whom DOD must account.
In 2012, in a committee report to accompany a bill for the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013, the House Armed Services Committee mandated that GAO review DODs efforts to increase its capability and capacity to account for missing persons. GAO will focus on three key issues identified in the report, specifically: (1) the accounting communitys organizational structure, (2) the lack of clarity regarding community members roles and responsibilities, and (3) DODs planning to meet the statutory accounting-for goal.

What GAO Found

The department's response to the accounting-for goal established in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 brought into sharp relief longstanding disputes that have not been addressed by top-level leaders, and have been exacerbated by the accounting community's fragmented organizational structure. Leadership from the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy and Pacific Command have been unable to resolve disputes between community members in areas such as roles and responsibilities and developing a community-wide plan to meet the statutory accounting-for goal. Further, the accounting community is fragmented in that the community members belong to diverse parent organizations under several different chains of command. With accounting community organizations reporting under different lines of authority, no single entity has overarching responsibility for community-wide personnel and other resources.
While the Department of Defense (DOD) is working to revise its existing guidance and develop new guidance, the roles and responsibilities of the various members of the missing persons accounting community are not all clearly articulated in existing DOD directives or instructions. GAO has previously reported on the need for collaborating agencies to work together to define and agree on their roles and responsibilities. DOD has established several directives and instructions related to the missing persons accounting program. However, none of this guidance clearly delineates the specific roles and responsibilities of all the organizations comprising the missing persons accounting community in the four key areas that GAO examined for the July 2013 report: (1) equipment and artifact identification and analysis, (2) research and analysis, (3) investigations, and (4) family outreach and external communications. Disagreements over roles and responsibilities where the guidance is broad or vague enough to support different interpretations has led to discord, lack of collaboration, and friction among the community's members, and particularly between the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) and Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Command (JPAC).
While DOD has made some progress in drafting a community-wide plan to increase its capability and capacity to meet the statutory accounting-for goal, as of June 2013 DOD had not completed a community-wide plan. GAO has previously reported that overarching plans can help agencies better align their activities, processes, and resources to collaborate effectively to accomplish a commonly defined outcome. However, GAO's July 2013 report found that community-wide planning to meet the accounting-for goal established by Congress has been impeded by disputes and by a lack of coordination among members of the missing persons accounting community, with the DPMO and JPAC developing two competing proposed plans, neither of which encompassed the entire accounting community.