Pentagon can’t guarantee accurate tracking of Ukraine aid, watchdog finds

The Pentagon has no standardized guidance for tracking and reporting the status of weapons deliveries to Ukraine, a government report revealed this week – making it impossible to know exactly how many munitions have actually made their way to eastern Europe.

With congressional opponents of continued military aid for Ukraine citing accountability for $42 billion in US-sent weapons as one of their main concerns, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) report released Wednesday revealed much of the uncertainty is not Kyiv’s fault – but that of the Defense Department.

The military uses a recording system, provided by the little-known Defense Security Cooperation Agency and known as “DSCA 1000,” to track weapons deliveries to Ukraine.

However, the report found the Pentagon’s own guidance “does not clearly define at what point in the delivery process defense articles should be recorded as delivered in DSCA 1000, and DSCA officials have no process for ensuring the accuracy of the information in that system.”

Delivering confusion

Without a standard Pentagon-wide policy, each armed service branch has independently chosen when to record an item as “delivered,” leading to confusion about the status of the assistance, the report said.

For example, the Army declares items delivered “as soon as they begin movement from Army points of origin” in the US — with “weeks” sometimes passing before they are turned over to Ukrainian forces.

Meanwhile, the Navy records the goods as delivered “when they reach the port of debarkation outside the US.”

Meanwhile, the Air Force briefly stopped recording weapons deliveries in DSCA 1000 altogether until after GAO investigators spoke with brass in June of last year due to the lack of policy guidance, according to the report.

“As of June 2023, the Air Force had not determined a standardized delivery confirmation process for defense articles provided to Ukraine,” the report said. “ … [An] official also said that DSCA 1000 data on the delivery status of Air Force defense articles approved for provision to Ukraine were not accurate and that the Air Force had not updated DSCA 1000 delivery data in recent months.”

That put the Air Force in violation of a requirement that all services record their deliveries “at least monthly” in the online records system, according to the report.

Meanwhile, DSCA officials told investigators that they consider weapons “delivered” only when they are physically transferred to Ukraine.

“Clear guidance on when to record defense articles as delivered in DSCA 1000 would help to ensure consistency in delivery data entry and accuracy during the PDA process,” the report said.

The Marine Corps came the closest to what DSCA intended, marking items as delivered “when they receive email confirmation from the logistics component or operating unit at the border that the defense articles were delivered to Ukrainian officials.”

Not only does the Pentagon lack guidance on when to record an item as delivered, it also did not provide “clear instructions on how the service branches are to confirm that a defense article was delivered to its end user.”

“Without clarifying the guidance for data entry or taking steps to address potentially inaccurate data in DCSA 1000, DOD may continue to lack awareness of the types and quantities of defense articles it has provided, and physically delivered, to Ukraine,” the report said.

The lack of guidance also leaves open the real possibility of violating federal law, which requires that any old equipment from US stockpiles must be physically in its recipients‘ custody before the Pentagon can spend congressionally approved funds on new weapons.

The service branches are also required to keep delivery data on weapons sent through the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI), which provides funds to purchase new weapons to be sent directly to Kyiv.

However, auditors found there were no records for the delivery status of nearly half of the all USAI orders for Ukraine.

As of July, just 8% of all USAI orders were reported as having been completed – but it is impossible to know the figure’s accuracy without records for 56 of the 118 total USAI orders, according to the report. 

While USAI assistance by nature is delivered over a longer time frame because the weapons have to be manufactured in the US, the GAO also urged the Pentagon to keep up-to-date records for all of the USAI orders it oversees.

One problem with that: The Pentagon has been unable to even determine why no records exist for so many USAI orders, according to the report.

Tracking issues

The Defense Department also lacks appropriate systems to keep track of the status of all weapons once they go into Ukraine, making it more difficult to independently ensure weapons sent there, stay there.

“Existing end-use monitoring systems have proven ineffective at keeping accurate data on whether a delivered item has been used, destroyed or lost,” the report said. “It is unclear whether DOD has tracked all allegations of end-use violations involving defense articles provided to the country.”

Without the proper and up-to-date data, Pentagon officials who make decisions on what to send Ukraine are left without concrete, reliable data to guide them.

What’s more, inaccurate or missing tracking data makes it difficult to give an honest assessment of whether any — or how many — American deliveries have slipped into the black market.

As of August, there had been just one report documenting an alleged illegal transfer of US-sent weapons from Ukraine to Russia since the beginning of the war – but the Pentagon determined it was likely untrue. When asked by GAO investigators how that determination was made, they were told that the claim was “consistent with Russian disinformation.”

But given the lack of data, there is no way to know whether the Pentagon has tracked all such allegations. 

While the department is required to report “suspected” instances of illegal transfers of weapons, it doesn’t have a standard process on how to determine the credibility of allegations that weapons are ending up in the wrong hands.

The report urged the Defense Department to promptly remedy the situation by issuing formal policies on recording tracking data to strengthen efficacy, and to prevent misuse.

“Without clear guidance on tracking defense article deliveries, DOD data on the status of security assistance for Ukraine are not always accurate,” the GAO said. “By taking steps to ensure the accuracy of its delivery data, DOD will be better positioned to track the status of defense articles critical to Ukraine’s self-defense efforts.”