GAO examines DoD’s audit stance, weapons portfolio

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GAO examines DoD’s audit stance, weapons portfolio

Asif Khan, the director of financial management and assurance at GAO, and Mike Sullivan, the director of Acquisition and Sourcing Management Issues, joined Pentagon...

Francis Rose

April 4, 2012 7:04 pm

1 min read

wfedstaff | April 17, 2015 3:36 pm

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The Government Accountability Office investigates many of the Defense Department’s most pressing issues.

In February, GAO testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on problems with the Army’s payroll system that could threaten DoD’s attempt at audit-readiness.

GAO found the Army could not identify a complete population of Army payroll accounts for fiscal 2010, according to the agency’s testimony.

Asif Khan, the director of financial management and assurance at GAO, discussed details of the report.

DoD’s auditability goal is part of a longstanding effort to modernize its business systems, which GAO has also examined.

Another key factor in DoD financial matters is the cost of weapons systems.

The watchdog agency examined the costs of 96 major weapons program, which totaled some $1.58 trillion. Over the past year, the total cost of the programs grew by 5 percent or more than $74.4 billion.

According to the agency, most of programs in the portfolio are smaller, while the Joint Strike Fighter accounted for the most cost growth in the past year.

Mike Sullivan, the director of Acquisition and Sourcing Management Issues, discussed the GAO report on DoD’s selected weapons portfolio.

Army’s payroll problems threaten auditability goals, GAO says