Key Takeaways:
- Military Readiness Has Declined Over Two Decades: The U.S. military is struggling to maintain readiness due to personnel shortages, outdated equipment, and increasing operational demands.
- Shortages Impact Mission Capabilities: Each military branch faces challenges ensuring enough trained personnel and operational aircraft, ships, and ground vehicles.
- Balancing Modernization and Readiness: The Department of Defense (DOD) must sustain current forces while investing in new technologies to counter emerging threats.
- GAO Identifies Over 100 Unimplemented Recommendations: Implementing these recommendations would improve sustainment, training, and resource management across all domains.
Declining Readiness Across All Warfighting Domains
The United States’ ability to project power depends on its ability to maintain combat-ready forces across air, sea, ground, and space domains. However, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has found that military readiness has declined significantly over the past two decades.
The primary reasons for this decline include aging equipment, insufficient personnel, and inadequate sustainment planning. While DOD has made efforts to rebuild readiness, these efforts have been slow, and major challenges remain unresolved.
Air Domain: Aircraft Maintenance and Personnel Shortages
The Air Force, Navy, and Army continue to struggle with aircraft maintenance and mission-capable rates. Many aircraft fail to meet their mission-capable goals, limiting their availability for operations and training.
One major factor is a shortage of trained aircraft maintenance personnel. The F-35 Lightning II program is a prime example, as sustainment costs have skyrocketed, and maintenance delays have negatively impacted operational readiness. Without a sufficient number of trained personnel, the ability to keep aircraft mission-ready remains a serious concern.
Sea Domain: Ship Maintenance and Industrial Base Weaknesses
The Navy faces persistent challenges in maintaining its fleet, with significant delays in ship repairs and overhauls. Many ships spend extended periods undergoing maintenance, limiting their availability for operations.
The Navy’s public shipyards are outdated and understaffed, contributing to long maintenance backlogs. In addition, the private sector shipbuilding and repair industry is struggling with workforce shortages and infrastructure limitations, further delaying critical maintenance and modernization efforts.
Ground Domain: Equipment and Logistics Issues
The Army has struggled to effectively field new equipment, often deploying systems before fully developing necessary training programs, infrastructure, and personnel support. This has resulted in logistical inefficiencies and unexpected costs.
In addition, the Army’s watercraft fleet is experiencing severe readiness issues, with a declining number of fully mission-capable vessels. Similarly, the Army’s ability to transport personnel and equipment via rail networks has been hindered by deteriorating infrastructure and a lack of trained rail operators.
Space Domain: Training and Coordination Gaps
The Space Force, the newest military branch, has not fully developed personnel training and readiness plans to sustain operations in a contested space environment.
Additionally, classified information barriers make it difficult for the U.S. to integrate effectively with allies in space defense operations. Without improved coordination and clearer training strategies, the Space Force risks falling behind in an increasingly competitive space domain.
Balancing Current Demands and Future Modernization
The military faces a difficult challenge: maintaining operational readiness while modernizing for future conflicts. Older systems require extensive maintenance, yet new weapons programs often experience cost overruns and delays.
At the same time, service members report a lack of hands-on training opportunities, limiting their ability to operate and sustain advanced weapon systems effectively. Additionally, budget constraints and shifting priorities have made it difficult to allocate resources efficiently, further delaying necessary sustainment projects.
GAO’s Recommendations
GAO has issued over 100 recommendations to improve military readiness, but most remain unimplemented. Some of the most urgent recommendations include:
- Enhancing sustainment planning to prevent maintenance backlogs for aircraft, ships, and ground equipment.
- Expanding recruitment and retention efforts to address personnel shortages in key roles.
- Improving budget transparency so Congress can better allocate resources to critical readiness initiatives.
- Developing better risk assessment frameworks for cyber and space-based threats.
Why It Matters
With rising global tensions and increasing threats from China, Russia, and other adversaries, maintaining a ready and capable military force is more critical than ever. If the U.S. does not address these readiness gaps, it risks falling behind in key warfighting capabilities.
Addressing GAO’s recommendations would strengthen national security, improve military efficiency, and ensure that the U.S. remains prepared for future conflicts.
Read the full GAO report here.