Army Totally Blanks Out on Congressional Report

In one of its more bizarre reports, the Government Accountability Office said Monday that the Army totally lost it when it came time to furnish Congress information required in the 2011 National Defense Authorization Act and instead provided information required in the 2007 Act.

Both the 2007 and 2011 laws require the Army to provide Congress with updates on the service's force transformation process, in which the service is shifting its focus from maintaining large divisions to equipping and staffing smaller, modular brigades. The 2011 law required the Army to provide details on "how modular combat, functional, and support forces will train, be sustained, and fight, as required by the current law."

When the Army filed its force restructuring report last September the GAO said it followed the reporting requirements in the 2007 Defense bill, not the 2011 legislation. Why? "Army officials responsible for developing the mandated report said that they did not address the amended requirements because they were not aware of the changes in the legislation. Army officials attributed this oversight to internal miscommunication," the GAO said.

As someone who has spent the better part of the past three decades slogging through Defense bills, I can easily understand how the Army zoned out on the differences in language between the two bills.

Besides, as well all know, members of Congress rarely read the legislation they pass or the thousands of reports they demand.