WASHINGTON, Dec. 6 (UPI) — A new report said officials at the Department of Defense suppressed an internal study that documented $125 billion in waste over fears Congress would cut its budget.
The Washington Post on Monday reported the administrative study issued in January 2015 by the advisory Defense Business Board said the Pentagon could save $125 billion over the next five years if it undertook a series of reforms.
The study provided a “clear path” for the Pentagon to save money by streamlining bureaucracy through attrition and early retirements, by utilizing information technology more efficiently and by lowering the use of high-priced contractors. The study said nearly a quarter of the Pentagon’s $580 billion budget was spent on operations such as accounting, human resources, logistics and property management
The study also found the Pentagon was paying just over 1 million contractors, civilian employees and uniformed personnel who worked in desk jobs. There are 1.3 million U.S. troops on active duty, including 298,000 who work desk jobs.
“They’re all complaining that they don’t have any money,” former Defense Business Board chairman Robert Stein told The Washington Post. “We proposed a way to save a ton of money.”
Defense Department spokesman Peter Cook told Fox News the study “had limited value” because it “lacked specific, actionable recommendations appropriate to the department.”
The Pentagon said it did implement changes that would save an estimated $30 billion by 2020, but The Washington Post reported most of those programs were previously planned and unrelated to the study.
