U.S. Army Spc. Sirena Sanchez guards a launcher at the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missile site Excalibur in Dededo, Guam on Sept. 21, 2024.
Guam National Guard/The Guam Daily Post photo
HAGÅTÑA (The Guam Daily Post) — A new report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office indicates there are more challenges facing the proposed missile defense system for the island.
The report also includes never before publicly released information about the system’s deployment timeline.
The 42-page report was released May 22 to U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, chair of the House Committee on Armed Services, and is titled “Missile Defense: DOD Faces Support Challenges for Defense of Guam.”
According to the report, as of August 2024, the Department of Defense had plans to distribute elements of an enhanced missile defense system known as the Guam Defense System, or GDS, across 16 sites on Guam.
The DOD plans to deploy the new GDS elements in phases, with the first deployment beginning in fiscal 2027 and the final GDS elements arriving by fiscal 2032, the report stated.
The Defense department will deploy this way to incrementally increase missile defense capability in Guam, according to the GAO.
It also said that a map showing the proposed locations on Guam for these missile defense elements as of August 2024 was omitted because DOD classified the map as secret.
For the report to the House Armed Services Committee, the GAO said its purpose was twofold: to assess the extent to which DOD has developed an organizational structure for overseeing and sustaining the GDS, and plans for supporting future missile defense units in Guam.
The GAO said the Defense department designated the U.S. Army as the service acquisition executive for the system, and the undersecretary of the Navy as the lead senior defense official for Guam.
But the GAO also found that while DOD has established an organizational structure to oversee and sustain the GDS, “there are unresolved challenges that could hamper the success of DOD’s efforts.”
The GAO found that:
DOD lacks a strategy that outlines how and when responsibilities for operating and sustaining GDS elements will transfer to their lead organizations.
The Army does not have a long-term strategy for integrating with the other military services in Guam to coordinate Army construction and installation support needed to support GDS and personnel.
The GAO recommend that the secretary of Defense:
• Direct relevant military components to develop strategies with a timeline and a plan for transferring responsibilities to lead organizations,
• Integrate the Army with bases in Guam, and
• Determine personnel requirements and deployment schedules for GDS personnel.
Another recommendation was classified as “secret” and was not included in the unclassified release.
The GAO said DOD concurred with all four of its recommendations.
