Under the guise of "acquisition reform," the proposal would repeal a Department of Defense requirement to submit quarterly "Selected Acquisition Reports" that provide cost, schedule and performance information on major Pentagon weapons systems;

• The proposal would reduce oversight of the nation's multi-billion-dollar national missile defense program, granting the Missile Defense Agency spending authority reaching far beyond that of any other federal agency (to learn more see POGO's report "Big Dreams Still Need Oversight: Missile Defense Testing and Financial Accountability Are Being Circumvented");
  
  
• The proposal would eliminate a requirement that the DoD notify Congress of significant cost increases in major weapons programs - known as Nunn-McCurdy breaches; and
  
  
• It also would do away with a reporting requirement that the Pentagon inform Congress when it leases major equipment. This request comes at a time when the Air Force is considering an overpriced multi-billion-dollar lease of 100 Boeing tanker aircraft (to learn more see POGO's report "Fill 'Er Up: Back-Door Deal for Boeing Will Leave the Taxpayer on Empty").
  

"Without a number of these important reporting requirements, Congress will be blindfolded. These reports enable Congress to fulfill its Constitutional responsibility to oversee Pentagon spending. They also ensure that the taxpayers and servicemen and women are protected from waste, fraud, and abuse," said Eric Miller, Senior Investigator of the Project On Government Oversight (POGO). POGO has opposed these provisions which would cede Congressional authority to the Pentagon at a time when more, not less, vigorous oversight and analysis of its spending and programs is needed (see POGO's Letter to House Armed Services Committee on 2004 Defense Authorization).

The letter's authors are Representatives Henry Waxman (CA), Ike Skelton (MO), David Obey (WI), and John M. Spratt, Jr. (SC), the ranking members respectively of the four committees overseeing the Pentagon: the Government Reform Committee, the Committee on Armed Services, the Committee on Appropriations, and the Committee on the Budget.

POGO investigates, exposes, and seeks to remedy systemic abuses of power, mismanagement, and subservience by the federal government to powerful special interests. Founded in 1981, POGO is a politically-independent, nonprofit watchdog that strives to promote a government that is accountable to the citizenry.

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