The Army's current plan to equip and reset the force is ahead of schedule. With the entire $17.1 billion supplemental allocated by Congress at the beginning of fiscal year 2007, the Army has obligated $9.8 billion for reset-$4 billion has gone for depot and field-level repair, while $5.8 billion has been allocated for new procurements.
After the Sept. 29 signing of the bridge supplement, the Army moved at unprecedented speed to distribute funding; both operations & maintenance and procurement funds were released within six days of receipt. The rapid release of those funds allowed the Army to front load new procurements within the initial 90 days of the fiscal year. The majority of procurement funding will be obligated by Feb 07. The Army will spend the entire $17.1B before the end of FY 07.
The Army has moved rapidly to restore battle losses and repair equipment through an aggressive reset program, despite entering the long war against global terrorism $56 billion short of equipment, as Army senior leaders have testified before Congress.
Additionally, the Army has had to quickly equip the Reserve Component as it transitioned from a strategic reserve to an operational force in meeting warfighting requirements. The Reserve Component has historically been under funded in its equipping and modernization programs.
Across the country, Army depots, program managers and headquarter staffs are expediting the reset plan. Depots' temporary and permanent workforces are increasing, further demonstrating the Army's unprecedented agility and flexibility in order to stay ahead of the dynamic and rapidly changing requirements of a ground force at war in some of the harshest conditions in the world.
To do that, the Army, with its industry partners, has implemented several initiatives to acquire, field, maintain, or reset thousands of pieces of equipment to include:
- Up-armored HMMWVs
- Rapid Equipping Force and Rapid Fielding Initiatives
- Aviation Survivability Equipment
- Radios
- Night Vision devices
- M4 Carbine rifles
- Improvised Explosive Device jamming devices
- Fragmentary armor kits
- Helicopters and tracked vehicles
All timelines in the Army's plan have been designed with a full appreciation of our unit rotation timelines and continued changing requirements from theater. The plan executes reset in synchronization with unit training and deployment schedules.
To ensure continued, rapid execution of our reset program, proper management and oversight procedures are in place. The Army remains committed to and has applied resources aggressively to maintain the best trained, the best equipped, fully manned and best led ground force in the world.
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For more information, please contact Paul Boyce at (703) 697-2564.
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