A new Government Accountability Office (GAO) report estimates the Defense Department’s deferred facility-maintenance requirement reached $285 billion in FY2025.
That’s significant.
(Nov. 16, 2016) A recruit from Division 902 stands by for final results on her Physical Fitness Assessment and running chip verification that electronically tracks their 1.5-mile run on Nov. 16 at Recruit Training Command. The final PFA is the third physical test administered to recruits and is their official assessment that determines their eligibility for graduation. About 38,000 recruits graduate annually from the Navy’s only boot camp. (U.S. Navy photo by Chief Petty Officer Seth Schaeffer/Released)
In fact, it’s more than double the $137 billion backlog reported for FY2020—an increase of over 100 percent in just five years.
The scale of the problem is better understood when you consider the Pentagon’s physical footprint: the Department of Defense has more than 736,000 facilities worldwide, most of which aren’t merely headquarters and barracks, but airfields and hangars, shipyards and waterfront facilities, ammunition storage, training ranges, maintenance depots, warehouses, power and utility infrastructure, hospitals, and housing barracks.
About one-third of these 700,000-plus buildings are more than 50 years old, and the bill for an infrastructure refresh is due.
191009-N-WB795-1126 GREAT LAKES, Ill. (Oct. 9, 2019) Electronics Technician 1st Class Troy Kruyer performs the push-ups portion of the physical readiness test inside Pacific Fleet Drill Hall at Recruit Training Command. More than 35,000 recruits train annually at the Navy’s only boot camp. (U.S. Navy photo by Chief Mass Communication Specialist Brandie Nix/Released)
Mounting Backlog
How did the backlog reach $285 billion? GAO says the services have been funding roughly 80 percent of their facility sustainment requirements.
The Defense Department’s own target is 90 percent.
And that seemingly modest 10-percentage-point gap compounds enormously when you consider the hundreds of thousands of buildings in the Pentagon’s possession.
Deferred maintenance also isn’t financially neutral.
If you ignore a roof leak today, for example, it can lead to water intrusion, which leads to mold, which can damage electrical systems, require structural repairs, and eventually lead to a wider replacement.
That same logic of cascading problems applies to HVAC, plumbing, electrical distribution, pavement, corrosion, and water systems.
It’s the same with your car: when you defer cheap maintenance, it can become an expensive project down the line.
This logic holds especially for infrastructure, which becomes more expensive to maintain as it ages.
GAO encountered buildings at Twentynine Palms, for example, that were more than 80 years old.
Part of one was slated for demolition because it had tested positive for mold and asbestos. Reportedly, staff in the parts of the building still in use had to supply their own air filters.
The Manpower Problem
Money isn’t the only bottleneck for the infrastructure refresher. GAO found installations struggling to hire and retain the skilled maintenance personnel needed for upgrades.
The problem was particularly severe, understandably, at remote installations where the local labor pool is small. Electricians, plumbers, HVAC technicians, construction workers, engineers, utility specialists—these people can be hard to find when you’re outside of US metropolitan centers.
Guam, for example: Andersen Air Force Base and Naval Base Guam have used the H-2B visa program to supplement their workforce with foreign nationals, including workers from the Philippines.
This problem highlights a limitation to the Pentagon’s expansion. Congress can appropriate billions, but money cannot instantly generate the electricians and welders needed for infrastructure upgrades.
Prioritizing Barracks
The barracks are where soldiers live, so problems there are especially consequential. Troops can end up living with mold, failing HVAC, or plumbing problems in these deteriorating buildings.
Poor living conditions deeply affect morale, retention, recruiting, health, family satisfaction, and confidence in leadership.
It’s not a superficial concern; it’s a vital interest that soldiers and sailors are properly housed. And from a purely practical standpoint, the services spend enormous amounts recruiting and training specialized personnel.
Losing an experienced specialist because the plumbing in their barracks was faulty has downstream effects that are more expensive than fixing the plumbing up front.
Congress has warned for years that poor facilities damage recruitment and retention. Now GAO is reinforcing that concern.
Infrastructure Equals Power
Our modern military depends heavily on fixed infrastructure.
For example, an aircraft doesn’t just need a 10,000-foot runway; it likely also needs hardened maintenance facilities, electrical power, secure communications, fuel storage and distribution, ammunition handling, climate control, electronics maintenance, and spare parts warehouses—the list goes on.
Naval power is similar: it doesn’t depend only on ships, but on dry docks, cranes, shore power, maintenance shops, fuel infrastructure, etc.
The installation is effectively the weapon system behind the weapon systems.
Deferred maintenance inevitably creates a readiness problem if it goes on long enough.
The problem will be especially acute in the Indo-Pacific, where the US operates from geographically dispersed installations.
This means a dependency on more locations.
If these installations are not properly maintained, it could have negative ramifications in a combat scenario.
About the Author: Harrison Kass
Harrison Kass is a writer and attorney focused on national security, technology, and political culture. His work has appeared in Tablet, City Journal, The Hill, The Spectator, and The Cipher Brief. He holds a JD from the University of Oregon and a master’s in Global & Joint Program Studies from NYU. More at harrisonkass.com.
