GAO Report “Defense Analysis: Additional Actions Could Enhance DOD’s Wargaming Efforts”

GAO-23-105351 was released on April 24, 2023 and is available online.

The GAO study team:

“identified steps DOD takes to ensure quality wargames. However, DOD stores wargame information in systems that don’t share data with others, which hinders collaboration. Also, none of the five military services have established standard education or qualifications for their wargamers.”

Furthermore, GAO states that

“Organizations within DOD and external providers—such as federally-funded research centers and contractors—provide wargames. But DOD hasn’t assessed the risks of relying on external providers.”

GAO made 10 recommendations for executive action (with which the DOD concurred). In addition to the Full Report (PDF), the report webpage includes the list of recommendations along with updates about what actions the DOD might take in response to each recommendation. This latter will be interesting to monitor!