Pentagon Finds Ammunition Assistance Calculation Errors Up To IDR 32.6 Trillion Missiles For Ukraine

US Marine air patrols above the Pentagon. (Wikimedia Commons/US Marine Corps/Lance Cpl. Brian R. Domzalski)

JAKARTA - The United States Department of Defense (Pentagon) found an additional error worth US$2 billion (Rp32,612,300,000,000) in its calculations for ammunition, missiles and other equipment sent to Ukraine, increasing the improper material value to a total of 8.2 billion US dollars (Rp133,710,430,000,000), according to a US Government report on Thursday.

The US Department of Defense has faced challenges in accurately assessing defense items sent to Ukraine due to unclear accounting definitions, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

In 2023, the Pentagon said its staff used "substitutional values" instead of "twisting values" to generate billions of material sent to Ukraine. The $6.2 billion error created a way for billions to be sent to Kyiv, cited from Reuters July 26.

The Pentagon told GAO since then, more than $2 billion has been found in excess. As a result, an additional $2 billion worth of weapons could be sent to Ukraine to cover up the amount of aid approved by the Biden administration.

GAO said the unclear definition of value in the Foreign Aid Act and the absence of a special assessment guide for the Presidential Withdrawal Authority had caused inconsistencies in the reported value of military aid.

In one example cited in the GAO report, 10 vehicles were priced at 7,050,000 US dollars when supporting documentation showed that the vehicles should have been valued at zero, the net book value.

GAO has recommended that Congress clarify the definition of value in the context of defense articles under the Presidential Withdrawal Authority.

Additionally, GAO has issued seven recommendations to the Department of Defense, urging them to update its guidance by including a special assessment section of the PDA and developing a component-specific assessment procedure. The Department of Defense said it had approved all recommendations and outlined actions to address the issue.