Aimee Bower

Air Force members who do not routinely cross a defended perimeter when deployed may not have received sufficient training for doing so when they need to. The authors conducted surveys and interviews to determine the kinds of experiences airmen have had "outside the wire," worked with subject-matter experts to categorize them and suggest training levels, and developed a series of recommendations for course content and further areas for study.

RAND Arroyo Center evaluated potential logistics applications for unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) to determine whether they are technically feasible, operationally feasible, and more cost-effective than other options. The study identified six factors that could be used to compare UAS and non-UAS based solutions to logistics tasks. The study uncovered significant potential for logistics applications of these systems in the near- and long-term future.

Combat Support Hospitals, when not deployed, keep a partial set of equipment at home station with the remainder in long-term storage, a strategy that has created maintenance and obsolescence challenges. This briefing describes a new strategy for configuring home station equipment sets and proposes that deploying CSHs eliminate much of the unit-owned equipment currently in long-term storage, actions that will sharply reduce total equipment costs.

The Air Force typically trains 30,000 to 40,000 new airmen a year. It utilizes two methods for training enlistees: centralized initial skills training ("schoolhouse" training) and decentralized on-the-job training. The authors develop a methodology to determine the most cost-effective combination of the two, based on a cost-benefit analysis of seven Air Force specialties.

Using a case study based on the Army's Stryker Brigade Combat team, the authors explore how the Army might improve its ability to contribute to prompt global power projection, that is, strategically responsive early-entry forces for time-critical events.

The Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS) provides finance and accounting services to customers within the Department of Defense. The authors examine the DFAS pricing structure and its impact on customer demand, the agency's workload, and equity in pricing. The authors found that the DFAS's uniform pricing for finance outputs creates cross-customer subsidization, suggesting a need for nonlinear, customer-specific pricing. The authors also examine whether any negative effects arose from the October 1999 switch from unit billing to hourly billing for DFAS accounting work and found no significant evidence that they had.