Equipping the Reserve Components of the Armed Services: Summary of Findings and Recommendations

Publication Date: January 1997

Publisher: RAND Corporation

Author(s): John Y. Schrader; Leslie Lewis; Roger Allen Brown; William W. Taylor

Research Area: Military and defense

Type: Brief

Abstract:

Reserve Components (RC) equipping has become increasingly of concern over the last 20 years, both as the nature of prospective military operations have changed and as technology has advanced. Different types of operations, for example, require different mixes and amounts of equipment. Further, each service uses, structures, mixes, and equips its active and reserve forces differently from the others. This study researched service policies and procedures to establish a descriptive baseline of the way RCs are to be equipped. It included both a top-down review effort that describes the process in each of the military services and a bottom-up assessment of selected items of equipment using a case study methodology to determine the effectiveness of these policies and to identify any systemic problems affecting execution. Finally, it provides an overall assessment of identified equipping problems and makes recommendations for improvement.