The Pentagon is failing in its goal of accounting for all the money it's spending, despite a deadline from Congress that it becomes auditable and totally financially accountable by 2017. The Marine Corps has lost track of around $800 million it already spent, according to NBC News.
The financial shortcomings were discovered recently in a report conducted by the Government Accountability Office. "Defense dishes out over $500 billion a year, yet still can't tell the people where all the money is going," Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) said, NBC News reported. Every other federal agency maintains accountability for the money it spends.
The Pentagon is famous for its secrets, but how this organization spends federal tax dollars isn't necessarily classified information.
This budget imbalance is particularly embarrassing, because it was announced previously that the Marine Corps did account for all the money it received in 2012. Now that celebration has become an embarrassment, as the auditor's office reversed this announcement to declare an $800 million gap in the books instead, according to NASDAQ.
The Pentagon spent $26.5 billion this July, according to Tell Me News. These funds went into hiring IT specialists to work with military intelligence, upgrading the Pentagon's Defense Healthcare Management System and developing new Navy robots, among other projects.
