The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a report detailing the shortcomings used in the selection process when relocating U.S. Space Command to Colorado instead of Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville.
In January 2021, the Secretary of the Air Force identified the Redstone Arsenal site in Huntsville as the top choice for the SPACECOM headquarters. The recommendation for the site was then affirmed by the Inspector General's Office and the GAO, both of which found that the Air Force had conducted an accurate analysis and Huntsville was the superior location.
However, on July 31, 2023, then-President Joe Biden reversed the decision to locate SPACECOM in Huntsville and instead selected a location in Colorado.
SEE: Alabama's federal delegation blasts Biden's decision to keep Space Command in Colorado Springs
While President Donald Trump and his Alabama allies have vowed that the current administration would revert Space Command to Redstone, no official announcement has been made.
On Thursday, GOA released a comprehensive report on its findings from investigating the Air Force's selection process, claiming it found shortcomings in the military wing's failure to follow so-called "Analysis of Alternatives" (AOA) best practices.
Goa by Craig Monger on Scribd
GOA claims the Air Force failed to incorporate three of the four characteristics of the AOA process: comprehensiveness, being well-documented, being credible and being unbiased.
"GAO believes that the AOA best practices are relevant and, if effectively implemented, can help ensure such basing decisions are transparent and deliberate," the report reads. "Developing basing guidance consistent with these best practices, and determining the basing actions to which it should apply, would better position the Air Force to substantiate future basing decisions and help prevent bias, or the appearance of bias, from undermining their credibility."
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