The AP's analysis reported some of the lost guns are stolen and later utilized in violent street crimes, while others have disappeared without a clue in the military's tremendous distribution chains.
Overall, AP identified at 1,900 firearms the four armed services listed as stolen or lost through the 2010s. Because a number of those service branches supplied incomplete info -- or none whatsoever -- that complete is a specific undercount.
In a declaration, Milley's spokesman said the chairman would research overhauling the way the services monitor and protected weapons. Milley"would love to think about a systematic fix later on at which the responsibility of the capacity to track and question those numbers is accurate and simplified," said Col. Dave Butler.
Four senators have publicly voiced worries because AP printed Tuesday.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., has been the latest to question military officers during a Capitol Hill look. Citing a case where automatic assault rifles were stolen from an Army base and offered to a California street gang, Feinstein requested Milley in Thursday's hearing what the army is doing to ensure"there are not any issues like this and weapons are well fastened."
Milley responded he had requested the leaders of every armed service to perform a deep dive in their amounts. He said the first information they've given him indicates the amount of lost weapons is"less" than that which AP reported. The AP derived its statistics from documents furnished by the service divisions, such as criminal investigations, lost land types and information in small arms registries, in addition to internal memos AP obtained.
"I want to square the equilibrium . I owe you a firm response," Milley informed Feinstein.
His spokesman, Butler, elaborated:"Though we can not yet check the numbers reported by AP, the chairman considers that this is just another illustration of the free press shining a light on the essential subjects we must get right"
Leading officials with the Army, Marines and Secretary of Defense's office have stated missing weapons aren't a prevalent problem and mentioned that the amount is a very small fraction of their army's stockpile.
Before publication of this AP's evaluation, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby stated in an interview which the armed services may account for 99.999percent of the several million guns.
Lawmakers' focus so much was a brand new reporting requirement, not systematic reform.
The Pentagon was used to discuss yearly updates regarding stolen weapons with Congress, however, the need to do this finished years back, seemingly in fiscal year 1994.
One of the several hundred lost guns that AP recognized during succeeding years was a stolen Army pistol that police linked to shootings at New York. Other instances included weapons components an Army insider caused the Texas-Mexico boundary to market.
On Thursday, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., stated he intended to write a"compulsory reporting requirement" to the National Defense Authorization Act which Congress is drawing this summer.
, have said they'd be looking into concerns raised by the coverage.
The AP's evaluation, which commenced in 2011, is the very first public accounting of its type in years, in part because neither the Department of Defense nor the armed services are needed to inform the general public about AWOL firearms.
The Army, the largest of the military agencies, and Air Force couldn't easily provide information to the AP on the number of weapons were stolen or lost by 2010 through 2019.
