[CPEO-MEF] Munitions Action Plan released

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

United States Department of Defense 
News Release
On the web:

http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Apr2002/b04242002_bt202-02.html 
Media contact: media@defenselink.mil or +1 (703) 697-5131 
Public contact: public@defenselink.mil or +1 (703) 428-0711 

No. 202-02 
IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
April 24, 2002 

DOD RELEASES MUNITIONS ACTION PLAN

The Department of Defense today announced the release of the Munitions
Action Plan, a critical element of the Pentagon's ongoing commitment to
the readiness of America's men and women in uniform and effective
stewardship of the environment. 

The goal of the plan is to provide a comprehensive and consistent
approach to managing military munitions across the munitions life cycle.
DoD leadership will use the plan to protect and enhance force readiness,
maximize explosive safety and minimize the environmental impact of
military weapons. "Equipping and training our armed forces with the
right munitions -- for the right mission, at the right time -- is
central to our ability to fight and win the nation's wars," said Deputy
Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz. "Implementing the Munitions Action
Plan will improve munitions management and is an important step in our
efforts to address the challenges to force readiness." 

The plan applies only to conventional military munitions and contains 29
specific objectives that are designed to result in faster, better and
more cost-effective accomplishments of common goals for the military
during what is referred to as the "munitions life cycle." 

The "munitions life cycle" consists of five phases: 

   Acquiring and producing munitions 
   Using munitions on test and training ranges 
   Managing the stockpile of military munitions 
   Demilitarizing (making into scrap) excess, obsolete or unserviceable
munitions 
   Dealing with munitions left on ranges no longer operational 

Created by DoD's Operational and Environmental Executive Committee for
Munitions, comments and input from the public regulators were considered
in the plan's earliest development stages. The plan has been distributed
to a wide variety of public and regulatory stakeholders whose input will
be reflected in future, updated versions of the document. Full text of
the Munitions Action Plan may be found at
https://www.denix.osd.mil/mapcrd. 

-- 


Lenny Siegel
Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
c/o PSC, 278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org

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