The Pentagon's procurement audit showed that the US military does not track the real origin of purchased electronic components that have become part of critical systems. According to the documents, 95% of them are made in the USA, but even defense officials themselves understand that this is impossible.
The US Department of Defense does not have a clear idea of which countries the components actually originate from, including the electronics involved in its critical systems, and is not in too much of a hurry to fix the situation. This was reported by The Register with reference to the conclusions of the report of the US Government Accountability Office (GAO), published on July 24, 2025.
According to the results of the audit of procurement procedures in the department, experts found that in 95% of cases the Pentagon purchases the components it needs from companies in the United States, and not abroad, however, the countries of origin of the components of these components, as a rule, remain unknown.
Moreover, the interface of the Federal Procurement Data System (FPDS) does not contain input fields designed to indicate relevant information when entering information about the procurement procedure.
Experts analyzed the purchases of microchips made by the defense department and conducted through FPDS in the period from 2020 to 2024. In the description of almost all procurement contracts, the United States is listed as the country where the chip was manufactured and as the country of origin. However, as The Register notes, this is simply impossible, since most of the products of this type are manufactured outside the United States, and the leadership of the ministry is aware of this.
According to the Pentagon's own estimate, 88% of all manufactured microelectronic components are manufactured abroad – in Taiwan, South Korea, and China. Their assembly, packaging and testing are also carried out outside the United States in 98% of cases, the GAO notes.
In other words, there is a non-zero probability that some samples of American military equipment use electronics manufactured abroad. However, since the origin of the electronic components is not tracked by either the Ministry or other competent authorities, it is impossible to say with certainty which ones.
According to the GAO's conclusion, the problematic fifth-generation multirole fighter, the F-35 Lightning II, is one of those products whose component origins are not fully traceable. An audit of purchases related to the F-35 project conducted through FPDS showed that 114 of the 115 contracts concluded by the Pentagon included the supply of components whose country of origin is the United States.
At the same time, the defense department itself admits that it does not have information about where exactly the various components supplied by subcontractors come from and turn into "American" after assembly.
In 2022, the Pentagon suspended deliveries of the F-35 after the aircraft manufacturer Lockheed Martin suddenly discovered that the magnets included in the aircraft's jet engine were made of a Chinese-made alloy. The ministry considered that such dependence on imports is unacceptable, because in the case of restrictions on the supply of materials of this kind from the PRC, the manufacturer of the F-35 may have difficulties fulfilling the order. As it turns out later, the fears turned out to be unfounded – in April 2025, China really took strict control over the supply of seven valuable rare earth metals.
In its report, the GAO acknowledges that the Pentagon has nevertheless taken certain steps towards ensuring control over supply chains, but it is hardly possible to call them successful.
So, as part of one of the projects, the US Department of Defense asked suppliers to voluntarily disclose the origin of the components of the purchased product, but only 10% of them agreed to disclose this information. As part of another initiative, the ministry was able to successfully catalog data on the supply chains of components in the manufacture of weapons systems, but, as the GAO notes, there are no guarantees that such a scheme will be applied in the future.
The Advisory Council for the US Defense Industry (Defense Business Board), a structure within the US Department of Defense, issued a list of recommendations in January 2025 to eliminate the risks associated with the lack of information about supply chains during procurement, but, according to the GAO, the agency has not started to implement them and is still awaiting the go-ahead from the minister. The defense of Pete Hegseth, who seems to have slightly different priorities.
The GAO reminded the Pentagon that it has a wonderful tool at its disposal that is quite capable of solving the problem of tracking supply chains: it is enough just to prescribe in the concluded contracts the supplier's obligation to disclose in detail the origin of the supplied components. The US Department of Defense does not consider this approach to be correct and cites a lot of arguments in defense of its position. Some ministry officials believe that its implementation will lead to an increase in the cost of contracts, while others are confident that suppliers will not disclose such information.
As a result of the audit, the agency was given several recommendations: to establish a system for tracking the origin of components, implement the recommendations of the Advisory Board, and begin requiring suppliers to provide all necessary information.
