Demand for exquisite munitions has skyrocketed as conflicts in Iran and Ukraine — and an ever-tense Indo-Pacific — continue to redefine stockpile demand.

So, too, has there developed an insatiable market for cheap systems and interceptors capable of balancing scales that, in regions like the Middle East, have been encumbered by cost-per-kill ratios as lopsided as 114-1 — in the case of a PAC-3 interceptor versus a Shahed-136 drone.

If that weren’t enough to consider, there’s the lightning-quick speed of AI integration and unmanned systems into formations, and the reality of having to rethink a simple concept — hiding — that was seldom given a second thought due to the total air superiority of the Global War on Terror.

Such frenzied developments, meanwhile, come against a backdrop of new Pentagon policy that aims to eliminate the antiquated red tape of the acquisition process and speed development to the battlefield.

A daunting cluster of problems to solve, no doubt. But if encountering such a catalog of to-dos is stress-inducing, one would not know it when speaking to U.S. Army Under Secretary Mike Obadal, who finds himself at the center of many of these discussions.

From his office and out on the trail, Obadal oversees the service’s business operations, acquisition strategy, and manpower and personnel systems, among myriad other duties.

Obadal assumed the position after a stint in the private sector, which followed a military career that included time as a Special Operations officer, the status of Master Army Aviator and qualifications in nine different aircraft.

Obadal spoke to Military Times about how he and the Army are approaching these seismic shifts in warfighting philosophy, and how this year’s AUSA exposition reflects the blistering pace of innovation that catalyzes them.

There are many examples of individuals without military experience working in consequential positions within the Pentagon. You are not one. How has your military experience shaped how you approach this role?

What I try very hard to do is not let my experience drive the way I do things. I want it to inform the way I do things, whether that’s my experience working with the interagency and seeing how other executive branch agencies operate, my experience in the conventional military or in other parts of the military, doing joint work, working with partners and allies or going out into corporate America.

I don’t want any one of those things to be the driver of how I make decisions and conduct myself in the business of the Army, but I do want all of it to come together and inform it.

So, it’s certainly very helpful for me when I talk to soldiers or when I look at programs or weapon systems.

The biggest thing it helps me with is understanding that there’s no single weapon system that operates by itself anywhere. They are all part of a joint force, and within that, you have a maneuver Army that is reliant — tanks are reliant on infantry, infantry is reliant on fires, all of it is reliant on aviation, medical and logistics.

All those components work together as a chain, and you have to make sure every link in the chain is as strong as possible.

That’s one of the biggest things that I take away from being in the military: an understanding that all of these things have to work in synergy, and there are no easy solutions.

We continue to watch the conflicts in Ukraine and Iran unfold. What do you expect to see at an event like AUSA that reflects what America has learned from them?

If you walk around the hall at AUSA, it’ll give you a good indication of the Army’s priorities. Our priorities are reflected in what we’re procuring.

Going back several years, when we were in the Middle East and we first saw adversary drones — counter-drone systems became a really important topic. It kind of started in the special operations and then expanded into the larger Army.

Ukraine has not just reinforced that counter-UAS is a critical part of operations today; it’s cemented it.

So, if you walk around AUSA, you’re going to see an immense number of not only drones but also counter-UAS. That’s a reflection of the procurement and the budget, not just in the Army but in the Pentagon.

That’s number one. Number two is software. Being able to see, sense and integrate to understand what your positional advantage is, and understand the adversary and their vulnerabilities.

That’s just military operations, but today it’s looking at how we apply the best sensors and best software to bring all of that together to give decision advantage to our commanders.

The third one is fires, and when you look at current conflicts, the importance of long-range precision fires is highlighted.

So, what you’ll also see at the conference is a reflection of our investment portfolio in our magazine depth, but also the variety of munitions.

Expanding out the optionality that commanders have beyond just one or two exquisite munitions, with everything from longer-range artillery, one-way attack and loitering munitions, up into our higher-end missiles.

All of those represent our fires portfolio, but that’s just for offensive operations. When we get into the defensive side, we’ll be seeing everything from ballistic missiles down to Group One drones.

If you look at those three areas — drones and counter-UAS; software and sensors; and the fires portfolio — and were to roll back the clock to AUSA 10 years ago, the difference is remarkable.

At that time, the focus was very vehicle-centric, armor-centric, pieces of kit for individual soldiers. All of those things are important and are continuing to advance, but these newer investment areas represent a noticeable shift in warfare.

These conflicts are obviously influencing the speed of acquisition. But that process includes an emphasis on both cost-friendly and exquisite munition stockpiles. What is the best balance to ensure success?

The conflicts are definitely influencing and accelerating the way the Army — and certainly the broader Department — are innovating, prototyping, procuring and then fielding different capabilities.

If you were to roll back a decade or even less, you would see very traditional models that go from experimentation into writing an initial requirement document, then into prototyping, then selection, then low-rate production and then finally into fielding and high-rate production.

That’s years long. That process is very deliberate, and it built our military to where it is today, which is still the most dominant, but with a number of vulnerabilities because of technical innovation in the commercial market that adversaries are able to take advantage of.

So, where can we compress this cycle and get it more into a process where we ask the commercial industry to experiment on their dime?

A lot of this has to do with private capital being interested in the defense market. They’re making a bet that they can get through some of the experimentation, and then we can follow on with prototyping and quickly get into low-rate and high-rate production before fielding.

Fielding then allows us to get immediate feedback that goes back into industry. That is essentially what had to happen in Ukraine because it’s existential to them.

So, when we say wartime footing, Ukraine is on the ultimate wartime footing, and there are lessons to draw from there. What are the unnecessary steps in the acquisition process? Where can you smartly accept risk?

Probably one of the biggest drivers of speeding things up is acknowledging that we’re willing to accept risk. We know that if we get a tighter innovation cycle, we’re accepting more risk on the battlefield, but we’re also driving down risk on the battlefield because we’re getting it to them much sooner.

So, then we get into how that translates to fires. Exquisite versus low cost. It’s a balance, or a high-low mix, essentially, where we have to have both offensive and defensive exquisite weapons.

We have to have certain stockpiles to be able to counter the exquisite weapons of our adversaries and have our own effects. Then you get into mass, which comes when we start going beyond the first few days of a conflict, and we’re in protraction. We have to have affordable mass. The cost curve needs to come back in our favor.

While balancing the above, how much of a difference has the surge in domestic manufacturing made in having these pre-positioned elements assisting efforts?

A massive difference.

The Infantry Squad Vehicle is a perfect example. That’s a Chevy Colorado chassis; the drivetrain and suspension are a little different, but it’s nothing unusual.

Essentially, it then goes to a detailer that puts the military-specific equipment on top of it. It’s everything that we need it to be.

As with anything, it has its vulnerabilities. We’re sacrificing heavy armor and survivability, which we needed throughout the GWOT years, for mobility, transportability and ease of repair.

But using this model also allows us to sustain it far more easily because so many of the components are commercial.

It especially matters when you get into keeping the ISV — or domestically made equipment — in the decades ahead and needing improvements over the years. With the ISV, as Chevy makes improvements to its chassis and drivetrain, that immediately feeds back into the production line of ISVs.

So, we’re now getting upgrades that are just byproducts of the commercial market.

With acquisition, there’s a major emphasis on AI. What are you discussing with tech companies to ensure the human-in-the-loop element equates to maintaining final say despite the speed of the tech?

Every company that deals with this emerging technology and the military is of the same mindset, which is that the human-in-the-loop factor has to be the default.

There are workflows and cycles that human commanders can say, “I need this to run in the background, and I don’t need to see it or be on it.” But when it comes to kinetic kill chains and making decisions on the battlefield, the workflows that enable commanders have to have very hard stops.

It’s not just a commander saying yes or no. It’s far more complicated and nuanced. It’s presenting options based on a tremendous amount of computing analysis and saying, “Here are all the courses of action based on the priorities that you gave, based on the environmental factors that the agents have been able to ingest and all of the long-term planning that goes into it.

That allows the commanders to then take highly complex tasks like mission planning and distill it down into areas where they can consume it more easily, and then apply what only humans can do, which is context and reason.

That context and reason part is what the tech companies that work with us are very focused on enabling, as opposed to taking over entire workflows.

Autonomy is important, really, in three areas when it comes to warfighting.

Think about combat breaching. That’s one of the most dangerous things we ask a human to do: to breach a linear minefield or barrier. If we can automate that, that removes something inherently dangerous.

The second is highly complex, like command and control. How do you distill what would take human staff officers hours or days into seconds, and give a commander not only several options, but the analysis behind it and the confidence in the product being presented?

The third is the ability to remove repetitive and mundane things human soldiers are doing. Resupplying via trucks, for instance. If we can automate that, we are removing that task from our logistics soldiers and allowing them to apply their talents to solving real problems with a clear vision and mindset.

Beyond weapon systems, something as simple as staging — or hiding — equipment or personnel requires a vastly different strategy than even 10 years ago. How does something as simple as saying, “How do we hide this helo?” impact your conversations with industry?

It’s not something that we’ve had to truly consider as an Army for 40 or 50 years because we were guaranteed air superiority.

We don’t have air superiority at this point because of long-range fires and precision targeting from space.

So, you go back to dispersion, displacement of assets and disaggregation of large headquarters. As you remember from recent decades, a division headquarters would be a massive entity with satellite dishes and other assets in the open. Those days are gone.

We now have to consider how we bring in technology from the companies to allow us to displace 10-foot satellite dishes and 20 miles of wire, and actually have small-scale edge compute and transport systems that can disaggregate everyone. That’s incredibly important.

Certainly, camouflage comes into play. Other classified capabilities come into play as well, and that’s all just the visible element. Then you get into electronic warfare and the ability to monitor.

So, how do you disaggregate some of that?

Those are all things that we are actively moving — and coming back to — in a more modern stance.

“The execution of Nidal Hasan by firing squad will take place at Fort Hood, Texas, on Thursday, December 3rd, 2026, at 1 p.m. CT.,” acting Army Secretary Adam Telle announced, confirming that the location would return Hasan to the site of the murders.

A memo Telle shared on X stated that President Donald Trump approved the execution order on Oct. 2.

“The execution officer will be the Commandant, United States Disciplinary Barracks,” the memo states.

Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell first announced the execution order on Monday, stating, “Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has recommended — and President Donald J. Trump has approved — death by U.S. Army firing squad for convicted terrorist Nidal Malik Hasan, the jihadist who opened fire on unarmed American soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009.

“He killed 13 people and wounded 32 others while shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ during the attack,” Parnell wrote.

If the date and method of execution are carried out, it would mark the first such case for the service since Jan. 31, 1945, when Pvt. Eddie D. Slovik was executed by a U.S. Army firing squad in France for desertion during World War II.

The last death sentence carried out by the U.S. military was in 1961, when Army Pvt. John Bennett was executed by hanging at the gallows in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, after he was convicted of raping and attempting to kill a young girl.

Hasan, who was born in northern Virginia, walked into a Fort Hood readiness processing center on Nov. 5, 2009, and opened fire using a semi-automatic handgun.

Thirteen people were killed, including a pregnant soldier.

Former Army Staff Sgt. Patrick Zeigler, a two-time combat veteran, was shot four times in the attack and spent nearly a year recovering in various hospitals.

“He looked me straight in the eyes as he pointed the gun at me, and a split second later, I’m on the floor with a hole in my head,” he told the Killeen Daily Herald in 2023.

At his court-martial, Hasan, now 56, admitted to the shooting, and in 2013 said he carried out the attack in support of the Taliban.

At the time, Hasan requested a delay in court proceedings so he could ready a new legal strategy that would show he acted “in defense of others.”

Asked by presiding Judge Col. Tara Osborn who he was defending, Hasan replied, “The leadership of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the Taliban.”

Hasan was convicted by a military jury in August 2013, which recommended he be sentenced to death.

He was subsequently transferred to Fort Leavenworth, where he has been incarcerated on death row.

“Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has recommended — and President Donald J. Trump has approved — death by U.S. Army firing squad for convicted terrorist Nidal Malik Hasan, the jihadist who opened fire on unarmed American soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009,” Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell announced. “He killed 13 people and wounded 32 others while shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ during the attack.

“The Secretary of the Army will set the time and place of the execution,” he continued. “Judgement day for Hasan has finally come.”

If Hasan’s execution is indeed carried out by a firing squad, it would mark the first such case for the service since Jan. 31, 1945, when Pvt. Eddie D. Slovik was executed by a U.S. Army firing squad in France for desertion during World War II.

The last death sentence carried out by the U.S. military was in 1961, when Army Pvt. John Bennett was executed by hanging at the gallows in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, after he was convicted of raping and attempting to kill a young girl.

Hasan, who was born in northern Virginia, walked into a Fort Hood readiness processing center on Nov. 5, 2009, and opened fire using a semi-automatic handgun.

Thirteen people were killed, including a pregnant soldier.

Former Army Staff Sgt. Patrick Zeigler, a two-time combat veteran, was shot four times in the attack and spent nearly a year recovering in various hospitals.

“He looked me straight in the eyes as he pointed the gun at me, and a split second later, I’m on the floor with a hole in my head,” he told the Killeen Daily Herald in 2023.

At his court-martial, Hasan, now 56, admitted to the shooting, and in 2013 said he carried out the attack in support of the Taliban.

At the time, Hasan requested a delay in court proceedings so he could ready a new legal strategy that would show he acted “in defense of others.”

Asked by presiding Judge Col. Tara Osborn who he was defending, Hasan replied, “The leadership of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the Taliban.”

Hasan was convicted by a military jury in August 2013, which recommended he be sentenced to death.

He was subsequently transferred to Fort Leavenworth, where he has been incarcerated on death row.

Jonathan Lehrfeld contributed to this report.

“Early investment and a relentless focus on quality and execution have positioned us to now deliver seekers at unprecedented levels in the near-term, and we’re committed to building on that momentum,” Steve Parker, president and CEO of Boeing Defense, Space & Security, said in a release. “Our Boeing teammates could not be prouder of the role they play in protecting U.S. and allied service members, civilians and critical infrastructure worldwide.”

The agreement follows the framework deal that was announced in April. Production will be spread over seven years, matching Lockheed Martin’s push to surge production on the PAC-3 MSE all-up round.

Lockheed in January announced a seven-year framework agreement to increase annual PAC-3 interceptor production from approximately 600 to 2,000.

Work on the seekers began immediately, the company announced in April, and will be completed at Boeing’s facility in Huntsville, Alabama.

Boeing’s PAC-3 seekers work by identifying, tracking and knocking out a range of threats, from ballistic missiles and hypersonics to hostile air platforms.

Once the seeker identifies the target, the highly maneuverable interceptor, which uses a two-pulse solid rocket motor, engages and eliminates threats via direct body-to-body contact.

Monday’s announcement, meanwhile, comes as the U.S. military’s reliance on costly interceptors against cheap munitions, particularly those deployed by Iran during Operation Epic Fury, has come under increased scrutiny over the past eight months.

The announcement also follows a busy week for Boeing. Last Tuesday, the U.S. Navy selected the company to build its F/A-XX sixth-generation carrier-based fighter under a development contract worth more than $20 billion. The same day, the Air Force signed a $2.38 billion order for 22 more F-15EX Eagle II fighters.

Military Times reporter Michael Scanlon contributed to this report.

The Pentagon on Tuesday announced a $5.1 billion fixed-ceiling incentive contract with HII to complete the carrier’s mid-life overhaul at Virginia’s Newport News Shipbuilding.

The refueling and complex overhaul, or RCOH, comprises approximately one-third of the maintenance and modernization a carrier will undergo during its service life, according to the announcement.

The RCOH process on Truman will “include refueling the ship’s reactors, as well as extensive modernization work in thousands of compartments and tanks, as well as on most ship systems,” a HII release stated. “In addition, major upgrades will be made in the propulsion plant and combat systems.”

Truman’s overhaul notice comes a little over a year after the carrier completed a 251-day deployment that saw the vessel fire over 1.1 million pounds of ordnance and unleash the largest carrier-launched airstrike in history.

Despite making combat history, the carrier’s deployment was also plagued by incidents that prompted an array of investigations.

In February 2025, the ship collided with the merchant vessel Besiktas-M near Port Said, Egypt. The ship’s commanding officer Capt. Dave Snowden was subsequently relieved due to a loss of confidence in his ability to command.

Truman also lost a trio of F/A-18 Super Hornets during the deployment. One was shot down by the guided-missile cruiser USS Gettysburg in a friendly-fire incident. Another experienced a failed arrested landing and went overboard. A third slipped off the hangar deck as a result of evasive maneuvers in response to an incoming ballistic missile and fell into the Red Sea.

Homeported at Naval Station Norfolk, Truman will be the eighth Nimitz-class carrier to complete its mid-life RCOH in Newport News.

“Our team has been diligently working to get ahead on this critical engineering and construction project that will prepare USS Harry S. Truman for the second half of her service life,” Bryan Caccavale, the Newport News Shipbuilding vice president of program management, said in a release. “When the ship arrives at NNS, we’ll apply that same diligence to working with our suppliers and Navy partners to ensure a successful recapitalization of CVN 75.”

The announcement did not specify when work on the carrier would begin, but noted that the overhaul is expected to be completed by November 2031.

The contract includes additional options that, if applied, could bump its total value to closer to $5.2 billion.

Inked at $20 billion for the full-scale development phase, the contract, according to a Pentagon release, “procures multiple test aircraft for ground, airworthiness, systems, and weapons integration testing.”

“The F/A-XX is a critical pillar in our commitment to maintaining peace through strength,” Michael P. Duffey, under secretary of defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, said in the release. “F/A-XX will dominate contested airspace, extend operational reach, and deliver a decisive combat advantage for the warfighter.”

Equipped with an extended range to provide power projection from U.S. carriers, Boeing has promised that the F/A-XX will, crucially, be interoperable with both manned and unmanned platforms such as Collaborative Combat Aircraft.

“This achievement marks a new era for the U.S. Navy,” said acting Secretary of the Navy Hung Cao. “The Sixth-Generation fighter is a generational leap in air superiority and will provide the world’s best aviators with unparalleled capabilities to fight, win, and come home safe. We are excited to partner with Boeing, and for our warfighters to continue to dominate the skies and defeat our nation’s enemies.”

Boeing’s contract award marks another milestone victory for the company, which has now all but guaranteed its monopoly on sixth-generation fighters across the services.

In 2025, Boeing beat out Lockheed Martin for the contract to build the U.S. Air Force’s sixth-generation fighter under the Next Generation Air Dominance program, or NGAD.

That aircraft, since dubbed the F-47, has entered its engineering and manufacturing development phase, one service official announced in July, with first flights expected as early as 2028.

The Air Force at the time announced plans to purchase at least 185 of the next-gen fighters, a number designed to replace the F-22 Raptor fleet.

The F/A-XX program, meanwhile, which has yet to receive its official designation, has been the subject of funding disputes for years, with engineering and supply chain concerns prompting some Pentagon officials to push for delaying the program.

The carrier-based fighter jet is slated to anchor the Navy’s next-generation fighter fleet — operating alongside the F-35 — and is expected to replace the aging inventory of F/A-18E/F Super Hornets and EA-18G Growlers beginning in the 2030s.

“It’s an honor to be selected to produce the Navy’s first sixth^–generation platform,” Steve Parker, president and chief executive officer of Boeing Defense, Space & Security, said in a release announcing the deal. “Backed by decades of work, bolstered by game-changing innovations and solidified by the investments we’ve made in new facilities uniquely suited to build multiple products with next-generation capabilities, our dedicated and talented team is ready to execute this critical program.”

Answering a displaced service member’s question about retrieving personal goods from the base they previously called home, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle said the Navy would not be using Naval Support Activity Bahrain for the foreseeable future.

“We’re not getting back in there anytime soon,” Caudle said. “I just want to be completely honest with that.”

On Feb. 28, Iran struck NSA Bahrain with missiles and one-way attack drones after the U.S. and Israeli militaries launched strikes on the Islamic Republic.

The Pentagon initially reported zero fatalities and said the strikes did not significantly impact military operations.

Several months later, however, the true impacts of the strike are coming into focus.

Retired Navy Capt. John Cordle recently described the loss of NSA Bahrain as having “profound tactical and strategic repercussions.”

“The more we learn about the attacks on the U.S. Naval Support Activity in Manama, Bahrain, during the opening days of Operation Epic Fury, the clearer it becomes why the news of its near destruction was not initially reported or acknowledged,” Cordle said.

Moving supply hubs that were once hundreds of miles away to thousands of miles away will prove to be a major limitation to future maritime operations, he added.

A sailor who was deployed aboard an Independence-class littoral combat ship during the Iran war told Military Times that they were unable to get food resupplies after NSA Bahrain was damaged.

After the damage, the Navy shifted to relying on a logistics hub at Diego Garcia, an atoll in the Indian Ocean that sits more than 2,000 miles away from the service’s carrier strike groups in the Middle East.

The distance required the sailors onboard the LCS to place food orders 30 days in advance, which proved challenging due to the unpredictable schedule of frenzied military operations.

At an Aug. 11 town hall in San Diego, military families told acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao that they were concerned about food shortages and declining morale aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln after the ship had not made an official port call in over seven months.

Damage to the Fifth Fleet headquarters, barracks, warehouses and communication towers at NSA Bahrain may lead to construction costs worth roughly $400 million, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation.

Meanwhile, thousands of troops and their families are reportedly still in limbo, with many living in temporary lodging while waiting to be reunited with their belongings — and even pets — after the base’s destruction.

Vice Adm. Curt Renshaw, who leads the Navy’s Fifth Fleet, admitted during a recent virtual town hall with Navy families that the service is “making it up as we go because nothing is conceived to go on this length of time.”

“These are complex problems, and the solutions have not been exactly obvious,” Renshaw said.

Roll Tide.

The inert cannonballs, which were — naturally — wrapped in paper towels, were discovered during the baggage screening process at Alabama’s Gulf Shores International Airport and later determined by police to have been stolen from the nearby coastal stronghold Fort Morgan.

“My first thought was, ‘I couldn’t see a fuse and need to get some help quick,’” TSA officer Justin Dupree recalled in a release. “I couldn’t see the entire item but was scared I might have been holding a live explosive.”

Dupree noted the antique artillery projectiles ranged in size, with the largest comparable to a grapefruit.

“I had never seen anything quite this unique,” Dupree said. “I’ve seen inert grenades and training munitions but never an Indiana Jones-esque stolen artifact-type situation.”

A TSA explosives specialist and the Baldwin County Sheriff’s Office were subsequently notified and determined that the cannonballs posed no threat.

Law enforcement investigating the incident stated the passenger claimed to be unaware of how the projectiles were acquired. The cannonballs were later returned to Fort Morgan, the release added.

Passenger attempts to transport illegal items, including outlandish weaponry, through the screening process are, of course, nothing new.

In a more glaring example from 2019, a Florida man traveling through Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley International Airport set off alarms after his bag was found to contain a disassembled rocket-propelled grenade.

The individual was subsequently taken into an inspection area, where he told airport security he was under the impression he could bring the checked RPG on the plane, CBS Philadelphia reported.

Inspection of the weapon itself revealed that the launcher was not in working order, and the grenade was a realistic replica.

The items were confiscated by security, and, miraculously, the individual boarded his flight on time.

The contract, the largest interagency lodging acquisition in the history of the Guard, comes as part of ongoing support for the Trump administration’s “Making D.C. Safe and Beautiful” executive order.

The length of the D.C. task force’s mission, which kicked off in August 2025, has made current lodging arrangements unsustainable, a Guard release stated. Mobilized troops have been staying in hotels throughout the region.

The Guard is hoping a long-term housing remedy will improve overall quality of life and flexibility for those mobilized while reducing taxpayer expenses, the release stated. The acquisition process was reportedly completed in under three months, “despite an agency-level vendor protest, which was reviewed and denied.”

“This contract delivers stable, secure housing for our soldiers and airmen while achieving significant cost savings for the government,” Monica Williams, executive director of acquisitions and head of contracting activity for the National Guard Bureau, said in the release. “We were able to move quickly to meet mission requirements and provide a long-term solution for deployed personnel.”

The contract pricing, according to Guard and GSA figures, is “about 49% below projected short-term commercial hotel costs and 27% below standard GSA schedule pricing for lodging and housekeeping services.”

The new arrangement comes on the heels of a May 28 report, meanwhile, that assessed that the 2,000-plus National Guard troops to have participated in the D.C. task force have had “no measurable effect on violent crime.”

The report, published by the Niskanen Center, described the Guard deployments as “an expensive tool” used in “the wrong places for the wrong types of crime.”

Researchers cited the $607 average daily cost per Guard member in the nation’s capital, compared with $384 in pay for Metropolitan Police Department officers.

Robbery and other violent crime rates in the D.C. area had also decreased prior to the Guard deployment, the report said. Those numbers were not impacted by the military operation.

Still, the report’s authors stopped short of calling the deployment a waste, noting that there was a 24% decline in opportunistic property crime recorded in the first six months of the operation.

“We brought 2,500 Guardsmen in from 15 states and the District of Columbia, and you all have done an amazing job,” Gen. Steve Nordhaus, chief of the National Guard Bureau, told troops in D.C. in July. “[Since arriving] you saved over 235 lives. You’ve done over 530 medical assistances to personnel, you restored children back to their families 27 times, and you have done amazing things in support of law enforcement to make sure we reduce crime.”

Sgt. Darilyn C. Duong, a DI with the 3rd Recruit Training Battalion, was found in her apartment in Port Royal, just north of the installation. She was 25 years old.

The cause of death is currently under investigation, Marine spokesperson 2nd Lt. Joshua Hartley said in a statement.

“The Marine Corps extends its deepest condolences to the family, friends and fellow Marines affected by this loss,” Hartley said. “At this time, it would be premature to speculate on the circumstances or results of the investigation. … Out of respect for the Marine’s family and loved ones, no additional details will be released at this time.”

A native of Winnebago, Nebraska, Duong is the second drill instructor assigned to Parris Island to be found dead in as many months.

On May 30, Sgt. Albert Haynes II, 24, was found dead in a hotel room in Starke, Florida, where he was staying while attending a poolee function with U.S. Marine Corps Recruiting Station-Jacksonville.

Duong, who was single with no dependents, enlisted in the Marine Corps as a Food Service Specialist before becoming a drill instructor.

Her awards include the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, the Navy Meritorious Unit Commendation, two Sea Service Deployment Ribbons, two Good Conduct Medals and the National Defense Service Medal.