Alternative Headquarters Support Funding for Theater Special Operations Commands

The current funding mechanism for theater special operations command (SOC) headquarters support costs is inadequately supported by legal guidance. Existing legislation and policy documents do not formalize theater SOC funding relationships to provide an enforcement tool that ensures the theater SOCs can properly resource their headquarters support requirements. Consequently, the ambiguity of this funding mechanism has allowed the theater SOCs to develop unique scenarios the financing headquarters support. To remedy this deficiency, this thesis conducts a comparative analysis of current theater SOC headquarters support funding mechanisms and examines three funding alternatives. This thesis concludes the best alternative would mandate that the Services assign separate Program Element (PE) numbers to theater SOC headquarters support in the Future Years Defense Program (FYOP) and distribute theater SOC headquarters support funding through the respective theater combatant commands. In addition, the thesis generates criteria that may he used in preliminary analysis by other commands that face similar funding ambiguities and may need to identify alternative funding mechanisms.Naval Postgraduate School Monterey CA Graduate School of Business and Publicpolicy is the author of 'Alternative Headquarters Support Funding for Theater Special Operations Commands', published 2002 under ISBN 9781423505655 and ISBN 1423505654.