The U.S. military has not properly tracked whether service members are exposed to burn pits, according to a new report by Pentagon’s internal watchdog.
During the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, American personnel regularly used these sites — essentially giant piles of trash set on fire — to dispose of waste. Some of that garbage included plastics, chemicals, rubber and other items that turned when burned.
As a result, military service members stationed near the pits have been found to be more likely to suffer from diseases like hypertension and asthma years later. And in 2022, the president signed a bill speeding up benefits for such personnel.
At issue in the Defense Department Inspector General report released Thursday was whether the Pentagon has monitored burn pits that sit near military sites but weren’t created by the U.S. military itself.
The Office of the Inspector General centered this audit on Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti and investigated from November to April.
Its main finding was a missing piece of the policy. The DOD does not require military commanders to monitor burn pits created by locals rather than the U.S. military, the report said. Without such a policy, American service members exposed to toxic smoke may not have that listed in their health records.
“This policy gap in identifying and reporting non-DoD-controlled burn pits can result in missing information on the DoD’s watch list of known burn pits,” wrote Robert Storch, the Pentagon’s inspector general. “When this information goes unreported, the ong-term health of Service members exposed to deadly toxins from burn pits could be put at risk.”
Storch recommended that the head of Pentagon acquisition and sustainment revise the policy and require commanders in the field to tell their combatant commander about any burn pits within about 2.5 miles of American military sites.
In a response to the report, Ronald Tickle, deputy assistant secretary of defense for environmental management and restoration, agreed with the recommendation and said his office would revise the policy to be clearer.
Noah Robertson is the Pentagon reporter at Defense News. He previously covered national security for the Christian Science Monitor. He holds a bachelor’s degree in English and government from the College of William & Mary in his hometown of Williamsburg, Virginia.
