"They've reached out a couple of times in the last two years to have industry work with them, to learn industry's best practices," said Richard F. Healing, a National Transportation Safety Board member and former Navy director of safety and survivability. "To date, that effort has suffered from a chronic lack of sufficient funding -- not walking the talk."
Even now, major safety measures will have to compete with such expensive priorities as buying weapons, waging war and rebuilding Iraq.
Angello said the council hopes "implementation costs will be very small compared to the savings."
In recent years, cost savings have come at the expense of safety. To trim the budget, the number of safety positions in the Defense secretary's office dwindled from five to one in the 1990s. A single official now oversees aviation, weapons and transportation safety issues. Though the shift occurred during the Clinton administration, these safety jobs have not been restored under Rumsfeld.
"The song remains the same," said George W. Siebert, who directed safety and occupational health policy in the Defense secretary's office from 1984 to 1998 and recalls a 1986 challenge by then-Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger to reduce accidents.
"The services really want to run their own show. That's where the money is. That's where the clout is. Unless they get that partnership, you're not going to see any reductions."
As a first step, the council compiled statistics on accident costs and causes. Angello described the number of military injuries as "stunning."
Between Jan. 1, 2001, and the end of September 2003, , the Army recorded 534 accidental deaths, the Navy, 291, the Air Force, 280, and the Marines, 250, Defense Department figures show. Half died in private car and motorcycle accidents, 15% in aviation accidents and 5% each in military vehicle accidents and by drowning.
During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, as in the recent conflict in Afghanistan, far more soldiers died from nonhostile causes, including sickness, suicide and accidents, than from enemy fire.
"You're talking about a very highly skilled, scarce commodity: the modern American service person," said Daniel Goure, a defense analyst and former Pentagon official. "You don't want to lose them at all, but you clearly don't want to lose them to accidents."
Many of the accidents occur at the intersection of bad judgment and faulty equipment. Take the crash that killed Matthew Smith.
