The auditors estimated that the Pentagon made “improper payments” — which lacked sufficient or appropriate documentation or approvals — of $ 957 million in 2017 and $1.2 billion in 2018. While even that larger amount is a fraction of the overall Pentagon spending, such payments grew by 25 percent over those two years, a worrying trend that needs to be reversed.

Anyone expecting the discovery of pilfered funds will be disappointed. The audit wasn’t looking for fraud — which generally refers to malicious illegal activities — and Defense Department officials said it found none. (Different audits examine different aspects of an organization.)

Its purpose was to determine whether accounts could be reconciled, making the results less sexy, perhaps, but still important. The inability to accurately track how money is spent makes it impossible to know whether precious resources are going to the right places, undermining the Pentagon’s ability to be successful in its far-flung missions around the globe.

But it would be misleading to imply that such an immense bureaucracy is not also experiencing actual fraud, abuse or waste. Cost overruns and performance issues with such major weapons as the F-35 fighter jet and missile defense systems have been well documented in the past, raising doubts about the Pentagon’s ability to responsibly manage taxpayer dollars.

And the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction has spent six years documenting more than $400 million in questionable costs, unfinished projects and poorly executed programs , and pursuing 132 criminal convictions, in Afghanistan, the site of America’s longest-running war.

Last month, for example, a former recruiter of language interpreters for the American military was charged in an alleged scheme to recruit unqualified interpreters to work with American combat forces in Afghanistan. And in September, the former owner of a now defunct marble mining company in Afghanistan was found guilty in federal court for his role in defrauding the Overseas Private Investment Corporation and defaulting on a $15.8 million loan.

The unfavorable audit results come at an awkward time. A recent congressionally mandated study reached the alarming conclusion that despite all the money spent on defense, the United States today is so weakened that it “might struggle to win, or perhaps lose, a war against China or Russia.” The study also found that America’s military superiority and technological edge over those two major adversaries has eroded.