The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) is asking why a small Department of Defense task force charged with developing the Afghan economy spent nearly $150 million on private villas, security guards and luxury meals while operating in the country between 2010 and 2014.
In its letter, SIGAR said that task force employees had solicited military contractor Triple Canopy to provide rooming for them that included “Western-style hotel accommodations,” such as flat-screen televisions, mini-refrigerators and DVD players. Contractors were also hired to provide food service that was “at least 3 stars,” specifying that each meal contain “at least two entree choices and three side order choices.” Triple Canopy was also instructed to ensure that three-course meals were available for “special events.”
Triple Canopy is one of the firms that have financially benefited the most from post-9/11 wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, earning roughly $2.2 billion in government contracts since 2003, according to the Project on Government Oversight. The company has continued to receive lucrative government contracts despite being at the center of several controversies related to the killing of civilians in Iraq by its employees and providing falsified documents for its private security guards.
– From the Intercept article: Pentagon Task Force Spent Nearly $150M on Villas and 3-Star Meals in Afghanistan
For all its failings, one thing the U.S. government has achieved in Afghanistan is a tremendous enrichment of military contractors and warlords on behalf of the American taxpayer.
Of course, today’s story is only the latest in a series of stories related to taxpayer fraud and theft which have been unveiled in the past year alone. Let’s revisit some prior examples.
First, the following is from July’s post, How the U.S. Government Squandered $1 Billion in Taxpayer Funds on “Ghost Schools” and Warlords in Afghanistan:
BuzzFeed News obtained internal Ministry of Education data for 2011 that has never before been made public. For Afghanistan overall, the data showed 1,174 schools — almost 1 in every 12 — was a ghost school, an educational facility that the Afghan government publicly claimed was open but that was, in fact, not operating. In the provinces that are the most dangerous to monitor — and into which the U.S. poured the most aid money — that proportion soared. In Kandahar province, where DeNenno served, a full third of the 423 schools the Ministry of Education publicly reported as open in 2011 were not functioning, and in Helmand, it was more than half.
But teacher salaries continued to go to these ghost schools — and still do, according to numerous Afghan and U.S. sources. While the Afghan government puts in some of its own money to pay teachers, more than two-thirds of teacher salaries are provided through a World Bank fund, to which the United States is the biggest donor. The World Bank fund did not respond to requests for comment, but USAID said that World Bank financial controls guard against salaries going to ghost teachers.
And just as with ghost students, the U.S. government has known about ghost teachers for years. Back in 2005 and 2006, an internal education ministry task force calculated that at least $12 million in salaries were going to so-called ghost teachers annually, according to several former employees of the USAID contractors embedded in the ministry. A scathing, confidential 2013 USAID audit of the Afghan education ministry obtained by BuzzFeed News reveals that the United States had been injecting hundreds of millions of dollars for more than a decade into a ministry marred by an “inadequate payroll system” and lacking even the most basic auditing practices.
In some areas, the belief that ghost schools have enriched fat cats at the expense of Afghan children has stoked such widespread ire that American education aid is actually doing the opposite of what the U.S. intended: It’s turning locals against the government.
A couple of months later, we learned that taxpayer funds were being used to protect Afghan child rapists in the post, Fighting for Pedophilia – It’s Official U.S. Government Policy to Allow Afghan “Allies” to Rape Little Boys:
KABUL, Afghanistan — In his last phone call home, Lance Cpl. Gregory Buckley Jr. told his father what was troubling him: From his bunk in southern Afghanistan, he could hear Afghan police officers sexually abusing boys they had brought to the base.
“At night we can hear them screaming, but we’re not allowed to do anything about it,” the Marine’s father, Gregory Buckley Sr., recalled his son telling him before he was shot to death at the base in 2012. He urged his son to tell his superiors. “My son said that his officers told him to look the other way because it’s their culture.”
The policy of instructing soldiers to ignore child sexual abuse by their Afghan allies is coming under new scrutiny, particularly as it emerges that service members like Captain Quinn have faced discipline, even career ruin, for disobeying it.
Then just last month, we learned the following, U.S. Military Spent $43 Million on a Gas Station in Afghanistan that Should Have Cost $500,000:
The U.S. Department of Defense spent nearly $43 million on a gas station in northern Afghanistan and has been unable to explain why it cost so much, a U.S. special inspector reported on Monday.
Although TFBSO achieved its immediate objective of building the CNG filling station, it apparently did so at an exorbitant cost to U.S. taxpayers. In comparison, SIGAR found that a CNG station in Pakistan costs no more than $500,000 to construct. Furthermore, there is no indication that TFBSO considered the feasibility of achieving the station’s broader objectives or considered any of the potentially considerable obstacles to the project’s success before beginning construction.
One of the most troubling aspects of this project is that the Department of Defense claims that it is unable to provide an explanation for the high cost of the project or to answer any other questions concerning its planning, implementation, or outcome.
Frankly, I find it both shocking and incredible that DOD asserts that it no longer has any knowledge about TFBSO, an $800 million program that reported directly to the Office of the Secretary of Defense and only shut down a little over six months ago.
TFBSO, mentioned above, stands for the Task Force for Business and Stability Operations. This is the same task force that we now know handed $150 million to military contractors for the unnecessary provision of luxury hotels, 3-star meals and private security. All of which was completely unnecessary.
From the Hill:
A special inspector general wants to know why a Pentagon task force meant to help rebuild the economies in Iraq and Afghanistan spent about $150 million of taxpayer money on private housing and security guards so its employees in Afghanistan could live off U.S. military bases.
“Based on allegations we have received from former [task force] employees and others, today I am writing to request information concerning [the task force’s] decision to spend nearly $150 million, amounting to nearly 20 percent of its budget, on private housing and private security guards for its U.S. government employees in Afghanistan, rather than live on U.S military bases,” Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) John Sopko wrote in a letter to Defense Secretary Ashton Carter released publicly Thursday.
The task force, known as the Task Force for Business and Stability Operations (TFBSO), is the same one that has come under increasing fire from lawmakers after another SIGAR report found it spent $43 million to build a compressed natural gas station in Afghanistan.
In total, the task force spent about $800 million before disbanding in March.
After a preliminary review of the latest allegations, SIGAR found task force leadership rented specially furnished, privately owned villas for about five to 10 employees, according to the letter. They also hired contractors for 24-hour building security, food services and bodyguards for staff and visitors.
Of course, this money didn’t disappear into thin air. As usual, it ended up in the hands of private contractors.
One example of the contract work was $57 million paid to private security company Triple Canopy from 2010 to 2014. The contract provided for armed support, as well as queen-size beds in certain rooms, a 27-inch or bigger flat screen TV in each room, a DVD player in each room, a mini refrigerator in each room and an “investor villa” that had “upgraded furniture” and “western-style hotel accommodations,” according to the letter.
I’d love to see Triple Canopy’s profit margins on this score.
Sopko cited former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Paul Brinkley, the task force’s first director, who wrote in his book, “Our goal was to get businesses running and to encourage private investors and corporations from outside of Afghanistan to engage in the country either as trading partners or as investors. Wherever possible, we avoided depending on the military.
“We were part of their mission … but we avoided living on military bases whenever possible. The goal was to show private companies that they could set up operations in Afghanistan themselves without needing military support.”
What shameless bullshit. At least Chuck Grassley called him out on it.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who has been conducting his own investigation into the task force, called Brinkley’s reasoning “Grade A baloney.”
“The concerns raised in SIGAR’s letter don’t inspire confidence that the task force took care with spending,” he said in a statement. “For example, the assertion that task force employees had to have outside housing and security to set an example for private companies sounds like U.S. Grade A baloney. I look forward to learning more about how the task force operated and what, if any, results it achieved in exchange for spending $800 million.”
Meanwhile, the Intercept provides a little more color on Triple Canopy, which seemingly exists to suck off the sucker U.S. taxpayer.
Triple Canopy is one of the firms that have financially benefited the most from post-9/11 wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, earning roughly $2.2 billion in government contracts since 2003, according to the Project on Government Oversight. The company has continued to receive lucrative government contracts despite being at the center of several controversies related to the killing of civilians in Iraq by its employees and providing falsified documents for its private security guards.
Naturally, there are more players eating on the U.S. taxpayer dime:
Another contractor cited in the SIGAR letter, the Muscogee Nation Business Enterprise, is said to have earned over $40 million providing transportation services to TFSBO members, though past reporting has indicated that the small Native American tribal-owned firm largely subcontracts its work out to other providers.
So will anyone actually be held accountable in any real sense for this scheme? Don’t be ridiculous. Which is why such theft will not only continue, but will continue to accelerate.
For related articles, see:
Afghan President Hamid Karzai Slams U.S. Foreign Policy in Farewell Speech
The U.S. Military Has Awarded Contracts to Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan
How the CIA Enriches Warlords, Drug Dealers and the Taliban in Afghanistan
U.S. Military Spent $43 Million on a Gas Station in Afghanistan that Should Have Cost $500,000
In Liberty,
Michael Krieger
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