Feral Jundi

     Not to mention the 40 million dollars being spent to build two Consulates, one in Mazar-I-Sharif and the other in Herat. So technically, it would be 551 million dollars. No doubt there will also be cost overruns, so this price will go higher.

     A couple of points about this contract worth noting. During the Iraq Embassy debate, there was much heartache about the size and cost of that thing. Of course this was one more dig for the opponents of the war and of the Bush administration. Now fast forward to this Embassy in Kabul, and it’s size and cost, and there was nothing really mentioned about it?  Politically speaking, it was barely a whimper in the news and I heard no bashing of the Obama administration over this move. Hell, I just found out about it today, and I track this stuff. lol

    And yet the expansion and due date of it being built, completely conflicts with the idea that we are wanting to pull out of Afghanistan any time soon. If anything, it just indicates a continuation of our commitment there. That kind of thing is the stuff that pisses off the Taliban big time.  Although I certainly hope that Crazy Karzai will get the picture that he needs to stop making deals with the Taliban, and put a little faith in the process under the new command of Petraeus.

    This Embassy expansion also signifies a certain future that the security contracting community will be a big part of. That would be the WPS program and all of it’s security requirements. These Consulates and Embassy will be packed with civilian specialists and diplomats, all tasked with going out into the hinterlands of Afghanistan to do their business. Private security contractors in the form of PSD teams will be the guys to get them out there and back in one piece. PSC’s will also be the guys protecting these Consulates and Embassy, and as the military draws down in the future, these folks will be very important to the static security mission there.

     Iraq will also be the one to watch as this progresses. There will be many lessons learned in Iraq that can be applied to Afghanistan and elsewhere in the world. The WPS program will certainly be an intriguing wartime venture between private industry and government to watch as this unfolds. –Matt

US to spend 500 million dollars on embassy in Afghanistan

Nov 3, 2010

KABUL — The United States is bolstering its presence in Afghanistan with a 500 million dollar expansion of its Kabul embassy and the construction of two consulates, it announced Wednesday.

Washington’s Kabul embassy is already its biggest in the world, with about 1,100 employees, projected to rise to 1,200 by the end of the year, officials said.

Hundreds have arrived over the course of this year as part of a “civilian surge” bringing development experts into the country to compliment the military effort already in its 10th year.

The United States and NATO have 150,000 troops in Afghanistan fighting the Taliban-led insurgency, following a military surge aimed at speeding an end to the war.

The embassy expansion contract was worth 511 million dollars and had been awarded under US law to an American company, Caddell Construction Inc., ambassador Karl Eikenberry said.

Another two contracts, worth 20 million dollars each, have been awarded for the construction of consulates in Herat, the main city in western Afghanistan, and Mazar-I-Sharif in the north, he said.

Speaking to a gathering of Afghan officials, Eikenberry said the expansion would enable the United States “to carry out its pledge to maintain into the future its very significant security, government, economic and civil society programmes”.

He said the projects currently employed 500 Afghans and that “once construction gets underway more than 1,500 Afghan workers will be employed through the completion of the project in summer 2014”.

The embassy project includes an office building with 302 desks, two apartment buildings with 433 beds and a parking garage with capacity for 300 vehicles, it said.

It said the project would employ 600 Afghans and generate 150 million dollars in business for local construction companies.

It was due to be completed in June 2014, with the two consulates — each expected to generate six million dollars for local businesses and employ 150 Afghans — due to be finished in January 2011.

“All combined over the last two years, the dollar value for our diplomatic facilities expansion contracts in Kabul, Mazar and Herat now will be at about 800 million dollars,” Eikenberry said.

Story here.