The commission’s visit to Afghanistan comes as US commanders weigh cutting back on desk jobs and other support staff to free up troops for combat, a move that could require more private contractors to fill the gap.
I know, why don’t we send the cooks to the frontli….. oh, my bad, the cooks are all KBR contractors. lol (I had to say it)
Outstanding news, and I hope the team is able to collect some good scoop on how things are going. One thing this group might want to consider though, is the massive dog and pony show that will go on as soon as these folks hit the deck. Now will they get an accurate assessment of how things are really going, who knows? But I guess it is the thought that counts. If you are one of the folks that this group visits, please do not be vocal in any issues you might have. How can anything be fixed, if no one says anything about it? I am sure the latest Program Support report is floating around in the team’s heads right now, as is the enormous pressure from the administration to not have any more embarrassments that could impede the war effort, so now is a perfect opportunity to get this right because folks actually care.
The other part of this article that I wanted to point out, was the latest troop shuffling game that General McChrystal and gang has been throwing around. The article mentioned briefly the idea, and I thought it was important to mention it again seeing how the MSM kind of glanced over it. All joking aside, that is scraping the barrel if the goal is to use support personnel to throw to the front lines.
The MSM is missing the big story on this as well. We have more contractors in Afghanistan than troops, we have a massive surge of security contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, yet the MSM is fixated on the idea that we are evil and not worth the attention because of a company called Xe. Really? It seems to me that it is contractors that are saving the day when it comes to man power issues for these wars, and yet the media and the public continues to ignore that fact. Yet again, if you read the reports, the dirty little secret seems to be that contracting is a good idea to the Obama administration and the Generals of this war. Losing the war in Afghanistan or Iraq tends to weigh pretty heavily on the minds of our leaders, and obviously contractors have become an important part of that strategy of not losing. –Matt
——————————————————————
US panel on wartime contracting to return to Afghanistan
August 22, 2009
WASHINGTON — A US commission investigating wartime contracting said it plans to return to Afghanistan on Sunday as part its effort to stem fraud and waste by private defense contractors.
Set up in 2008 after audits found rampant abuse in Iraq, the Commission on Wartime Contracting is charged by Congress with reviewing US contracting related to reconstruction, logistics for the military and security operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“This trip is an important part of carrying out our study mandate from Congress, and it’s especially important given that we’re intensifying our efforts in Afghanistan,” commission co-chair Michael Thibault said in a statement Friday.
“Among other things, we’ll be looking to see whether and how contracting lessons from the Iraq involvement are being applied to Afghanistan,” he said of the week-long trip.
The commission members will have a chance to share their findings from the Afghan visit at congressional hearings scheduled in September.
More than 200,000 contract employees work to support US military operations and reconstruction work in Iraq and Afghanistan, performing a range of jobs from guarding diplomats to washing uniforms and building hospitals.
In their first appearance before Congress in June, panel members presented an initial report pointing out waste and serious “problems” in how the US government oversees its vast army of contractors.
The commission cited the construction of a 30-million-dollar dining hall at the Camp Delta military base southeast of Baghdad as an example of poor oversight. Replacing the existing mess hall with a larger facility was unnecessary as US troops have to leave the country by the end of 2011.
The commission’s visit to Afghanistan comes as US commanders weigh cutting back on desk jobs and other support staff to free up troops for combat, a move that could require more private contractors to fill the gap.
Stuart Bowen, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, has warned the United States risks repeating the same mistakes in Afghanistan that have led to billions of dollars being squandered in Iraq on reconstruction.
Bowen told lawmakers in March that he estimates between three and five billion dollars have been wasted in the US effort to rebuild Iraq since 2003.
The panel’s final report is due in July 2010, but Congress could extend the bi-partisan commission’s mandate by another year.
Story here.