Feral Jundi

Monday, November 2, 2009

Industry Talk: Still No Count of U.S. Contractors in Afghanistan

Filed under: Afghanistan,Industry Talk — Tags: , , , — Matt @ 7:42 PM

“I kind of want to scream…. Why if it’s so important, are we failing to do something so basic?” said Christopher Shays, a former Republican lawmaker and a co-chair of the bipartisan committe 

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   What?  Are you kidding me?  How long have we been doing this, and the government still hasn’t a clue on how to count how many of us are over there? Eight years in Afghanistan, and we can’t even get a basic census done? This is pathetic and a total lack of leadership, and on so many levels.

    The taxpayer is paying for it, and there should be no excuse about not knowing how many folks we have on the books. Amateur hour I say, amateur hour! –Matt

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Still no count of U.S. contractors in Afghanistan

Mon Nov 2, 2009

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. government does not know exactly how many contractors it employs in Afghanistan, a U.S. commission said on Monday, raising basic questions about oversight of wartime operations.

Contractors in Afghanistan outnumber U.S. troops there and scandals involving misconduct by employees of private firms on the U.S. payroll in Afghanistan and Iraq have prompted calls by Congress for greater accountability.

The Commission on Wartime Contracting, a bipartisan, independent commission mandated by Congress, presented data at a hearing showing major discrepancies in different accounting methods used to determine the number of U.S. contractors.

A traditional manual count by the U.S. military’s Central Command turned up nearly 74,000 U.S. Defense Department contractors in Afghanistan as of June 30 — more than twice the number shown in another survey by the Pentagon.

“I kind of want to scream…. Why if it’s so important, are we failing to do something so basic?” said Christopher Shays, a former Republican lawmaker and a co-chair of the bipartisan committee.

Gary Motsek, an assistant deputy undersecretary of defense, acknowledged in testimony that U.S. efforts to create a system to better count the number of contractors in Afghanistan had so far come up short.

“We failed,” Motsek said, calling for better funding and regulations to require all U.S. agencies to report figures for contractors. “You should be concerned about the gap, because we are concerned about the gap.”

Motsek and Redding Hobby, deputy director of logistics, contracting, and engineering at Central Command, indicated that while the manual count system was not 100 percent precise, it was still the best gauge available.

Michael Thibault, another co-chair appointed by Democratic congressional leaders, questioned whether not knowing the number and identities of Afghan contractors on the U.S. payroll exposed U.S. personnel to greater security risks.

“It’s going to take one tragedy and there’s going to be a scorched-earth effort looking for accountability, and that’s why it’s so important,” Thibault said.

Motsek, however, described the lack of a firm tally as an administrative shortcoming that did not endanger U.S. forces. He said contractors needed separate security clearance to enter U.S. military bases in Afghanistan.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Story here.

Sunday, August 23, 2009

Industry Talk: Afghanistan Contractors Outnumber Troops

Filed under: Afghanistan,Industry Talk — Tags: , , , , , , — Matt @ 8:22 AM

     As soon as I get a copy of the census, we will see how much security contractor use has risen in Iraq and Afghanistan.  That is the statistic I like tracking, and I love to dangle that in the face of the anti-contractors out there.

    But overall, nothing shocking in this article.  We all knew we would be playing a big role in the surge, and we will continue to do so regardless of the little thanks we receive.  Maybe one day, someone in a position of power will recognize the fact that we were crucial to the war effort.

     One note in particular is that somehow the defense planners, congress, and President Obama are all still supporting the concept of contracting in this war, despite the pressure from the main stream media.  So what does that mean if both President Bush (a Republican) and President Obama (a Democrat), became reliant on the use of contractors for their specific wartime goals?  Does this mean that security contractors and contractors in general are legitimate forces, or do we become illegitimate as soon as the war is over and the historians start cranking out the books?

     Gosh, I certainly feel legitimate, regardless of what the MSM might have to say about it.  And here are the numbers….. lol –Matt

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WSJ

Afghanistan Contractors Outnumber Troops

Despite Surge in U.S. Deployments, More Civilians Are Posted in War Zone; Reliance Echoes the Controversy in Iraq

By AUGUST COLE

August 22, 2009

Even as U.S. troops surge to new highs in Afghanistan they are outnumbered by military contractors working alongside them, according to a Defense Department census due to be distributed to Congress — illustrating how hard it is for the U.S. to wean itself from the large numbers of war-zone contractors that proved controversial in Iraq.

The number of military contractors in Afghanistan rose to almost 74,000 by June 30, far outnumbering the roughly 58,000 U.S. soldiers on the ground at that point. As the military force in Afghanistan grows further, to a planned 68,000 by the end of the year, the Defense Department expects the ranks of contractors to increase more.

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Saturday, May 30, 2009

Industry Talk: Contractor Census- More Security Contractors, Less Overall Contractors in the USCENTCOM AOR

   There is a lot of juice in this report(s), and I recommend reading through it to get a feel for where things stand right now.  The stuff that jumped out at me, is the increase in security contractors in both Iraq(23%) and Afghanistan(29%) from the last quarter census.  You would think with all the negative press out there, that the US would be cutting down on the use of armed contractors.  It looks to me like someone at least appreciates what we do, enough so to contract even more of us.  

   To me this is significant.  With Iraq, troop withdrawals will be creating security vacuums in some areas, and security contractors will be filling those gaps. And with the RUF being that we are only limited to defensive operations, you will see us taking over many defensive operations in Iraq and more Coalition troops being freed up for offensive operations.  The numbers don’t lie.

   With Afghanistan, this makes sense as well.  With an increase of troops, there will be an increase in support in the form of contractors.  But someone has to protect those contractors while they build stuff, and those security contractors will be used to defend FOBs to free up the troops so they can go on the offense.

   I highly recommend checking out the report, because it showed the graphs that went along with the report, as well as the break down in contractor types.  It is broken down under US Citizens, Third Country Nationals, and Local Nationals.  In Iraq, Third Country Nationals outnumbered everyone- lots of Ugandan security contractors is one example.  In Afghanistan, it is the Local Nationals that outnumber everyone, and there is no surprise there.   

   The trend line is there and security contractors are stepping up to fill these defensive security needs in the war. My hope is that the reforms needed to manage and account for these contractors is able to catch up.  And this report below showed some promising new developments in that area as well.  It sounds like the SPOT database is starting to work it’s magic, and I am glad they were able to get a better handle on the accountability area.  The decrease in overall contractor numbers from last quarter was somewhat contributed to this new database tracking system.  There is a description of the SPOT in the link I provided below, and I recommend reading that report as well.    

   In other areas, we will see how the SOFA and UCMJ issues turn out, because that is an area that definitely needs leadership and enforcement.  I still think that we need to be moving faster on the issue of contractor management and accountability, and for it to take this long to get just this far is disheartening.  We have a war to fight and this is all stuff that should have been hashed out years ago. –Matt

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CONTRACTOR SUPPORT OF U.S. OPERATIONS

IN USCENTCOM AOR, IRAQ, AND AFGHANISTAN

BACKGROUND:  This update reports DoD contractor personnel numbers in theater and outlines DoD efforts to improve management of contractors accompanying U.S. forces.  It covers DoD contractor personnel deployed in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM) area of responsibility (AOR) as of March 31, 2009.

KEY POINTS:

Ending 2nd quarter FY 2009, USCENTCOM reported approximately 242,657 contractor personnel working for the DoD in the USCENTCOM AOR.     

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