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As Sequester Pinches Pennies, Iraq Reconstruction Audit Reveals $60 BILLION In ‘Botched’ Efforts
That’s right, $60 billion on buildings that never got built, crony contracts that lined pockets without anything getting done; bribes, kickbacks, luxury items, aborted projects and just general mismanagement, fraud and an obscene waste of U.S. taxpayer dollars. This at a time when some Americans aren’t getting their paychecks, services are being cut, and workers are losing precious hours, amongst many other belt-tightening measures currently being implemented.
$60 billion.
Stuart Bowen is the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) and his audit came out this week, just as we’re nearing the 10th anniversary of the Iraq invasion. And what he found was disturbing at the very least. From Danger Room|Wired:
…$8 billion of that money wasted outright. And that’s a “conservative” estimate, Bowen tells Danger Room.
“We couldn’t look at every project — that’s impossible — but our audits show a lack of accountability,” Bowen says. “We are not well structured to carry out stability and reconstruction operations.”
That isn’t nearly the whole story of the Iraq War’s expense. Bowen is only looking at reconstruction money, not the cost of military operations in Iraq, which totaled over $800 billion. But on Wednesday, Bowen’s office released a mammoth, final report into the botched reconstruction, which cost the U.S. taxpayers, on average, $15 million every day from 2003 to 2012 — all for dubious gain.
It turns out there wasn’t just one way to waste all that money. Some projects got started and never finished, like a prison in Diyala province, shown above, that languishes unbuilt nearly nine years after the government spent $40 million to build it. Other contracts went to cronies: the top contracting officer in Hilla awarded $8.6 million to a contractor, Philip Bloom, in exchange for “bribes and kickbacks, expensive vehicles, business-class airline tickets, computers, jewelry, and other items.” Still others got needless cash infusions: one unspecified school requested $10,000 for refurbishments and got $70,000. Government contracting databases didn’t even have “an information management system that keeps track of everything built,” Bowen recounts.
$60 billion.
Stuart Bowen is the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) and his audit came out this week, just as we’re nearing the 10th anniversary of the Iraq invasion. And what he found was disturbing at the very least. From Danger Room|Wired:
…$8 billion of that money wasted outright. And that’s a “conservative” estimate, Bowen tells Danger Room.
“We couldn’t look at every project — that’s impossible — but our audits show a lack of accountability,” Bowen says. “We are not well structured to carry out stability and reconstruction operations.”
That isn’t nearly the whole story of the Iraq War’s expense. Bowen is only looking at reconstruction money, not the cost of military operations in Iraq, which totaled over $800 billion. But on Wednesday, Bowen’s office released a mammoth, final report into the botched reconstruction, which cost the U.S. taxpayers, on average, $15 million every day from 2003 to 2012 — all for dubious gain.
It turns out there wasn’t just one way to waste all that money. Some projects got started and never finished, like a prison in Diyala province, shown above, that languishes unbuilt nearly nine years after the government spent $40 million to build it. Other contracts went to cronies: the top contracting officer in Hilla awarded $8.6 million to a contractor, Philip Bloom, in exchange for “bribes and kickbacks, expensive vehicles, business-class airline tickets, computers, jewelry, and other items.” Still others got needless cash infusions: one unspecified school requested $10,000 for refurbishments and got $70,000. Government contracting databases didn’t even have “an information management system that keeps track of everything built,” Bowen recounts.
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/03/07/as-sequester-pinches-pennies-iraq-reconstruction-audit-reveals-60-billion-in-botched-efforts/
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