Last Wednesday, in the middle of the Larry Craig scandal and close to the upcoming Labor Day weekend, the Army announced two investigative initiatives concerning contractor spending on the Iraq war. This announcement happened just days after it was reported in the Washington Post that the DOD planned to ask the Congress for another $50 billion for the war on top of the existing $147 billion request before the Congress.
To stop the immediate bleeding of money from the Army contracts, Secretary of the Army Pete Geren plans to have the Army examine around $3 billion worth of contracts that were in Kuwait because there has been fraud found in the letting of contacts in that area. There have been 20 military and civilian Army employees indicted for contract fraud. It sounds like a very large review but keep in mind that KBR alone has had more than $20 billion in contracts since the war began.
In the longer term, the Army has set up a Special Commission on Army Contracting which will report in 45 days to see if the Army can "ensure future contracting operations are more effective, efficient and transparent." The Commission will be headed up by Jacques Gansler, a former DOD official who has been revolving in and out of the Pentagon since the 1970s.
This sounds like welcome help considering the contracting disasters of the Iraq war. As I exposed in my book, Betraying Our Troops: The Destructive Results of Privatizing War, this massive outsourcing of the war to contractors has drained the US Treasury while not providing the soldiers what they need to fight this war. I am concerned that this new war service industry will continue to bedevil the DOD and the troops even after this war is over.
However, the Pentagon archives are full of commission and task force reports that were supposed to bring change. Sometimes these commissions were set up merely to deflect criticism during a rash of scandals or to appease an upset Congress. Some of these commissions really had good intentions but institutional pressures made sure that their reports gathered dust with little or no change. I would like to hope that the Army's actions are more than a Kabuki dance to ward off more biting Congressional investigations and not just to get their next $200 billion money fix.
Dr. Gansler has his work cut out for him. He currently runs the University of Maryland's new Center for Public Policy and Private Enterprise, which, according to the university, "fosters collaboration among the public, private and nonprofit sectors to promote mutually beneficial public and private interests."
Hmmm....I guess I am worried about this because I see too cozy of a relationship between the Army and their private contractors in Iraq. The Army has allowed the contractors to walk all over them, bill outrageous sums and even threaten work stoppages in a war zone to get paid. Since there are now more contractors in Iraq than troops, we have to wonder if this new war service industry "collaboration" with the Army needs to be fostered or whether the Army has to stand up to the contractors despite the politics. The Army needs to insist that the contractors fulfill their duties and finally give the troops what they need. This will require criminal and civil prosecutions beyond going after some of the small time crooks and going after the systemic fraudulent practices of the big and politically connected contractors.
Will the Army reform itself during this war? The odds are against it. Most effective reforms of military contracting have come only because the Congress has passed laws insisting on it. Congressional and media exposes of fraud and waste helped pass reform laws in the Congress during the 1980s (most of these reforms have been wiped out in the past 20 years) and the Truman Commission in World War II actually did indict large defense contractors in a war and even jailed a general. I will be watching the Army very carefully in the next 45 days to see if they really get a handle on this unprecedented yet underreported scandal. The Congress could help these investigations along by putting in their own reforms to "help" the Army to do the right thing.
History is against any meaningful reform but our troops deserve no less. They are putting their lives on the line and the Congress and the Army must give them what they need, not what the contractors need to make a profit.
Follow Dina Rasor on Twitter: www.twitter.com/dinalynnrasor
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Rhetorical questions R us, eh?
That money was to be made through fraud and no-bid contracts, of course. And so it has!
The other memory derives from a written article. The gist was that the Army was paying KBR whatever they asked for meals they were providing. Surely KBR would have to document the number of meals so the Army could ascertain whether they were being fairly charged, right? Wrong. KBR maintained that the number of meals they were serving was a trade secret!
If I were confronted with this situation, I would do three things: (a) terminate the contract with KBR, (b) take the case to court, (c) deploy undercover agents to count the number of meals and compare that number with the amount KBR was billing. And, (d) if it turned out KBR was defrauding American taxpayers, I'd have them in court.
Has any of this happened? Not that I've heard or read. Why? Yeah. That's the question, isn't it.
So brave are they. We should be so proud to have Petraous on the winning side.
Go for it. Encourage your children to join the military and they too some day may become four star Generals saluting and obeying a fascist dictator.
Here's some info sorta specific to your request.
You probably have it already.
If it's a complete waste of your time, please accept my sincere apologies (at least the price is right):
http://oversight.house.gov/features/moredollars/
"More Dollars, Less Sense
Worsening Contracting Trends Under the Bush Administration"
Page includes a link to a database of government contracts.
Enjoy.
And we're here to learn from one another, thus you cannot waste my time, even if you repeat what I may already know.
Well wishes,
me
Sadly, I do not hold out much hope that the Democratic congress will find the guts to do anything either.
I USED TO FEEL YOUR PAIN.
Then I started to monitor Henry Waxman's “Committee on Oversight and Government Reform” website.
Go to: http://oversight.house.gov/
Things are definitely looking very promising here.
It started as basically one page. Now it’s a MONSTER! With TEETH!
We haven't heard much from Henry, but that's because he's WAY busy.
From (presumably) any page on the site, enter search criteria of "contractor".
The 384 hits represent ongoing ACTION, virtually all of it involving Iraq.
I also suggest you go to: http://oversight.house.gov/features/moredollars/ (or select link on homepage of this site):
“More Dollars, Less Sense:
Worsening Contracting Trends Under the Bush Administration”
This page also includes a link to a database of all government contracts. If you want to see it, (presumably) it's there. (Perhaps some security issues. I haven't looked thoroughly.)
Henry takes his job VERY seriously. Watch this sight to see history in action!
He even went all the way back to the Cheney secret energy meetings issue, which preceded his placement on this committee by four years. 374 hits on that topic ALONE! (“ Cheney energy “) The man is a BULLDOG.
(At times, he’s just about my only ray of hope.)
PLEASE take a look.
THANK YOU!