If there was fraud in Iraq construction aid, prosecute it. But otherwise, this is nothing to get worked up over:
Ten years and $60 billion in American taxpayer funds later, Iraq is still so unstable and broken that even its leaders question whether U.S. efforts to rebuild the war-torn nation were worth the cost.
In his final report to Congress, Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction Stuart Bowen's conclusion was all too clear: Since the invasion a decade ago this month, the U.S. has spent too much money in Iraq for too few results.
The reconstruction effort "grew to a size much larger than was ever anticipated," Bowen told The Associated Press in a preview of his last audit of U.S. funds spent in Iraq, to be released Wednesday. "Not enough was accomplished for the size of the funds expended."
You'll recall that the enemy kept blowing things up. So much of the money had to be used for security related expenditures. And rebuilding stuff again and again.
Recall, too, that we did not attack Iraqi infrastructure during our invasion to avoid having to immediately rebuild it, only to find that the infrastructure was so worn out that it had to be rebuilt from the ravages of Saddam's neglect. When sanctions "sequestered" his income, the palaces did not suffer--basic infrastructure used by the people--especially by Shia people--went without maintenance.
The most basic point this misses is that money is ammunition in a counter-insurgency fight, as I wrote four years ago when the head of the effort was just getting going:
Yet let's not get too carried away in this exercise [in auditing]. If there was fraud, by all means prosecute the guilty. But in a counter-insurgency, money is ammunition. We should not question it in terms of effect by examining efficiency. Do we examine whether expenditures of ammunition was necessary? No. And nobody raises a stink if an infantry platoon burns through ammunition and calls in fire support to nail a single sniper in a building. It was necessary to spend money in Iraq to undermine the insurgents' appeal and nullify terror damage. Slowing down that expenditure to rigorously account for the money before spending it would have hampered the war effort.
Really, we spent 14 times as much at the stroke of a pen in the 2009 stimulus. How's the audit on that going? And we spent far more on bullets and fighting-related expenses. Construction aid was a small fraction of the war spending (not quite as much as the stimulus act, if I recall). And it was well worth it. The objective of the spending was to win the war--not build a lovely mall for all to enjoy and turn a tidy profit in the end. We spent on civilian projects to win hearts and minds. This was simply not the same as civilian spending in a peacetime environment.
Again, this was a method of winning the war no different in its objective than shooting the enemy or collecting intelligence. Discussing the efficiency is just stupid. You want to discuss effectiveness? By all means. But do remember that we won the war, in the end, by defeating the armed enemies.
If you are worried about making the results in Iraq worth the cost, why aren't you screaming as loud as I have about remaining in Iraq to defend our gains during the post-war struggle to define the new Iraq that will arise from the ashes of the old Iraq of Saddam crushed in 2003 and the campaign to defeat Iranian and al Qaeda efforts from 2004 to 2008 to be the ones to define Iraq?
UPDATE: While reading another article on this, I caught this linked article from 2009 on a contractor problem uncovered by the investigation:
As soldiers exit the dining facility, run by KBR and its subcontractor Najlaa International Catering Services Iraq, they see signs along the emerald walkway urging those who "like to recycle" to follow the path and "Think Green." At the end of the path, soldiers sort aluminum cans and plastic silverware into separate bins.
But there's one problem: The recyclable goods are thrown into a pit with the rest of the trash and burned. While this is likely to disappoint soldiers who "like to recycle," it also is a breach of the government's contract with KBR to run the dining facility on FOB Warhorse, according to the US government's Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA).
The chimerical recycling program is apparently a microcosmic example of the spotty accountability under which contractors have operated – at substantial expense to US taxpayers. A report issued Oct. 30 by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) said that audits of $6.4 billion worth of contracts revealed "internal weaknesses," including inadequate oversight of invoices and excessive change orders. The report also noted evidence of duplicate payments and payments sent to fictitious addresses and unapproved contractors.
Horrors! In a war effort, a contractor didn't recycle! Good grief. Like I said, by all means go after corruption and try to correct problems. But don't forget that the spending was an effort to win a war. I'm not nearly as shocked that KBR failed to recycle as much as I'm shocked that we put recycling into a war-support contract.
