Rep. Dennis Kucinich is currently asking for a flood of calls to trigger a debate on war spending, through "yes" votes on his resolution now on the floor calling for U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan by the end of the year. A 3 hour debate and vote will take place tomorrow.
Just happened across a startling piece, even for me, by the Nation's Jeremy Scahill which details how Afghanistan has become U.S. private contractor piggy land even by Bush administration standards.
In Afghanistan, the Obama administration blows the Bush administration out of the privatized water. According to a memo [PDF] released by [Sen. Claire] McCaskill’s staff, "From June 2009 to September 2009, there was a 40% increase in Defense Department contractors in Afghanistan. During the same period, the number of armed private security contractors working for the Defense Department in Afghanistan doubled, increasing from approximately 5,000 to more than 10,000."
This was written back in December, just after Obama announced the "surge":
as a result of the coming surge of 30,000 troops in Afghanistan, there may be up to 56,000 additional contractors deployed. But here is another group of contractors that often goes unmentioned: 3,600 State Department contractors and 14,000 USAID contractors. That means that the current total US force in Afghanistan is approximately 189,000 personnel (68,000 US troops and 121,000 contractors). And remember, that’s right now. And that, according to McCaskill, is a conservative estimate. A year from now, we will likely see more than 220,000 US-funded personnel on the ground in Afghanistan.
It's party time on K Street. The money spigots are flowing, and there is no one watching where it goes:
Despite the massive number of contracts and contractors in Afghanistan, oversight is utterly lacking. "The increase in Afghanistan contracts has not seen a corresponding increase in contract management and oversight..."
According to one USAID official, the agency is "sending too much money, too fast with too few people looking over how it is spent." As a result, the agency does not "know ... where the money is going."
What's the solution to too many private contracts and no one knowing where the money is going? More private contracts! Yee haw!
The Obama administration is continuing the Bush-era policy of hiring contractors to oversee contractors. According to the McCaskill memo:
"In Afghanistan, USAID is relying on contractors to provide oversight of its large reconstruction and development projects. According to information provided to the Subcommittee, International Relief and Development (IRD) was awarded a five-year contract in 2006 to oversee the $1.4 billion infrastructure contract awarded to a joint venture of the Louis Berger Group and Black and Veatch Special Projects. USAID has also awarded a contract Checci and Company to provide support for contracts in Afghanistan."
Kucinich calls the next two days critical in whether or not congressmen hear from constituents on his resolution. If it is blown out of the water, someone turn that music back up because the cops are gone and the party is still on. If a flood of outrage gets a good number to change their votes to "yes," then it could trigger a real debate when the next war spending bill comes up later this spring. It is understood that the bill has little chance of passing and so Kucinich has designed it as a barometer for this purpose.
Kucinich Privileged Resolution on Withdrawal from Afghanistan
Call your congress member.