Baghdad's Missing Billions Rediscovered
| Wed Feb. 7, 2007 9:59 AM PST
After former CPA head Paul Bremer got grilled by Henry Waxman yesterday, the press has rediscovered the story of the billions of dollars in reconstruction money that went missing during the heady days after the fall of Baghdad. In particular, it's glommed onto the nifty fact that the U.S. government shipped 363 tons of Benjamins (and maybe some Ulysseses, too) to Iraq—much of which was spread around like play money. In his defense, Bremer explained, "We were in the middle of a war, working in very difficult conditions, and we had to move quickly to get this Iraqi money working for the Iraqi people." Apparently democracy is a lot easier to export than standard accounting practices.
The revealing tale of the cash airlift isn't new, however—we wrote about it in September 2005. It's good to see it being picked up again, though. And it gives me an excuse to post this great photo of CPA officials giddily posing with $2 million in cash, which was given to the security contractor Custer Battles, which was accused ofdefrauding the government.
Update: Post amended in light of Custer Battles' fraud conviction being overturned later today.
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Comments
There is no excuse for the mismanagement. In private business, people would get fired, starting with the president, on down. The money trail should be thoroughly investigated. The Democrats are cowards if they do not thoroughly investigate this matter and put pressure on getting the incompetents fired. This is not a question of politics. Even assuming that it was right to go to Iraq, the subsequent handling is pure incompetency.
I understand the amount now declared "missing" is about $12 billions. Wouldn't that be nice to put into Social Security solvency or Medicare? No, that money has been eaten up by the filthy corruption that shows what the real reason for this "war" was.
Why cash? There is no excuse. The Iraqi banks continued to function. Visa is still everywhere etc. The phones worked so online charges and money transfers could be handled. There is no excuse. This is organized crime. The perpetrators are traitors and should be spending the rest of their lives behind bars. This is RICO stuff.
Where's the special prosecutor?
I think when this was done was right after the "war" ended and there were no banks, etc. By the way, I read today that Custer Battles was completely vindicated in the allegations of fraud against them when the judge threw their case out.
