Billions of Dollars Unaccounted For in Iraq, Pentagon IG Reports
| Thu May. 22, 2008 10:45 AM PDT
Want to see a signature worth $320 million? Click here. It belongs to Jack Gardner, an official with the now-defunct Coalition Provisional Authority, who in July 2003 authorized that amount to be transferred to the Iraqi Ministry of Finance for the payment of Iraqi salaries. There are no other records of the transfer, just Mr. Gardner's John Hancock. Now that's power.
The payment is but one example of the process by which U.S. dollars have disappeared without a trace into the confusion (and, yes, corruption) of Iraq reconstruction, confounding Pentagon auditors who are now trying to find out where all that money went... and what exactly, if anything, the U.S. got in return.
One such auditor is Mary L. Ugone, the Pentagon's deputy inspector general for audit. Her testimony this morning before Rep. Henry Waxman's (D-Calif.) Committee on Oversight and Government Reform coincided with the release of a new report from Pentagon's Office of Inspector General, which reviewed over 180,000 payments made by the Pentagon to contractors in Iraq, Kuwait, and Egypt, totaling approximately $8.2 billion. Of that, the Pentagon admits that it cannot properly account for how $7.8 billion—"a stunning 95% failure rate in following basic accounting standards," Waxman said in his opening statement.
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The IG report details how $135 million was paid to the governments of the United Kingdom, South Korea, Poland, and others contributing troops to Iraq without any mechanism for determining how it was used. Another $1.8 billion in seized Iraqi assets were also simply given away, without any accountability. IG investigators examined 53 payment invoices. Not one made note of the money's ultimate destination.
Together with a separate Pentagon IG report released last November, which showed the Defense Department could not account for at least $5 billion issued to Iraqi security forces (causing it to lose track of nearly all of the 13,508 rifles, machine guns, and RPGs it provided to Iraqi troops), today's report sets the new total of Pentagon Iraq funds lost or stolen at almost $15 billion.
To date, Pentagon auditors have referred 28 cases to criminal investigators.
Photo used under a Creative Commons license from SqueakyMarmot.
Comments
I feel Britney/Paris story coming on in an effort by the media to distract people from this issue. Maybe we can talk more about some polygamists in Texas instead of the fact that all this money we give to the Gov is going to places we don't know. I know if I was in a war torn country I'd be corrupt and keep any money some foreign country dropped in my lap.
Too bad that 7.8 billion that we cannot account for is not being invested in U.S. interests, I mean interests besides oil. What about jobs and crime? Maybe some better education for the kids?
J, you're absolutely right! It will never make the news. And to be perfectly honest, even if it did, would it make a difference? Would people stop and think "what the fuck are these beltway douches doing? why did we vote these people into office? that money belongs to the AMERICAN PEOPLE, not Halliburton."
I WANT TO RIP MY HAIR FROM MY SCALP WHEN I READ ABOUT THE GOVERNMENT'S WASTE!!!!
Here one wonders: This have anything to do with "Iraq Corruption Whistleblowers Made to Suffer," AP, 08/24/07.
"Cases show fraud exposers have been vilified, fired, or detained for weeks."
What about how Justice Brandise decided that when the Govt. is the lawbreaker it breeds contempt for the law...
Conversely, "That is the effect of seeing a brave whistleblower stand up and win; it inspires the rest of us," Office of Special Counsel's War On Whistleblowers, D. Schulman, MoJo, 04/24/07.
"OSC is investigating Karl Rove's political machine. But until recently OSC head Scott Bloch's policy was to ignore whistleblowers' tips on murder, espionage, and terrorism, while vigorously rooting out any signs of the 'homosexual agenda.'"
...One "rich" man's agenda..., is an honest man's mortal sin...
Submitted by Gary E. Andrews (not verified) on Fri May. 23, 2008 3:53 PM PDT.
There was no logic for invading Iraq, except for personal profit. This access to the U. S. Treasury gave the gang of violent extremists who have taken over the U. S. government unfettered access to cash. These signatures worth millions are not for multi-million dollar checks or electronic funds transfers, the normal mode of modern transactions; they are for cash. Cash is much easier to steal. Especially in a war zone. It loses its paper trail immediately. It becomes legitimate capital for investment in other commerce, political donations, covert actions around planet Earth to advance the fascist agenda, personal wealth to last a lifetime, for generations of the perpetrators' families and causes.
CBS' 60 Minutes had a man who audited the Pentagon for decades and was consistently unable to account for trillions of dollars that disappear there.
Since there were no longer any Reagan-Bush Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, and Iraq had no involvement with the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks, the only remaining logic for invading there was to perpetrate this looting of the U. S. Treasury. That and the Iraqi treasury, and the treasuries of whatever other countries' could be lured into the 'Coalition of the Billing.'
And the spilling of blood? Well, that's the price they're willing to pay. Their sons and daughters aren't there. But everyone else's are, and will be for the five more years the fascist perpetrators' candidate-select, McCain, says he needs, and the hundred years of occupation of Iraq he says will be "...alright with me." Your tax dollars at work.
If going bankrupt is the way for the US to withdraw drom Iraq, so be it! In fact, the rest of the world citizens cannot wait for that day to come. On the other hand, what an exquisite and ironic piece of news. In South America, the US has always lectured us on how corrupt we are and what a sinkhole our governments are. Well, it seems the US government happens to be a huge black hole.
There's a lot of people in this Republic that are trying to make a change....look for them. Go outside and look around and join them.
Perhaps the only way I deal with the tragic losses we have suffered as a Nation, ie: morals, trust and integrity to name a few, is to believe that once again we as a 'people' will take back our Country. One step at a time but always forward.
Watch DemocracyNow! or become a member of IVAW.org and join the brave soldiers speaking out against our 'crimes against humanity'.
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