Afghanistan And Iraq At Risk For Contracting Fraud

By Justin Duckham-Talk Radio News Service

A dilapidated U.S. compound in Kabul plagued with broken pipes and an unusable sewage system is only one of many examples that U.S. reconstruction efforts in the Middle East continue to be susceptible to incompetence, wasteful spending, and fraud at the hands of contractors, according to the Commission on War Time Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“We don’t have enough people watching the contractors. Seventy percent of our contracts go to sub-contractors...we have to get the information second hand. We need to reexamine that,” said Christopher Shays, the current co-Chairman of the Commission on War Time Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan, during a hearing held today with the House Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs.

Shay, and fellow co-Chairman Michael J. Thibault’s testimony coincides with the release of their Committee’s interim report detailing the extent of the mismanagement in the two countries. The report highlighted several key issues including the presence of an insufficient amount staff for supervision, technological limitations within the contractors’ companies including out-of-date billing and labor systems, and an overall lack of accountability.

KBR, a Texas based construction and engineering company that acted as the military’s sole contractor for the Logistics Civil Augmentation Program, was named as one of the company’s responsible for losing billions of dollars in wasteful spending.

“I don’t think we’re aware of another program, contrac, or contractor that has had this number of suspensions or referrals,” said Defense Contract Audit Agency Director April Stephenson during a May hearing with the Commission on War Time Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

There are 240,000 contractor employees aiding the U.S. in Iraq, Afghanistan, and surrounding areas. Since 2001 1,360 contractor employees have been killed in the two countries.

Senator Joe Biden (D-DE) Investigates Perscription Drug Abuse

A joint Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary and the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control held a hearing entitled “Generation Rx: The Abuse of Prescription and Over-the-Counter Drugs.” The Committee discussed drug abuse with a panel made up of experts including medical epidemiologist, Dr. Len Paulozzi, as well as Director of the National Institute of Drug Abuse Dr. Nora Volkow.

Chaired by Senator Joe Biden (D-DE), the experts’ testimonies at the hearing were appalling. The testimonies showed how opioids (such as Vicoden), central nervous system depressants (such as Xanax and Valium), and stimulants, were among the drugs most commonly abused by American’s today.

Paulozzi’s report concluded by noting the obvious- prescription drug overdoses are a serous health problem. Biden noted that prescribes should be taught to less carefree in dispensing pain medications, and other drugs that could leave patients susceptible to addiction. With the rate of drug overdoses and drug related fatalities growing at a startlingly high rate, Biden’s concern about the American drug dependency and problems with abuse is not difficult to realize.