The Pentagon’s watchdog for Afghan spending found that a deteriorating security situation in the country is making it more difficult to keep U.S.-funded construction projects running.
The quarterly report released Friday found that Afghanistan was “even more dangerous” between October and December than it was over the same time period a year ago and that the Taliban controls more territory now than at any time since 2001.
“The lack of security has made it almost impossible for many U.S. and even some Afghan officials to get out to manage and inspect U.S.-funded reconstruction projects,” according to the report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction. “The dangers of absent oversight were exposed when a task force appointed by President Ashraf Ghani reportedly found that millions of dollars were being embezzled while Afghanistan pays for numerous nonexistent ‘ghost’ schools, ‘ghost’ teachers, and ‘ghost’ students.”
Lt. Gen. John Nicholson, the administration’s next pick to head the fight there, said Thursday that he agreed with senators’ assessments that the security situation in Afghanistan is getting worse, not better. He said the U.S. has “years to go” to build up some capabilities within the Afghan ranks, like intelligence gathering or air support, so they can operate independently.
Last year marks the first that Afghan forces took the lead in the fight, with American troops playing a support role. Nicholson said that the Afghan forces suffered serious casualties from Taliban attacks that were more aggressive than officials had predicted.
John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, appeared before Congress last week to testify that the $800 million the U.S. has spent building up the Afghan economy and infrastructure has yielded few if any successes.
Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., asked Nicholson at his confirmation hearing Thursday to look into wasteful spending in Afghanistan once he’s in his new job, since that money can be better spent support troops.
“I hope that you will follow up on SIGAR,” she said. “If you think about what we could do with $800 million to spend on troops, we can not afford to keep wasting money like this in Afghanistan.”
Over the last quarter of 2015, SIGAR investigations saved the U.S. taxpayer over $100,000, collected $110,000 in fines, forfeitures and restitutions and recovered $1.45 million in civil settlements, according to the report.
The watchdog group also closed several investigations, including one in which a U.S. Army sergeant pleaded guilty to “conspiracy to receive and accept illegal bribes by a public official.” The sergeant was sentenced to two years in prison followed by a year of supervised release.
Another U.S. Army sergeant pleaded guilty to the same charge, but was sentenced to only a year and a day behind bars, a year of supervised release and was ordered to forfeit $10,000, the report said.
SIGAR released several reports over the past year investigating spending by the Defense Department’s Task Force for Business and Stability Operations, which they found wasted millions on building a compressed natural gas station, housing its staff in luxurious villas and launching projects intended to bolster Afghanistan’s oil, gas and minerals industries that were not successful.
