$80 Billion For What? (berman / Nation)

[struggle4progress]

The Iraq War currently costs American taxpayers $1.5 billion a week. With 1,438 US fatalities and calls for withdrawal surfacing, the Bush Administration wants an additional $80 billion to maintain the occupation.

Even before this funding request, the war's costs have amounted to three times more than the $60 billion Bush estimated before the invasion. When former White House budget chief Lawrence Lindsay projected the likely costs at closer to $100 or $200 billion, he was publicly admonished by the Administration and later fired. It's actually worse than Lindsay thought; factoring in the $80 billion, the war will cost $105 billion this fiscal year alone.

Before Congress allocates billions more, it should closely examine how previous funds for Iraqi reconstruction have already been misspent. The special inspector general for Iraqi reconstruction, Stuart Bowen, disclosed this week that the US Coalition Provisional Authority lost track of roughly $9 billion given to Iraqi ministries by the US. As part of the Iraqi Development Fund--consisting of Iraqi oil sales and assets seized from Saddam Hussein--the money was "left open to fraud, kickbacks, and misappropriation of funds," the report charged. The Iraqi auditors who should've overseen the money weren't even working at the time it was doled out, between October 2003 and June 2004.

Last Spring, former administrator Paul Bremer promised "fundamental" internal controls over reconstruction funding. Instead, Bremer paid one ministry for 8,206 guards of whom only 602 showed up, awarded a $1.4 million contract to Northstar Consultants for an audit that was never done and spent $435 million on another ministry without proper oversight controls. Bowen's report follows a United Nations audit last October that could not account for $1 billion in reconstruction projects and another $1.4 billion deposited by Kurdish leaders in Northern Iraq. <snip>

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/outrage