How decay overtook Walter Reed

[babylonsister]

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0307/p01s01-usmi.html

How decay overtook Walter Reed
The problems at the US Army hospital show how strained military resources have become.
By Gordon Lubold | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

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WASHINGTON - Lawmakers probing the scandal at Walter Reed Army Medical Center are saying it wasn't just a failure of leadership.

Constrained resources during a war lasting longer and costing more than anyone in the administration had expected, along with a controversial privatization initiative at the hospital, also played a role. But beyond these circumstances, one key factor has come up during congressional testimony this week: The facility was due to be shuttered in coming years, raising the possibility that officials were reluctant to make large financial commitments to it.

This combination of challenges illustrates just how strained military resources have become as the US grapples with its longest conflict since the Vietnam War. And as the current center of attention, Walter Reed has emerged as a symbol of the difficult decisions confronting the Pentagon. A core question: How can the Defense Department maintain facilities that are to be closed, including its premier Army hospital, without essentially throwing money away?

"You've got to pay the money, and the reason is simple: Up until the moment you cease operations, and you pull down the flag, it's a US military installation, and it has vital services it has to provide," says Christopher Hellman, a former congressional staffer who has followed the base-closure process closely. (Walter Reed is part of the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process.) "The reality is you don't have the luxury of canceling contracts and delaying maintenance work at what is still an operational facility," says Mr. Hellman, now a military policy analyst at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation in Washington.

Still, some experts don't necessarily see that the Army made a conscious decision to stop paying maintenance bills on the facilities at Walter Reed just because it was closing.

"Buildings don't fall apart in the year and a half since the base closure commission issued its recommendations," says Jeremiah Gertler, a senior analyst on the 1995 base closure commission.

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[peacetalksforall]

1. Three issues: contractor, profit, and outright danger.

Why did we give a contractor our taxpayer dollars for operations and maintenance?
What did the Army or Pentagon say to the contractor that appeared to give them permissions to let it go and where has the money gone?
How could any military person allow sick soldiers be subject to the fungus of molds and rodents?

Contractor: IAP Worldwide Services - the same contractor who drove Katrina ice all over the country. A once honorable company until they got into the fat taxpayer dollars of war deals with PNACers. Yes, I'm accusing - until they step forward and defend themselves with some truth and insight. The accusation is also against the military and this administration.