Where's The Money? Lost In War
In 2008 Congress created the bipartisan commission on wartime spending. The commission, set to expire the end of next month, was setup to function as a Truman style commission. They have finally released their report and it shows how much waste there actually has been in Iraq and Afghanistan:
As much as $60 billion in U.S. funds has been lost to waste and fraud in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade through lax oversight of contractors, poor planning and payoffs to warlords and insurgents, an independent panel investigating U.S. wartime spending estimates.
In its final report to Congress, the Commission on Wartime Contracting said the figure could grow as U.S. support for reconstruction projects and programs wanes, leaving both countries to bear the long-term costs of sustaining the schools, medical clinics, barracks, roads and power plants already built with American tax dollars.
As this story grows, it's going to be interesting to see how quickly the right starts blaming Obama for all the waste, so I feel it necessary to engage in a friendly reminder:
The man Congress put in charge of auditing the billions of dollars dumped on Iraq after Saddam Hussein was toppled has told the Los Angels Times he can't rule out the possibility that $6.6 billion in cash sent from the U.S. was stolen.
Special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction Stuart Bowen told the Times the missing money may represent "the largest theft of funds in national history."
