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Official Report Faults Iraq Reconstruction
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As a senator, President-elect Barack Obama (D-Ill.) co-sponsored a bill introduced by Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), now the vice president-elect, to provide $7.5 billion in development money to Pakistan over the next five years. The bill was unanimously approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee but did not make it to the floor by the end of this year's session.
Development in war-torn Afghanistan -- where violence has increased sharply this year and where there is little infrastructure, no oil revenue, widespread government corruption, and rampant drug production and trafficking -- is seen by many as even more problematic than in Iraq.
The United States has spent $32 billion on Afghan reconstruction since 2001, and the international community has contributed $25.3 billion. Obama has pledged more resources for the effort, along with an expanded military presence.
Although Congress established an Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR, in January, it has barely gotten off the ground. Its leader, retired Marine Maj. Gen. Arnold Fields, was not sworn in until late July, and $20 million in initially authorized funding was never disbursed. A supplemental war appropriation in the summer allotted $2 million for SIGAR; Congress subsequently made an additional $5 million available.
In his first quarterly report to Congress in October, Fields said that "due to current funding restraints, SIGAR does not expect to reach full operational capacity until the 4th quarter of fiscal year 2009." Of an anticipated 90 employees, he said, 21 have been hired.
In a clear evocation of the problems SIGIR found in Iraq, Fields noted that "the evolving political and security dynamics of the Afghan reconstruction agenda has challenged the implementation of a coherent and enduring strategy.
"As a result," Fields said, "clear lines of command and control appear to be lacking, setting the conditions for diffused responsibility and accountability."
