Leopold: Congressional Report: Gross Mismanagement of Iraq Funds

Received an email today from Jason from Truthout.org on his latest article. Cheers!

A damning report issued last month by the nonpartisan research arm ofCongress says the Department of Defense continues to overstate its financialneeds, by tens of billions of dollars, to fund the wars in Afghanistan andIraq. The agency also casts serious doubt on President Bush's statementsthat money to fund the war will dry up by the end of the month if hisbudgetary demands are not immediately met.


The 45-page report, "The Cost of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Other Global Waron Terror Operations Since 9/11," prepared for Congress by the CongressionalResearch Service, warned lawmakers that before they release additional fundsto the Pentagon for the Iraq war, they should first demand that DefenseDepartment officials provide an accurate accounting of how the money isbeing spent.


Since 2001, the Pentagon has grossly mismanaged the $510 billion spentthus far on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars; has used money earmarked forequipment upgrades to finance fighting on the battlefield, and has refusedto provide Congress with a transparent accounting of the money it has spentand intends to spend, according to the CRS report.


"Congressional leaders have promised more scrutiny of theadministration's requests for a [fiscal year] 2007 supplemental and [fiscalyear] 2008 war costs. The [fiscal year] 2007 supplemental requests anadditional $93.4 billion for war costs, which would bring DOD's annual warcost to $163.4 billion, the highest to date and 40 percent more than in2006. If enacted, cumulative war costs would reach $607 billion," the reportsays. "Thus far, Congress is receiving fairly detailed quarterly reportingon various metrics for success in Iraq ... but cost is not one of thosemetrics."

Exacerbating the issue is the fact that the Department of Defense "hasperiodically revised the figures shown for each operation in previous years,suggesting questions about the validity of its figures," the report says,adding that some of the department's supplemental requests for 2007 include"$2 billion from some unknown source."

Until now, President Bush has enjoyed the luxury of having a Republican majority in Congress issue the Defense Department a blank check to use asthe administration saw fit in Iraq without needed oversight from lawmakers,the report said.


Now, with a Democratic majority presiding over both Houses,Congressional researchers have advised lawmakers that they should becautious not to give in to urgent budgetary demands from the administrationthat may very well be based on financial chicanery, the report added.


The report recommends that Congress should consider taking drasticmeasures to rein in the administration's out-of-control spending and draw onhistory for guidance. More on Jason's article.

This is why it is important for Pelosi, Waxman, and the 110th Congress to hold the President and the money that is being allocated for the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and for the troops accountable!!!! For six years, we cannot account all of the money that were allocated and/or spent for the troops and for the war.