What Did $19 Billion Buy?
June 28th, 2007Guess who’s training and arming the Iraqi insurgents… That’s right.
Via: Washington Post:
The United States has invested $19 billion to train and equip nearly 350,000 Iraqi soldiers and police since toppling Saddam Hussein, but the ability of those forces to provide security remains in doubt, according to the findings of a bipartisan congressional investigation to be released today.
As a result, President Bush’s pledge to have U.S. troops “stand down” as Iraqi forces “stand up” remains unfulfilled. Instead, U.S. troop numbers and operations have escalated in recent months, and the overall level of violence has not decreased.
Despite the substantial number of Iraqi security forces and their increasing willingness to fight — demonstrated by rising numbers of casualties — their progress toward taking full responsibility for the nation’s security remains mixed, according to a report on the investigation by the oversight panel of the House Armed Services Committee. U.S. commanders now predict that it will take years and tens of thousands more Iraqi soldiers and police to achieve that goal.
The Pentagon “cannot report in detail how many of the 346,500 Iraqi military and police personnel that the coalition trained are operational today,” according to the 250-page report. Details of the document were provided to The Washington Post by congressional staff members.
“We have no idea what our $19 billion has gotten us,” said Rep. Martin T. Meehan (D-Mass.), chairman of the Armed Services subcommittee on oversight and investigations, noting that the United States investment represents $55,000 per Iraqi recruit.
“The DOD can’t tell us how well the Iraqis perform their missions or even plan them,” he said in an interview. “The police are in particularly bad shape, although they are critical to counterinsurgency.”
The lack of transparency is especially worrisome, the report said, because of the possibility that Iraqi forces trained and equipped by the United States have joined the insurgency or sectarian militias.
“This report details the complete lack of understanding of who we have trained and what happens to them after we train them,” Meehan said. “Many of the forces we have trained are unaccounted for, and others are on the rolls but haven’t been vetted,” he said, adding that forces “could actually be fighting against us.”
The subcommittee’s report found “strong evidence” that some Iraqi forces trained by the U.S.-led military coalition are involved in sectarian violence and other illegal activities. In addition, the Pentagon “cannot account for whether coalition-issued weapons have been stolen or turned against U.S. forces,” the report said.
The $19 billion in appropriations — about $5 billion each fiscal year since 2004 — has primarily gone toward recruiting, training and equipping Iraqi security forces but also includes funding for building training centers, managing logistics and creating an Iraqi leadership structure in the ministries of defense and the interior.
And who got that $19 billion? Whether the training’s working or not, somebody or somebodies made $19 billion. If “Operation Iraqi Freedom” is nothing but a cash cow, (besides being an excuse to control the oil), then this is just business as usual. What’s the big deal? But of course, that’s not how it’s spun, and telling us who made the money would move us, the readers, in the direction of the truth.
The funny thing is those who call themselves the “left” (Daily Kos etc.), whatever that is (there really is no “left” in the US – the same people control both “left” and “right” thru their Hegelian Dialectic method of “foundations” funding both sides as a mechanism of control – see the “Nation” mag etc.), seem to view Bush and his cronies in every disaster for us “normals” as “incompetent”. Very foolish. Bush and his handlers (i.e. the old man and his NWO buddies including the bankers, Clinton, and the “opposition” party etc.) clearly have a well thought out plan (or take their orders, receiving position and profit, from those with the plan) that they have been working on same for decades – – and all is going quite well as to that plan – – it’s just not the one you will hear about on corporate tv – – there you will only hear about “incompetence” in terms of Katrina, Iraq, corporate pollution, etc. As mass murder continues on due to “incompetence” maybe the “left” and “progressives” might want to wake up to the fact that “incompetence” is/has become a great defense for mass murder. Hitler should have had such great PR in the press as his prodigy the fascists currently running the show – – ya see him and his buddies Himmler and the guys were just “incompetent” that’s why 20 million plus were murdered, er died thru incompetence, in the 1940s . . . AIDs was some kind of incompetence, 911 was incompetence, blah, blah, blah, . . . it’s coming our way soon but don’t look for the NYT or the WaPo, America’s versions of the Soviet’s Pravda, to do anything but sell the peons, er US citizens, down the river to “Bird Flu” (due to medical “incompetence”),the Halliburton camps constructed and ready for construction (highly portable, a big improvement on those 1940s German Camps that took so much longer to construct) w/I believe about $300 million of our money they were given to get ready for construction of same . . . . don’t worry your Blackwater Mercs will be patroling your gated communtities (see Katrina to get an idea of their work to come in the “Homeland”) w/orders to shoot to kill “intruders”, protecting your right to eat freedom fries if you can find any in the garbage pits of the 1-5% who will soon own everything in the coming feudal (Dominionist Christian) society . . . but hey, go ahead and read the “Nation” etc. (but please check out their funding sources for a good laugh and look up Hegelian Dialectic) – – and remember as they will always tell you, there are no conspiracies, just “conspiracy theoricists” . . . have fun in the camps . . . .
TMB: It’ll be interesting if the scenario you picture actually happens (but I don’t think the Dominionists will be running it…and DO NOT call them “Christians”! They are most certainly NOT! They worship power, not Christ! Anyway, they are known by true believers in Christ as “mystery Babylon, mother of harlots.” As for the camps, the people (such as myself) who are aware of what’s coming down will, because we are mentally, physically, and emotionaly prepared, probably avoid them. These camps are for the masses, the so-called “zombies,” who are hugely in debt, will be foreclosed on, and won’t know what is hitting them. What happened to Katrina victims will be writ very large…did you know that New Orleans is fast becoming the “Delta City” of “Robocop” fame, and that “Old New Orleans” is NOT going to be rebuilt, as with “Old Detroit”? But yes, your scenario looks very plausible, except you forgot to mention that those camps of your will actually be “debtor prisons” (I mean, the oligarchs have to have some kind of rational, eh?)