Rapid Fire September 10, 2012: Afghanistan Close, But No SIGAR

* The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) released its interim report [PDF] on the pretroleum-related logistics capabilities of the Afghan National Army (ANA). NATO’s Combined Security Transition Command in Afghanistan (NTM-A/CSTC-A) has been training and equipping them for a total close to $1.1B over the 2007-2012 period. This has trickled down into recent annual justifications in the US Army budget in the $340M-$430M range. The SIG notified [PDF] the Pentagon of what they see as significant problems: “CSTC-A did not have any records of fuel purchase and payment information prior to March 2011 because, according to CSTC-A, all ANA POL financial records totaling nearly $475 million from fiscal year 2007 to February 2011 had been shredded in violation of DOD and Department of the Army policies. It also did not have records or practices in place to fully account for fuel consumption once vendors delivered the fuel directly to ANA locations. In June 2012, CSTC-A was able to reconcile the ANA fuel purchases with payments between March 2011 to March 2012, but still could not account for fuel consumption.” * In response NTM-A/CSTC-A issued a short statement saying they are aware of and addressing these “deficiencies.” A year […]