Massive amounts of money poured into US programs in Afghanistan have just plain gone missing, but even in those cases where the contractor and the program can be accounted for the results are mixed, at best.
The latest case, brought to us by McClatchy, is Tetra Tech (NASDAQ: TTEK), which the US government paid $15 million to “boost Afghans’ confidence in their justice system.” Mostly a company that consults for water companies, they had no experience in Afghanistan at the time.
Not that anyone really has experience in successfully convincing Afghans that their notoriously crooked justice system isn’t notoriously crooked, but the project appears to have gone off the rails, with the company’s team holed up in a five star Kabul hotel.
So far, the sum total of their events, beyond some pretty hefty hotel bills, has been a pair of kite-flying events. People in Afghanistan do like to fly kites, its true, but handing out free kites with “pro-justice messages” on them has been mocked as a rather silly use of US taxpayer dollars, even more-so when they are used in regions where the majority of the population can’t read anyhow.
If teaching the Afghans to respect justice is the real mission…I have a recommendation or two…stop making war on the people and end the occupation… followed by an honest reconstruction effort that does not continue to pour money down the proverbial "rat hole" enriching only Washington's cronies and their hand-picked, select cabal of Afghan politicians.
I can just picture the Afghans point to a courthouse, holding their stomachs and bursting in gut-wrenching laughter. Kinda like we do here in the US.
Many years ago there was the quintesential idea that Americans that were overseas were ignorant and arrogant, not unlike the James Bond Movie and the Bayou Sherriff in Thailand.
The sad thing is that in fact this isnt just an idea it is in fact the truth, Americans DONT HAVE EFFEN CLUE in other peoples cultures. Now I am an Aussie an I have seen and heard some really dumb and crass things spoken by our American Bretheren and we have a SIMILAR culture. Its time for US governemnt types to actually give such jobs to those that know or at least are supposed to know, the company is a Bottled Water consultant, for Pete's sake.