At Least They’re Trying

As reported in “Army Families Online”, the Army stood up the Contracting Command last week.  Not bad – only five years after the greatest expansion of contracting on the battlefield ever, with up to a 1:1 ratio of contractors on the battlefield, and with the SecArmy saying we can’t fight a war without contractors – now is a good time to take a look at them.

Griffin said the stand-up was a historic event, not because it was a new command but because the Army was demonstrating to OSD leadership, Congress, and the American taxpayer that Army leadership was serious in taking steps to regain confidence in Army contracting and ensuring that it becomes one of the Army’s core competencies.
Parsons told the audience that his new command would be world-class providers of contracting support to warfighters whenever, wherever to meet their needs.  News: Army stands up contracting command

Maybe they’ll find some of the EIGHTpointEIGHT BILLION dollars that disappeared in a single day in Iraq.  Or maybe they’ll get forward enough on the battlefield to actually provide contract money to the COs in the remotest bases and not just the big complexes, then followup on local contracts and standards.

And here’s a near perfect illustration of one of my main points about these so-called American companies:

And now Congressional investigators report dodgy bookkeeping by which Blackwater insists its 850 operatives in Iraq are separate contractors, not employees. That little device has allowed the company to avoid paying an estimated $50 million in American payroll taxes. (The Private Sector’s Tramping in Iraq – New York Times)

Now Blackwater’s contracts with the State department won’t be under this kind of scrutiny but it brings home another point -the straight outflow of dollars from the treasury to these companies and then nothing comes back. They don’t pay taxes on lots of it, claiming to be offshore companies or they play paperwork games.  KBR and Haliburton, both Houston companies, only book a small percentage of their revenues as being paid here.  Most of the monies they make are claimed to be paid overseas to companies in the Cayman Islands.  Besides losing transparency, there are few tax dollars that come back into the country this way, piling up in dividends and salary instead.

Some will see the Contracting Command as more affirmation of the administration’s intent to permanently remain in Iraq.  Of course – there is one other thing that the Army and the larger Pentagon could do to insure more success and more accountability:  have an honest dialogue with the American citizenry about the costs of war and occupation, get their support, and then have the Armed Forces fight the damn thing!

The Private Sector’s Tramping in Iraq – New York Times

Here’s a near perfect illustration of one of my main points about these so-called American companies:

And now Congressional investigators report dodgy bookkeeping by which Blackwater insists its 850 operatives in Iraq are separate contractors, not employees. That little device has allowed the company to avoid paying an estimated $50 million in American payroll taxes.

The Private Sector’s Tramping in Iraq – New York Times