Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Weapons we paid for lost in Iraq, some used to kill Americans.

We know (and it has been documented ad nauseum) how there has been little or no accountability for money that has been sent to Iraq-- you know, the guys who were driving around Baghdad in pickup trucks early on during the occuption of Iraq handing out wads of hundred dollar bills, trying to buy us love.

We know that there has been little or no accountability for the no-bid contracts handed out to Halliburton and other contractors. That too has been documented ad nauseum.

But you'd think at least there would be some accountability for weapons sent to Iraq. After all, if we are arming people, we at least want to know who we are in fact arming and where the arms are wouldn't you?

Well, apparently not.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- The Pentagon cannot account for 190,000 AK-47 rifles and pistols given to Iraqi security forces in 2004 and 2005, or about half the weapons earmarked for soldiers and police, according to a government report.

The Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of the U.S. Congress, said in a July 31 report to lawmakers that the Defense Department also cannot account for 135,000 items of body armor and 115,000 helmets reported to be issued to Iraqi forces as of September 22, 2005....

One senior Pentagon official told The Washington Post some weapons probably were being used against U.S. troops. He said an Iraqi brigade created in Falluja disintegrated in 2004 and began fighting American soldiers.


So even arms aren't worth auditing when we send them into a country full of enemies. Un-friggin-believable. The ineptitude and incompetence of this administration is simply mind-boggling.

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