The Universal Seduction: Pentagon Privatizes $15 Billion Iraq War Fraud

(May 24, 2008) Privatizing Iraq War Fraud by the Pentagon continues to be the favorite corporate-government insider scam, grossing up to $15 billion in bogus payments for unverified and alleged "goods and services," according to an audit by the Inspector General of the Department of Defense.

The Pentagon report, entitled "Internal Controls Over Payments Made in Iraq, Kuwait and Egypt," notes that auditors were also unable to find any records to explain a mysterious $134.8 million payment --

$68.2 million to the United Kingdom, $45.3 million to Poland and $21.3 million to South Korea. These payments could be Pentagon bribes for support of the ill-fated War on Iraq.

The audit also reported that the Pentagon did not have any required paper work to document expenditures, i.e. no receipts, vouchers, signatures, or invoices for $7.8 billion that American and Iraqi contractors were allegedly paid, according to the 69-page audit.

If the Pentagon were a civilian corporation, all its personnel would be in prison -- not only for war crimes, but for fraud and criminal conspiracy.

"We estimated that the army made $1.4 billion in commercial payments that lacked the minimum documentation for a valid payment, such as properly prepared receiving reports, invoices, and certified vouchers," the DoD's Deputy Inspector General Mary Ugone told a Congressional committee on May 22, 2008.

"We also estimated that the army made an additional $6.3 billion of commercial payments that met the 27 criteria for payments but did not comply with other statutory and regulatory requirements."

The Pentagon also gave away another $1.8 billion in war booty (Iraqi assets) with absolutely no accountability.

Plus $5 billion was spent on paying (bribing) so-called Iraqi security forces which could not be properly traced either, according to a previous November 2007 Inspector General report.

"Taken together, the Inspector General found that the defense department did not properly account for almost $15 billion," said Congressman Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

According to documents shown at the Waxman hearing, there were many more instances of egregious in-your-face fraud and conspiracy. For example, a cash payment of $320.8 million in Iraqi money was authorized on the basis of a single signature and the words "Iraqi Salary Payment" on an invoice.

In another case, $11.1 million was paid to IAP, an American contractor, on the basis of a voucher with no indication of what was delivered, reported the New York Times.

"The disclosure that $1.8 billion in Iraqi assets was mishandled comes on top of an earlier finding by an independent federal oversight agency, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, that United States occupation authorities early in the conflict could not account for the disbursement of $8.8 billion in Iraqi oil money and seized assets," the New York Times continues.

According to Ugone, the Pentagon has been appropriated $492 billion for the War on Iraq to date.

Most of these appropriations have been "privatized" or skimmed through the normal Pentagon scam channels by "Beltway Bandits," the cabal of corporate-government insiders who always get the best of the choice Pentagon frauds.

Since the Pentagon is run by high-level professional thieves, all bets are off...

SOURCES:
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5ieRhHYX-NosV0VEguc06fs15a4Jg

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/22/AR2008052203751_pf.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/23/world/middleeast/23audit.html?hp=&pagewanted=all

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