Afghanistan

Top 5 Defense Contractors who profited the most from the war in Afghanistan

September 30, 2021 | Around the World, The Danger Zone

stealth-fighter-jet

A hasty U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan as the Taliban overpowered the government and took control of the capital left many wondering what happened to the trillions of dollars spent over the last two decades since 2001.

Around $300 million a day was spent according to a Brown University calculation – that was spent on private contractors to power the logistics. Private contractors served largely as hired guns, but also as cleaners, cooks, construction workers, technicians, and servers on sprawling U.S. bases.

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The employment of private security contractors in Afghanistan soared during former President Donald Trump’s tenure to nearly 6,000.

Almost 17,000 contractors operated in Afghanistan, according to documents prepared for Congress by the Defense Department earlier this year ahead of the withdrawal. This number dropped to 7,800 as of July.

In the months leading to the end of the 20-year war, major defense companies were awarded contracts in Afghanistan worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

In terms of lives lost, contractors paid a higher price than U.S. service members since the beginning of the U.S.’s longest war. About 3,814 contractors had been killed in Afghanistan as of late 2019, compared with approximately 2,300 troops, according to the Washington Post’s Afghanistan Papers.

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Afghan government relied on foreign military contractors and trainers to function, said John Sopko, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), in March.

The three largest defense companies in the world are all U.S. companies. Their combined revenue accounts for 1 percent of the $10 trillion U.S. GDP, according to the CIA World Factbook.

The price of shares in several of the world’s largest defense contractors sank in August as the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces from Afghanistan led investors to reassess their commitments to beneficiaries of the U.S. military-industrial complex.

Here are the five military contractors that ate up as much as $2 trillion of the money the U.S. Treasury spent in Afghanistan over the last two decades.

lockheed-martin

Lockheed Martin

Based in Bethesda, Maryland, Lockheed Martin is the world’s largest defense contractor that deals in global security and aerospace products. It employs about 114,000 people worldwide.

Lockheed made $65.4 billion in sales in 2020. If you bought and held $10,000 of this company’s stock in 2001, it’s now valued at $133,559.21.

Lockheed is best known for its Black Hawk helicopters which were widely used in the Afghan war. The big bucks for Lockheed come from contracts for the F-35 stealth fighter ($12 billion in the current budget alone), the combat systems for Aegis cruiser ships, and lots of electronics for command-control, cyberwar, and space communications.

boeing

Boeing

Boeing is best known for its commercial airliners but its big-ticket defense contracts relate to the B-1 bomber, B-52s, C-17 cargo jet, V-22 Osprey vertical take-off aircraft, and F-15 and F-18 fighters. All were in Afghanistan.

“Seeing first-hand how these troops count on Boeing ought to make us redouble our efforts to ensure we give them the best equipment we can,” said Brian Nelson, a spokesman for Integrated Defense Systems at Boeing, after a visit to Afghanistan in 2009.

Raytheon

Raytheon Technologies Corporation, based in Waltham, Massachusetts, is an aerospace and defense company that provides advanced systems and services for commercial, military, and government customers worldwide. It has 195,000 employees worldwide who work in avionics, cybersecurity, directed energy, electric propulsion, hypersonic, and quantum physics.

Until 2020, it was known as Raytheon Company before it merged with the United Technologies Corporation aerospace businesses to become the third-largest defense contractor in the world.

Apart from selling weapons to governments across the world it also offered military training in Afghanistan. Its big contracts were for a new nuclear cruise missile, strategic missile defense systems, and a lot of projects dealing with sensors, satellites, electronics, and cyberwar.

General Dynamics

General Dynamics Information Technology, a business unit of General Dynamics is a defense and Information technology contractor headquartered in Reston, Virginia. It was awarded a task to provide information technology management services in Afghanistan to support the U.S. Army corps of Engineers (USACE) Middle East District reconstruction and infrastructure development programs.

The task order was awarded under the IT enterprise solutions contract and had a potential value of $32 million over five years. It also had multibillion-dollar contracts for nuclear submarines, Burke-class destroyer ships, and on the commercial side, Gulfstream jets.

Northrop Grumman Corp

Founded in 1939, Northrop Grumman is a leading global security company providing innovative systems, products, and solutions in aerospace, electronics, information systems, and technical services to government and commercial customers worldwide. Northrop Grumman’s Europe air traffic management systems subsidiary, Northrop Grumman Park Air Systems, was awarded a contract by NATO to provide a second air traffic control receiver site for Kandahar Air Base, Afghanistan.

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COMMUNITY: U.S. calling Afghanistan withdrawal a logistical success? Your thoughts.

September 28, 2021 | COMMUNITY

logistics

On Tuesday General Mark Milley testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee along with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and the head of U.S. Central Command General Kenneth McKenzie Jr. None of these generals will resign or would resign prior to the disastrous withdrawal although they knew it would end in disaster for Americans left behind.

General McKenzie took responsibility for droning an innocent family but won’t admit he used Taliban intelligence. He didn’t have any other intelligence. The droning was based on good intelligence according to General McKenzie.

General McKenzie testified that he advised Biden to not withdraw all the forces.

“I recommended we keep 2,500 troops in Afghanistan.” Also says he predicted withdrawing them would cause the Afghan army to collapse and the Taliban taking over. General Milley later said the same thing.

This crew didn’t have enough resources, didn’t have the proper staging, and yet they planned it by their own testimony! They also didn’t plan for the President’s option to flee.

General Milley, totally unprepared for the questioning, couldn’t answer questions about the Woodward book suggesting he’s a traitor. Milley said he didn’t read it. He didn’t want to check for accuracy? He has no sense of responsibility.

Basically, they want you to believe they planned for every contingency and no one could have done a better job.

IN THE GUARDIAN »

Gen Mark Milley gave the stark assessment at an extraordinary hearing of the Senate armed services committee to examine the US departure, which also became a postmortem on the 20-year war that preceded it.

Milley appeared alongside the defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, and the head of US Central Command, Gen Kenneth ‘Frank’ McKenzie, in the most intense, heated cross-examination of the country’s military leadership in more than a decade.

At one point, Milley was obliged to defend his loyalty to his country, in the face of allegations of insubordination in last weeks of the Trump administration, and to explain why he had not resigned in the course of the chaotic Afghan pullout.

“It is obvious the war in Afghanistan did not end on the terms we wanted,” Milley said, noting “the Taliban is now in power in Kabul.”

Private defense contractor CACI International to be punished for an incident in Abu Ghraib years ago

September 15, 2021 | Around the World, Justice Abroad

Professional Overseas Contractors

Kelley Beaucar Vlahos — The names Lynddie England, Janice Karpinski and Charles Granier became synonymous with the Abu Ghraib torture scandal. But we know now that those who directed the torture from the Pentagon, who set the conditions on the ground in that prison, were never held truly accountable. The only ones who did time were the low-ranking National Guardsmen and intelligence officers. Then-Brigadier Gen. Karpinski (who didn’t go to jail but was relieved of her command and was demoted in rank) was clearly the scapegoat among the top brass.

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U.S. Military installations overseas scramble to accommodate thousands of evacuees from Afghanistan

September 1, 2021 | Around the World

afghan-evacuees

Thousands of Afghans shell-shocked at the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, brought to Ramstein Air Base in Germany, where they await the next leg of their journey, to the United States.

After Kabul fell to the Taliban the United States began flying people out of Kabul at a rate of thousands a day. Many were brought to U.S. military installations in Qatar or Kuwait. But by the end of that week, those bases could not safely support anymore. Ramstein, which has served as a key transit point in Germany for troops and equipment throughout the 20-year war in Afghanistan, was called on for one more mission.

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United States closes $800 million Embassy in Afghanistan

August 30, 2021 | Around the World, The Danger Zone

Afghanistan

NATE BERG | When the U.S. government officially pulled its military presence from Afghanistan, it left behind a valuable piece of real estate. The U.S. embassy in Kabul, a sprawling 15-acre complex of more than a dozen buildings and annexes, was built at an estimated construction cost of $806 million.

As the Taliban takes over, it is physically filling in the footprint of the previous regime, including taking over the presidential palace. The U.S. embassy, the centerpiece of the country’s long and tumultuous presence in Afghanistan for more than 20 years, could similarly change hands. The State Department declined to comment.

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This is not the first time the United States has packed up and left an embassy behind. In Somalia in 1991, escalating tensions led to the evacuation of the U.S. embassy in Mogadishu. “Free-wheeling militia violence” led to the evacuation of the U.S. embassy in Tripoli, Libya, in 2014. Most memorably, American embassy officials crowded a rooftop staircase to board a helicopter and evacuate the embassy in Saigon, Vietnam, in 1975. Images of the evacuation became visual shorthand for the country’s ill-fated military intervention.

For many, the parallels between Afghanistan and Vietnam are hard to ignore. The sight of helicopters ferrying U.S. personnel from the embassy in Kabul to nearby Hamid Karzai International Airport were starkly reminiscent of the scene in Vietnam nearly 50 years ago. But the official U.S. stance is different. “This is not Saigon,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told CNN on August 15, arguing that the U.S. mission in Afghanistan was started to deal with the perpetrators of the attacks of September 11, 2001, and that that mission has been a success.

The embassy began sending staff home in April, but the full evacuation in August virtually emptied the complex. It’s an eventuality the State Department has planned for, with protocols, policies, and even a handy guidebook for employees: “You’ve been evacuated. Now what?”

The future is less defined for the buildings themselves. According to experts in embassy and diplomatic building design, at least some measures are designed from the start to ensure the buildings don’t become targets.

“You can never predict exactly what the political situation will be 10 or 20 years after the completion of the building. So for that reason, there must be some basic standards of safety and security,” says Barbara A. Nadel, principal of Barbara Nadel Architect in New York and editor of a book on the design of embassies and other high-security buildings. Nadel says embassy design has evolved in recent decades to prioritize its security in the face of attacks and unrest, learning from attacks on embassies in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya, in 1998, as well as the attacks of September 11, 2001. Those events, she says, were “a wake-up call that these buildings, because they are symbolic, there are people who want to take them down.”

U.S. Embassy Kabul, Afghanistan

In Kabul, the U.S. embassy’s main building was designed to resist such efforts. A substantial beige stucco structure with offices and apartments, and fronted by a large textured shatter-resistant glass facade covering thickly reinforced walls, the building is fortified to withstand bomb blasts, and is set back significantly from nearby roads to provide a physical buffer from potential gunfire. Designed by Washington, D.C.-based Sorg Architects, the half-million-square-foot building opened in 2013, and cost more than $350 million to build. In an email, architect Suman Sorg said she was unable to comment on the building’s design features and deferred questions to the State Department.

Such large-scale buildings are typically designed to be a long-term U.S. presence, according to Michael Minton, an architect who previously spent 26 years in the State Department’s Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations. “It’s hard to program a facility for closure,” says Minton, now a senior associate at the architecture firm DLR Group. “We design our facilities with resilience in mind, and we also design our facilities with future growth in mind.”

Even so, safety concerns sometimes lead to American officials leaving, for short or long periods. Minton says that in these situations, the buildings aren’t likely to sit idle. “There have been a number of American missions overseas that have drawn down and are unoccupied, but they need to be maintained. So you’ll have staff that are there maintaining the facilities so that they don’t freeze or flood, and so that any maintenance issues are taken care of,” he says. “The embassy will be taken care of, will be protected, and will be maintained.”

But even with a gradual evacuation, leaving an embassy behind is a complicated process. A retired U.S. Navy SEAL with 20 years of experience, who requested his identity not be revealed, says evacuations are simply “chaotic.” He helped plan an embassy evacuation in a North African country during a brief rebel uprising, and says it’s a combination of corralling personnel from within the complex and those who may be living outside its walls, helping the typically embedded CIA within the embassy to destroy sensitive documents and equipment, and leaving anything unnecessary behind.

An evacuated embassy may remain secure for some time. Most U.S. embassies are compartmentalized with security systems controlling access to wings, corridors, and rooms. In Kabul, the former Navy SEAL says, the Taliban are likely to move in, and these security systems won’t be able to withstand efforts to break in.

“They will defeat those mechanisms over time and gain access to whatever they need to gain access to. But at the end of the day, you’d think the embassy folks would understand that,” he says. “Just because we’ve got this secure and super cool system, it’s going to get broken into because we’re not coming back.”

Other U.S. embassies have managed to see continued use even after being evacuated or going into disuse, in one form or another. The former U.S. embassy in Karachi, designed partly by modernist Richard Neutra and featuring smooth barrel-vaulted roofs, was saved from demolition by Pakistani architectural preservationists after the embassy was relocated, and the building was eventually vacated by the U.S. in 2011. In Tehran, the U.S. embassy building made notorious by the 1979 hostage crisis has lived on as a museum, maintained by a wing of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard in the years since diplomatic ties have been cut between the two nations and the U.S. abandoned the building. Named the U.S. Den of Espionage Museum, this is one piece of embassy preservation U.S. officials are probably not happy about.

It’s unclear what, if any, future plans are in place for the U.S. embassy in Kabul. After investing hundreds of millions of dollars to build the embassy complex, the U.S. appears to be leaving a very expensive and secure complex of buildings in the hands of a new occupying force.

Military analysts blaming the collapse of Afghan military on Military Contractors departure

August 26, 2021 | Around the World, The Danger Zone

Private Military Contractors

REPORT FOREIGN POLICY — Military analysts trying to understand the stunning collapse of the Afghan military is increasingly pointing to the departure of U.S. government contractors starting a month ago as one of the key turning points.

The Afghans had relied on contractors for everything from training and gear maintenance to preparing them for intelligence gathering and close air support in their battles against Taliban fighters.

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Thousands of those contractors—often military veterans who work for private security firms—left Afghanistan weeks ago and deployed elsewhere in the region or in the Persian Gulf.

“[I]t was their departure that led to the erosion of the capability of the Afghan Air Force elements, which were critical,” a former senior U.S. commander with extensive experience in Afghanistan told Foreign Policy on condition of anonymity. “But how could they have been left behind when our forces that provided ultimate security for them were withdrawn?”

The contractors continued to advise Afghan troops by video, but former officials said it was no substitute for operating alongside them.

“We built the Afghan army in our image to be an army that operates with air support and intelligence [and] whose backbone is contractors,” David Sedney, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Afghanistan, told Foreign Policy in a recent interview.

Experts told Foreign Policy that Afghan troops could still do the basics of ground combat without American contractors, and they’d even added some level of skill in repairing military vehicles.

But it was the U.S.-supplied air power that gave Afghan troops their advantage over Taliban fighters, and without on-the-ground maintenance contractors, the military quickly collapsed.

“Contractors were essential for keeping most of the air platforms flying,” said Sean Carberry, who served in the U.S. Department of Defense’s inspector general office until earlier this year.

“The [Afghan army] could still conduct operations without contractors—they could fight, maneuver, shoot, all the basics. But, without the safety net of ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] and air support, many Afghan soldiers didn’t want to go head to head with the Taliban.”

This dependence on contractors is not unusual: Most modern militaries rely on contract labor to keep their systems operating. While the Afghans could do basic maintenance on some aircraft, they could do little to fix Black Hawk helicopters and C-130 transport aircraft the Pentagon supplied over the years, which provided close air support for units fighting the Taliban and ferried more troops into battle.

Former officials expected that the Afghans would need to lean on that type of support for some time. “[I]t was unrealistic to expect the [Afghan National Security Forces] to be self-sufficient in that regard, and therefore some amount of contractor support was always going to be necessary,” Carberry added.

Just last month, the Pentagon sent almost 40 spare Black Hawk helicopters to Afghanistan to provide the military with a supply chain to replace broken parts, as well as additional Super Tucano aircraft.

With some military equipment left on the battlefield now falling into the hands of the Taliban, some experts are speculating that the group will seek help from Russia and China to maintain and operate the gear.

“What they’re going to do is hire Russian contractors now so they can fly their aircraft,” said Mick Mulroy, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East during the Trump administration and currently an ABC News analyst.

Biden administration officials insist the problem with the Afghan army wasn’t insufficient training or equipment but rather a lack of determination to fight the Taliban. “You cannot buy will, you cannot purchase leadership, and leadership was missing, as we’ve been saying for weeks,” top Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Monday.

There had been hope in recent weeks that the United States could leave contractors in the country to help maintain the Air Force, according to a senior Afghan official who recently spoke to Foreign Policy on condition of anonymity. And Kabul had also hoped to turn fledgling militias that had sprouted up across the Afghan countryside into guard-like hold forces to prevent the spread of the movement.

But the Taliban managed to amass forces against isolated Afghan troops and overwhelm them, according to the former senior military commander.

“On the military side there’s going to be a lot of looking at what happened to the Afghan military after 20 years,” said Mulroy, the former Pentagon official. “We’re going to be talking about that for decades.”

DOD reports they value personnel over equipment

August 26, 2021 | Around the World, The Danger Zone

taliban-hummer

According to the Department of Defense, the U.S. military is planning to leave Afghanistan by August 31. The plan for that departure includes not just U.S. service members, but also some of the important military equipment still in the country.

But, right now, the Defense Department is busy getting American citizens, Afghans with special immigrant visa applications in process, and other vulnerable Afghans out of the country. And that will continue to be the No. 1 priority right up until the very end, Pentagon Press Secretary John F. Kirby said.

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CONTRACTOR LIFE: Your AAFES coins from deployment in Iraq & Afghanistan may be worth more than you think

July 29, 2021 | Contractor Life

deployment-pogs

When deployed troops buy whatever they need, if they pay in cash, they won't be given pennies, nickels, dimes, or quarters as change. Instead, they'll be given cardboard coins (colloquially called "pogs," like the 90s toys). And, now, coin collectors are going crazy for them.

Depending on where in Iraq or Afghanistan troops are stationed, they may have easy access to an AAFES (Army & Air Force Exchange Service) store. Bigger airfields have larger stores that sell all an airman could want — meanwhile, outlying FOBs are just happy that their AAFES truck didn't blow up this month.

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CONTRACT AWARD: $151,434,777 to provide Intel and IT support in Poland, Afghanistan, Iraq, Niger, the Philippines & Djibouti

July 28, 2021 | Contract Awards

leidos, inc.

Department of Defense (DoD) awarded a $151,434,777 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for the High-Resolution Three-Dimensional Geospatial Information Operations and Technology Integration II.

Work will be performed in Poland, Afghanistan, Iraq, Niger, the Philippines, Djibouti, and Manassas, Virginia, with an estimated completion date of Sept. 5, 2025.

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Latest contractor census FY July 2021, contractor support area DoD – USCENTCOM

July 25, 2021 | Around the World, Hiring Information

PMC

BACKGROUND: This report provides Department of Defense (DoD) contractor personnel numbers for 3rd quarter Fiscal Year 2021 (FY21) and current status of efforts underway to improve management of contractors accompanying United States (U.S.) Forces. It includes data on DoD contractor personnel deployed in Afghanistan, Operation Freedom’s Sentinel (OFS); Iraq and Syria, Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR); and the U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM) area of responsibility (AOR).

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KEY POINTS: During 3rd quarter FY21, USCENTCOM reported approximately 26,887 contractor personnel supporting DoD in the USCENTCOM AOR, a decrease of approximately 10,710 from the previous quarter. The contractor personnel figures in this report are derived
from the USCENTCOM SPOT-ES+ Census in early June, but have since decreased due to ongoing redeployment and related drawdown activities in accordance with the President’s direction.

DoD Contractor Personnel in the USCENTCOM AOR

contractor census

chart-2-census

o Contractor Posture: Approximately 7,795 DoD contractors supported operations in Afghanistan during 3rd quarter FY21, a decrease of 53.7% from 2nd quarter FY21. Local Nationals comprise 33.9% of total contractor force; 5,147 U.S./TCN remain in Afghanistan. Significant reductions in requirements for contracted support and contractor populations in the 3rd quarter were driven by decreases in military requirements following the President of the United States (POTUS) announcement of a full withdrawal from Afghanistan by September 2021.

o A total of 466 Private Security Contractors (PSCs) personnel were supporting USCENTCOM operations in Afghanistan as of 3rd quarter FY21. A detailed summary is provided in the following table.

DoD PSC Personnel in Afghanistan

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USCENTCOM Vendor Threat Mitigation Branch (VTMB): During the 3rd quarter the VTMB rated 87 entities and determined 67 (77%) were “Acceptable” and 20 (23%) were determined to be “Unacceptable without Mitigation” requiring completion of a Risk Mitigation Plan or Base Access Denial Letters. VTMB also formalized the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) FY15, Section 841-843, “Never Contract with the Enemy” process through targeting working groups and a quarterly review board. Additionally, USCENTCOM VTMB is coordinating with the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Logistics (ODASD(Log)), through their Vendor Threat Mitigation (VTM) Working Group to unify the process of notifications in accordance with Department of Defense (DoD) wide policy. During this quarter, no entities or persons were identified in accordance FY15 NDAA Section 841 as actively opposing U.S. or Coalitions troops and providing U.S. Government funds, goods or services to the enemy.

CONTRACT AWARD: $29,448,286 to provide maintenance capabilities in support of the Afghan Air Force

June 10, 2021 | Contract Awards

afghan-airforce

Department of Defense awarded $29,448,286 contract to provide maintenance capabilities in support of the Afghan Air Force.

Work will be performed in Mesa, Arizona; Kabul, Afghanistan; and Al Ain, United Arab Emirates, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 30, 2021.

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Pulling out of Afghanistan in the middle of contracts, will cost the U.S. millions

May 4, 2021 | Around the World, The Danger Zone

Leaving Afghanistan Will Be More Expensive Than Anyone Expects

Penalties for broken contracts, fees for shipping equipment, and salaries for the Afghan military are just a few of the costs that will hit the United States as it leaves.

U.S. President Joe Biden has announced the full withdrawal of U.S. and coalition forces from Afghanistan by Sept. 11 this year. This policy has some in Washington banking on a windfall of freed-up money for other defense priorities.

Don’t count on it.

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Leaving costs more than staying. The Department of Defense is seeking some new and plenty of ongoing investments in counterterrorism infrastructure in the region as a result of the pullout. Salaries and other expenses for roughly 300,000 members of the Afghan National Security Forces will endure.

Departing a country where U.S. forces, contractors, and government employees have been operating for 20 years is expensive. That’s to say nothing of the 8,000 other allied military troops in Afghanistan alongside the Americans. Not only is there a lot of property, buildings, and equipment, but there’s also a network of private entities that have been doing a large portion of the work there.

Breaking contracts struck with those players costs money. During the Iraq drawdown, the Army found that in some cases, it was cheaper to pay an existing contract to fulfillment rather than change or shorten it. Depending on how the contracts in Afghanistan are written, they could entail large penalties for amending or breaking them.

Getting equipment moved back home or somewhere else is also a big task. It will require more forces than are in the country now, which will not be free. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby has discussed the need for additional logistics, engineering, and force protection forces as the drawdown ensue. And Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin just approved the deployment of B-52 bombers to Afghanistan and is keeping the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower in the Persian Gulf for additional force protection.

Yet labor is not the biggest contributor to cost. Location is.

In Iraq, military leaders found that material they would have otherwise returned home to the United States was left behind because flying it home cost more than leaving it for the host nation’s security forces. And Iraq is a country with less harsh terrain and shorter distances to cover overall. There, Washington was able to find plentiful options for commercial trucking to move fully loaded equipment convoys from Iraq into Kuwait.

For Afghanistan, that outcome is unlikely, and its landlocked terrain is a challenge. Moving items by truck is much trickier given its location and availability of ports and airports nearby. Yet air and sealift would cost anywhere from two to five times as much as using a wheeled vehicle for transport, according to private conversations with comptrollers.

Not all assets and equipment will be redistributed around the region or back home. Some will have to be destroyed because it is not worth the cost to transport, it would not be used by the host nation, or the technology is too sensitive. To get a real sense of the costs of departing Afghanistan, planners will have to assess all the options and contingencies in detail. There will be under- and overestimated bills and costs that linger into the next fiscal year given the uncertainty.

For his part, Austin has said that, even with troops departing Afghanistan, the military will maintain counterterrorism capabilities in the region; they’ll just be repositioned elsewhere nearby. Secretary of State Antony Blinken echoed this point, stating the United States will “remain vigilant against any possibility that the threat of terrorism reemerges in Afghanistan. We’ll reorganize our counterterrorism capabilities to stay on top of that.”

Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, weighed in on this reorganization recently, implying that funds recouped from the drawdown in Afghanistan “are resources now that can help us also apply to … refocusing on other threats and challenges.” The sentiment was echoed by Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, who told the House Armed Services Committee that he intends to re-posture some of the exiting forces in Afghanistan elsewhere in the Central Command area of operations. These troops will help with “offshore, over-the-horizon” counterterrorism missions. In particular, those will include persistent surveillance and pressure on insurgents.

Clearly Pentagon and political leaders are trying to convey to the Taliban and others that the United States’ absence does not mean bad actors are out of the crosshairs. Austin, for example, was quite clear that “working in conjunction with our allies and partners, there’s probably not a space on the globe that the United States and its allies can’t reach.”

Meanwhile, Blinken has talked up plans to continue supporting Afghanistan and its people. In a speech to NATO, for example, he spoke about the shared interests of countries in the region in ensuring Afghanistan doesn’t fail, including refugee flows, drugs, and extremism, to name a few. That support will also include financing for the Afghan National Security Forces, according to Kirby. And Austin has said the military will continue supporting and paying salaries for Afghan security forces even as Pentagon leaders are looking to continue funding “key capabilities such as the Afghan Air Force and Special Mission Wing” as well.

None of that will be cheap. The most recent defense appropriations bill allocates $3 billion for the Afghanistan Security Forces Fund, which is to remain available until Sept. 30, 2022. The United States and its coalition partners provide an additional $1.5 billion to the Afghanistan military on top of pay. Presumably, Congress will back up the public promises made by the secretary of defense and continue to finance Afghan security forces for an indefinite period of time—likely years, if not decades.

Just as the United States uses contractors to supplement its operations, it also pays some to do the same for the Afghan military. The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction John Sopko testified in March that “Afghan security forces are nowhere near achieving self-sufficiency, as they cannot maintain their equipment, manage their supply chains, or train new soldiers, pilots, and policemen without the 13,000 [Department of Defense] contractors.” He said that the Pentagon estimates that “no single Afghan airframe can maintain combat effectiveness for more than a few months if contractor support is withdrawn.” Kirby told press last week that the contractor support will continue but that it’s going to be “of a different character.” McKenzie told Congress that he is investigating whether “distance contracting” is possible to support the Afghan security forces’ equipment maintenance, logistics, and more.

The discussion about all of these factors is taking place in Central Command, which will have responsibility for the ultimate decisions that will then impose costs on the military services. Previously, much of such spending had been budgeted for through the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) account, which is separate from the annual defense budget used to staff, train, and equip the force. For fiscal year 2021 alone, Congress provided $69 billion in OCO funding but only $20 billion is being projected for these costs in fiscal 2022.

In its report accompanying the coming defense appropriations bill, Congress called the “OCO experiment” an “abject failure” that allowed Pentagon leaders to “avoid making difficult decisions.” Now, the Biden administration is proposing transferring contingency funding to the Pentagon’s base budget, which is set to be released next month.

But eliminating the OCO account does not eliminate overseas contingencies. What it does do, however, is increase the likelihood the services will have to cannibalize funds exclusively intended to train and equip the force to pay for any unexpected expenses related to shifting regional operations. While the Afghanistan withdrawal is to be completed by the end of this fiscal year, some costs will spill into 2022—further squeezing the limited funds available and taxing the services financially.

Ending the United States’ military presence in Afghanistan is not mission over. It is mission change.

If Congress is expecting a windfall of savings to result from the Afghanistan withdrawal, it is likely to be disappointed. Threats will still need to be managed—just from slightly farther away. In the meantime, it will discover that leaving is hard, dangerous, and expensive.

Mackenzie Eaglen is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. She has served as a member of the National Defense Strategy Commission and the National Defense Panel.

U.S. contractors pullout could devastate Afghan forces

May 1, 2021 | Around the World, The Danger Zone

Afghanistan

The departure of thousands of U.S. defense contractors from Afghanistan by May 1 - set by a deal last year with the Taliban – may be “more devastating” to Afghan forces than an American troop pullout, a U.S. government watchdog warned on Wednesday.

The assessment by John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction (SIGAR), came as the Biden administration presses the Taliban and Kabul to consider a proposed peace accord and reviews the February 2020 agreement amid surging violence.

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American Contractor Sentenced for Theft of Government Equipment on U.S. Military Base in Afghanistan

May 1, 2021 | Around the World, Justice Abroad

An American military contractor was sentenced today to 51 months in prison for her role in a theft ring on a military installation in Kandahar, Afghanistan.

Varita V. Quincy, 35, of Snellville, Georgia pleaded guilty on Oct. 13, 2020, to one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States and commit theft of property of value to the United States and one count of making false statements. According to court documents, Quincy admitted that, between April 2015 and July 2015, she and others conspired to and did steal the property of value to the United States including generators, a truck, and other items worth over $150,000. Larry Green, one of her co-conspirators, negotiated the sale of the stolen property with a third-country national middleman, who in turn facilitated the sale of the items to unknown persons in Kandahar.

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DOD Contractor Census, 2nd Quarter 2021 — Afghanistan, Iraq & Syria

May 1, 2021 | Contract Awards

us-contractor

BACKGROUND: This report provides Department of Defense (DoD) contractor personnel numbers for 2nd quarter Fiscal Year 2021 (FY21) and current status of efforts underway to improve management of contractors accompanying United States (U.S.) Forces. It includes data on DoD contractor personnel deployed in Afghanistan, Operation Freedom’s Sentinel (OFS); Iraq and Syria, Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR); and the U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM) area of responsibility (AOR).

KEY POINTS: During 2nd quarter FY21, USCENTCOM reported approximately 37,597 contractor personnel supporting DoD in the USCENTCOM AOR, a decrease of approximately 567 from the previous quarter.

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CONTRACT AWARD: $10,703,000 for counter IED training and force protection in UAE and Afghanistan

April 28, 2021 | Contract Awards

IED-training

According to the Department of Defense (DoD) a company out of Reston, Virginia, was awarded an additional $10,703,000 to contract W31P4Q-18-A-0011 for system optimization engineering and live-virtual modeling to the Counter Vehicle-Borne Improvised Explosive Device and associated force protection systems.

Work will be performed in Afghanistan, the United Arab Emirates, and Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, with an estimated completion date of March 30, 2022.

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CONTRACT AWARD: $24M information technology communications infrastructure and services in Afghanistan

March 11, 2021 | Contract Awards

IT-technician

According to the Department of Defense (D0D), a company out of Fairfax, Virginia, was awarded an additional $24,905,656 to contract W52P1J-18-C-0020 to provide mission-critical information technology communications infrastructure and services.

Work will be performed in Afghanistan, with an estimated completion date of March 14, 2022. Fiscal 2021 operation and maintenance (Army) funds in the amount of $24,905,656 were obligated at the time of the award.

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DOD Contractor Census, FY JANUARY 2021 Afghanistan, Iraq & Syria

January 15, 2021 | Around the World, The Danger Zone

us-contractor

BACKGROUND: This report provides Department of Defense (DoD) contractor personnel numbers for 1st quarter Fiscal Year 2021 (FY21) and the current status of efforts underway to improve management of contractors accompanying the United States (U.S.) Forces. It includes data on DoD contractor personnel deployed in Afghanistan, Operation Freedom’s Sentinel (OFS); Iraq and Syria, Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR); and the U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM) area of responsibility (AOR).

KEY POINTS: During 1st quarter FY21, USCENTCOM reported approximately 38,164 contractor personnel supporting DoD in the USCENTCOM AOR, a decrease of approximately 5,645 from the previous quarter.

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CONTRACT AWARD: $38M for contractor logistics support services in Afghanistan

November 30, 2020 | Contract Awards

afghan-airforce

According to the Department of Defense (DoD), a company out of Gaithersburg, Maryland, was awarded a $38,365,662 modification (P00037) to contract W58RGZ-17-C-0058 for contractor logistics support services supporting the Afghan Air Force.

Work will be performed in Kabul, Afghanistan, with an estimated completion date of Feb. 28, 2021.

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CONTRACT AWARD: $52M for aircraft and equipment support in Afghanistan, Kosovo, Kuwait and Germany

November 30, 2020 | Contract Awards

Aircraft Maintenance

According to the Department of Defense (DoD), Fort Worth, Texas, was awarded an additional $52,301,773 to contract W58RGZ-19-C-0025 for support of various Army Model Design Series aircraft and equipment in support of deployed units.

Work will be performed in the U.S., Afghanistan, Kosovo, Kuwait and Germany, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 30, 2021.

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Troops and Contractors experience Thanksgiving in Afghanistan a little different this year

November 27, 2020 | Around the World

Thanksgiving, Afghanistan

Like many Americans back home, troops deployed to Afghanistan are celebrating Thanksgiving differently this year because of the coronavirus.

Bases have typically covered the dining facilities with seasonal decorations, while senior officers and enlisted leaders carved and served turkey and roast beef. Bands performed live music.

In 2020, meals will be put in doggie bags and troops will eat them at a safe distance from one another.

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DOD Contractor Census, FY OCTOBER 2020 Afghanistan, Iraq & Syria

October 31, 2020 | Around the World, Hiring Information, The Danger Zone

BACKGROUND: This report provides Department of Defense (DoD) contractor personnel numbers for 4th quarter Fiscal Year 2020 (FY20) and current status of efforts underway to improve management of contractors accompanying United States (U.S.) Forces. It includes data on DoD contractor personnel deployed in Afghanistan, Operation Freedom’s Sentinel (OFS); Iraq and Syria, Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR); and the U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM) area of responsibility (AOR).

KEY POINTS: During 4th quarter FY20, USCENTCOM reported approximately 43,809 contractor personnel supporting DoD in the USCENTCOM AOR, a decrease of approximately 5,128 from the previous quarter.

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CONTRACT AWARD: $15.9M for private security service protection in Afghanistan

October 22, 2020 | Contract Awards

According to the Department of Defense (DoD), a company out of McLean, Virginia, was awarded a $15,974,994 firm-fixed-price contract to provide U.S. Forces Afghanistan with private security service protection.

Work will be performed in Mazar-e Sharif, Afghanistan, with an estimated completion date of Oct. 29, 2023.

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CONTRACT AWARD: $166M for critical operation, maintenance & defense of Army communications in Kuwait, UAE, Afghanistan, Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq and Qatar

August 27, 2020 | Contract Awards

According to the Department of Defense (DoD), a company out of Colorado Springs, Colorado, had $116,821,426 to a previously awarded contract.

The contract will be for the continued support of critical operation, maintenance, and defense of Army communications, which supports the Army Operational Base Communications Information Systems and infrastructure in support of U.S. Central Command forces.

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DOD Contractor Census, FY July 2020 Afghanistan, Iraq & Syria

July 15, 2020 | Around the World, Hiring Information, The Danger Zone

civilian-contractor

CONTRACTOR SUPPORT OF U.S. OPERATIONS IN THE USCENTCOM AREA OF RESPONSIBILITY

BACKGROUND: This report provides Department of Defense (DoD) contractor personnel numbers for 3rd quarter Fiscal Year 2020 (FY20) and current status of efforts underway to improve management of contractors accompanying United States (U.S.) Forces. It includes data on DoD contractor personnel deployed in Afghanistan, Operation Freedom’s Sentinel (OFS); Iraq and Syria, Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR); and the U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM) area of responsibility (AOR).

KEY POINTS: During 3rd quarter FY20, USCENTCOM reported approximately 48,937 contractor personnel supporting DoD in the USCENTCOM AOR, a decrease of approximately 3,205 from the previous quarter.

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