U.S. Defense officials still cannot say what happened to $6.6 billion, sent by the planeload in cash and intended for Iraq’s reconstruction after the start of the war.
The auditors are closing the books on the U.S. airlift of $12 billion (via C-130 Hercules cargo planes) sent to Iraq at the start of the Iraq War.
The loss of $6.6 billion is being called a “mystery” and an “embarrassment” and, perhaps, a “theft.”
House Government Reform Committee investigators charged in 2005 that U.S. officials “used virtually no financial controls to account for these enormous cash withdrawals once they arrived in Iraq, and there is evidence of substantial waste, fraud and abuse in the actual spending and disbursement of the Iraqi funds.”
Pentagon officials have contended for the last six years that they could account for the money if given enough time to track down the records. But repeated attempts to find the documentation, or better yet the cash, were fruitless.
More at The LA Times
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