Is there a cover up of contractor fraud in Iraq?
Does anyone else have their blood boil when reading about the U.S. Military being involved in covering contractor fraud in Iraq? If the situation in Iraq is one tenth as bad as the stories that come out of Iraq, we are in a heap of trouble. I am speaking about an article that I read in the Dallas News about Navy Veteran, Donald Vance. It was Mr. Vance’s misfortune to gather evidence and documents related to fraud against the US Government by an Iraq corporation.
According to the article, the company was wholesaling guns, land mines, rocket launchers for cash. The company was selling the military equipment to anyone who could pay. Not just selling to US Soldiers, but also selling to Iraqi warlords, insurgents and State Department workers. Literally, they used the term “Wal-Mart” of gun sales. The company allegedly had a “no questions asked” policy.
This war is plagued with corruption. We simply do not know who is corrupt and who isn’t in light of the recent rash of high-level resignations out of the White House. Do you really believe Alberto Gonzales and Karl Rove quit because they wanted to spend more time with their families or are they hiding something?
I was sitting here all tee-d off about the article and started to imagine what the government could possibly say to defend locking up a whistleblower who is trying to stop fraud on our own government. Then it came to me! What if the government was using an Iraqi Corporation to lure in and track insurgents? What if the government needed an operation to look so corrupt that anyone, even an insurgent, would purchase military hardware directly from us? The military could then track the weapons once the insurgents had them in their hands.
Would it be worth the human lives that giving insurgents rocket launchers would cost? Not to me. However, to a utilitarian anti-terror government operative, this may sound dandy. Maybe you too like spy novels and ends justify the means plots. However, if you do, I think you’re wrong.
The only way to have a fair and just society is if everyone follows the rule of law. It all starts with a social compact to follow the law. We, in the United States, follow the law. Our social norm is to follow our own laws. No one is supposed to be above the law (regardless of whether Scooter Libby gets any jail time.) We have a civil justice system that we believe fairly takes care of civil disputes and a criminal system that fairly determines the fate of those charged with criminal activity. This needs to extend to all levels of our government, even during foreign mission. We need to play by our own rules.
My analysis of dummy corporations and the like is totally hypothetical. I just dreamed it up. It would make a good spy novel. But in truth, it may be far worse then my moral dilemma. The truth may be that the administration, the military, the foreign corporations, the oil money elite of Iraq and all the others in this mess we are calling a war may all be in bed together ripping off millions of dollars of taxpayer money and wasting the lives of good young United States of America souls so they can continue to make millions through fraud and deception. It makes me shudder to think about it, because we are a great society and if we allow this type of behavior to stand, if we turn our back and ignore the fraud, well then,, the truth is that we are ready fall like Rome did so long ago.
Click Here to read more on the article from the Dallas News.
According to the article, the company was wholesaling guns, land mines, rocket launchers for cash. The company was selling the military equipment to anyone who could pay. Not just selling to US Soldiers, but also selling to Iraqi warlords, insurgents and State Department workers. Literally, they used the term “Wal-Mart” of gun sales. The company allegedly had a “no questions asked” policy.
This war is plagued with corruption. We simply do not know who is corrupt and who isn’t in light of the recent rash of high-level resignations out of the White House. Do you really believe Alberto Gonzales and Karl Rove quit because they wanted to spend more time with their families or are they hiding something?
I was sitting here all tee-d off about the article and started to imagine what the government could possibly say to defend locking up a whistleblower who is trying to stop fraud on our own government. Then it came to me! What if the government was using an Iraqi Corporation to lure in and track insurgents? What if the government needed an operation to look so corrupt that anyone, even an insurgent, would purchase military hardware directly from us? The military could then track the weapons once the insurgents had them in their hands.
Would it be worth the human lives that giving insurgents rocket launchers would cost? Not to me. However, to a utilitarian anti-terror government operative, this may sound dandy. Maybe you too like spy novels and ends justify the means plots. However, if you do, I think you’re wrong.
The only way to have a fair and just society is if everyone follows the rule of law. It all starts with a social compact to follow the law. We, in the United States, follow the law. Our social norm is to follow our own laws. No one is supposed to be above the law (regardless of whether Scooter Libby gets any jail time.) We have a civil justice system that we believe fairly takes care of civil disputes and a criminal system that fairly determines the fate of those charged with criminal activity. This needs to extend to all levels of our government, even during foreign mission. We need to play by our own rules.
My analysis of dummy corporations and the like is totally hypothetical. I just dreamed it up. It would make a good spy novel. But in truth, it may be far worse then my moral dilemma. The truth may be that the administration, the military, the foreign corporations, the oil money elite of Iraq and all the others in this mess we are calling a war may all be in bed together ripping off millions of dollars of taxpayer money and wasting the lives of good young United States of America souls so they can continue to make millions through fraud and deception. It makes me shudder to think about it, because we are a great society and if we allow this type of behavior to stand, if we turn our back and ignore the fraud, well then,, the truth is that we are ready fall like Rome did so long ago.
Click Here to read more on the article from the Dallas News.
