Who Won in Afghanistan? Private Contractors

[douglas9]

The U.S. lost its 20-year campaign to transform Afghanistan. Many contractors won big.

Those who benefited from the outpouring of government money range from major weapons manufacturers to entrepreneurs. A California businessman running a bar in Kyrgyzstan started a fuel business that brought in billions in revenue. A young Afghan translator transformed a deal to provide forces with bed sheets into a business empire including a TV station and a domestic airline.

Two Army National Guardsmen from Ohio started a small business providing the military with Afghan interpreters that grew to become one of the Army’s top contractors. It collected nearly $4 billion in federal contracts, according to publicly available records.

Four months after the last American troops left Afghanistan, the U.S. is assessing the lessons to be learned. Among those, some officials and watchdog groups say, is the reliance on battlefield contractors and how that adds to the costs of waging war.

Since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, military outsourcing helped push up Pentagon spending to $14 trillion, creating opportunities for profit as the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq stretched on.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/who-won-in-afghanistan-private-contractors-troops-withdrawal-war-pentagon-11640988154?mod=djemalertNEWS

[paleotn]

1. Same as it ever was.

Who really came out on top from the crusades in the Levant? The Genoese, Venetian and Florentine merchant class.

[ShazamIam]

2. The Afghan and Iraq wars provided a lot of private profit including the profit that fund

the private military organizations like Erick Prince's, now at home in U.A.E., all brought to you with tax money.
In addition to armed military, other jobs were then outsourced to low wage locals for support the military once provided with its own troops. Cleaning and laundry for example. Tax payers paid and the private contractors profited.

In the olden days, wars provided jobs at home for manufacturing of the war materials and other support, the private contractors outsourced off shore when they could and used prison labor and illegal immigrant labor via sub-contractors.

No benefit or profit to ordinary citizens.

[Srkdqltr]

3. Of course. Are we surprised?

[Voltaire2]

4. Oh also the Taliban won.

[jimfields33]

6. That part was due to Afghan people accepting the government

After they told us to leave.

[Ferryboat]

5. Something like 60% of the military budget goes to contractors.

[Midnight Writer]

7. We should have used that money to buy off the whole country.

Pay off the Taliban, set the tribal leaders up in luxury estates, give the people food, healthcare, infrastructure and education. Turn the whole country into the jewel of the region.

Maybe it still wouldn't have worked, but it would have been cheaper and not involve killing.

You can't force freedom at the point of a gun, but maybe you can buy peace.

[Baked Potato]

8. I'm donating all the money my defense stocks earned me.

Not really, I don’t own any stocks.

“According to a report in The Intercept, the top five US defence contractors — Boeing, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman — the 20-year Afghanistan war was an “extraordinary success”.

https://www.firstpost.com/world/so-who-won-the-afghanistan-war-americas-boots-on-the-ground-didnt-but-its-the-suits-who-made-a-killing-9900441.html