US Embassy in Iraq missing property worth millions

[cory777]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON – Tens of millions of dollars in federal property is missing or unaccounted for at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, the largest U.S. diplomatic mission abroad, according to an internal State Department audit released Wednesday.

The report from the department's inspector general found that 159 of the embassy's 1,168 vehicles, worth $18.5 million, are unaccounted for.

The report said 282 vehicles worth $40.4 million have not been properly registered, and $2.3 million in other property, including furniture and other office equipment, is missing.

The audit doesn't say whether the missing property has been lost or stolen, but it says the failure to account for the items is unacceptable.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100602/ap_on_bi_ge/us_us_iraq_embassy

[tularetom]

1. I'm shocked, shocked I tell you...

Seriously, who didn't see this coming?

[RKP5637]

2. Yep, easy money. n/t

[Webster Green]

3. Another US Government clusterfuck.

I wonder if they ever got the wiring straightened out. I remember years ago, after the walls were already up, they found out the electrical contractors had cut corners and run undersized wire. Probably ran 18 gauge speaker wire instead of 10 or 12 gauge wire for electrical circuits. :rofl:

[bhikkhu]

4. How about all those pallets of hundred dollar bills?

Maybe they got put in the cars before they lost them?

[Tx4obama]

6. Here's a link to a bunch of Alan Grayson videos regarding the pallets of money. n/t

[gateley]

5. Delete - bhikkhu and I were thinking along the same lines. nt

[Scuba]

7. Check the Haliburton warehouse. Probably in there.

[No Elephants]

8. Or the Al-Qaeeda in Iraq warehouse.

[City Lights]

9. Or KBR.

It's gotta be one or the other.

[Igel]

10. This is a surprise?

Worked for an Army base research unit one summer in college. I car-pooled with regular, full-time staff. One managed a landscaping maintenance shop. He cursed one day that he had to do an audit.

I don't remember how many shovels, edge trimmers, lawnmowers he was missing. Or how many mowers, shovels, edge trimmers, mulchers, etc. he had that weren't registered. But he real worry was the tank (large metal thing with a turret and treads, not a water-storage container) that somebody had stored in his shop. It wasn't even registered to the base, and which the inspectors, when they came to verify his audit, were sure to notice. He couldn't move it. He couldn't leave it there.

I stopped working there a few days before the site visit. Pity. He was sweating bullets on that last day and it would have been worthwhile finding out what happened.