The U.S. has wasted at least $15 billion in taxpayer dollars on failed reconstruction projects in Afghanistan, according to a letter a government watchdog agency sent to members of Congress, which was released on Thursday.
The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, (SIGAR), a government watchdog office set up to monitor U.S. spending, identified $15.5 billion in waste, fraud, and abuse between its inception in 2008 through December 2017, according to the letter sent to Reps. Walter Jones (R-NC), Peter Welch (D-VT), and Tim Walberg (R-MI).
That $15.5 billion figure came from SIGAR’s examination of only $52.7 billion of the total $126 billion in U.S. taxpayer funds appropriated for Afghanistan reconstruction projects — or 29 percent of the portion of funds examined so far.
Of the $15.5 billion wasted, $2.2 billion and $3.5 billion were spread across 643 instances, but the bulk of it — $12 billion — came from two government reconstruction efforts that “appear to have failed and wasted U.S. taxpayer dollars,” SIGAR said.