WASHINGTON ‐ The United States spent $64,597 to build a wall around a school in Qala Nazir Baba, a village in Logar Province in Afghanistan. It spent an additional $41,792 to rehabilitate an irrigation system in Zoya, a village in Wardak Province....| Management of the stabilization programs has sometimes been so loose, said one former official at the aid agency, that local Taliban leaders have been able to submit requests,... and have had their requests approved. |
Villagers believed that the projects would not have been allowed to take place without the Taliban's approval, and so their support for the Taliban, rather than for the United States or the Afghan government, actually increased because of the aid. The stabilization projects were part of an ambitious aid program started by President Obama in December 2009 as part of the "civilian surge" he announced along with an increase in American troop levels in Afghanistan.
U.S.A.I.D. officials, who could not visit the project sites for security reasons, sometimes did not know whether the projects had even been completed.
"U.S.A.I.D. came to us and said, We can't find our projects,' said one person involved with the study evaluating the two stabilization programs.
Management of the stabilization programs has sometimes been so loose, said one former official at the aid agency, that local Taliban leaders have been able to submit requests,... and have had their requests approved. |