There have been infinite suggested solutions for the current economic crisis in America: Raising taxes, cutting government programs, creating more employment opportunities. But the government cuts that would most effectively reduce the amount of debt are also the most secretive, and have been skillfully hidden from public knowledge – until now. A recent BuzzFeed investigation of government spending in Afghanistan has finally enlightened the public on how their money is being spent abroad. Well, kind of; because it has not really been spent on anything.
BuzzFeed investigators inspected 50 schools that were funded by the United States government in Afghanistan. The need to spread education throughout the country, especially to women, has justified America’s invasion of Afghanistan for almost a decade, and numerous statistics about the successes of schools, teacher-training programs and updates to the Afghan Ministry of Education have been cited as evidence. Through photo documentation and the conduction of over 150 interviews with education officials and local residents, it was found that almost all of this hype has been a farce.
Since 2002, BuzzFeed claims that the U.S. government has spent over $1 billion in taxpayer dollars on education programs in Afghanistan, yet there is literally nothing to show for it. Schools that were supposedly constructed and filled with students, especially females, are completely run down and vandalized. Politicians, like Hillary Clinton during her time as Secretary of State, have assured us that the schools are new and the number of students enrolled is exponentially higher than the amount before America invaded Afghanistan. The BuzzFeed documentation contradicts this notion – according to their investigation, 75 percent of the schools built with American taxpayer dollars were deemed too unhealthy for students to be in. The exteriors of the buildings are cracked and rotten, exposed electrical wires protrude out, there is no running water and the ground is mud.
According to Buzzfeed, the attendance of females in the schools was exaggerated by more than 40 percent. U.S. politicians repeatedly recited inflated statistics for the success of these schools given by the Afghan Ministry of Education. It was known by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Pentagon that these figures were highly exaggerated, but they were continually stated in congressional meetings and on social media sites.
Judging by the information provided in the BuzzFeed investigation, USAID, the U.S. Military and the government as a whole have been extremely ignorant of their spending. Hundreds of thousands of missing taxpayer dollars have not been accounted for. Conveniently, the majority of American money has been poured into areas where war is prevalent, making the projects dangerous to monitor. If the schools that were paid for are in warzones, there is a viable excuse not to check up on their construction. But do not worry, BuzzFeed journalists did that for us. They claim that one-third to one-half of the schools that were reportedly built in the most active warzones are ghost schools – no teachers, no students and sometimes, no building. The government has paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for schools that were not even constructed.
Under the CERP Act, very little documentation is needed for military spending, so how much money was spent on which projects is nearly impossible to trace. But what is easily traceable is the lack of success the entire crusade for education in Afghanistan has had and the corruption it demonstrates within the U.S. government. Based on the Buzzfeed report, our government and the Afghan government knew these projects were nearly useless. It seems unbelievable that so much money has been continually funneled into them. But when the intentions of the U.S. government are realized, this plan was actually a massive manipulation to justify the invasion of Afghanistan. Since the decision was made to conquer the Afghani nation, many Americans have been strongly opposed. When government officials cite statistics about all the innocent Afghan boys and girls who are able to receive an education solely because of the military’s presence in their country, the war seems justifiable. Now, it is known that one of the strongest benefits of the war in Afghanistan is a complete lie, and millions of dollars have been spent ineffectually.
Some government officials have recognized that immediate measures must be taken to reconcile the government’s spending and so constructed the Afghanistan Accountability Act, which recently passed a Senate committee and will be presented in Congress. The act would require that the State department take measures to reduce corruption of government spending in Afghanistan. At this point, the millions of dollars wasted cannot possibly be reconciled. The money cannot be traced, due to our government’s negligence of precise fiscal records. It cannot be refunded, as the BuzzFeed article speculates a great deal has probably made its way into the hands of the Taliban. Yes, the Taliban – the very group that America is supposedly trying to stop. Someone please enlighten the rest of us on the point of this war again?