John Sopko

John Sopko talked about his role as Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) and discussed how American taxpayer dollars were spent on reconstruction in Afghanistan. Over $103 billion had been spent on reconstruction projects in Afghanistan since 2001. He spoke about work his office had done documenting construction of buildings and generators, defective planes, and missing ships, all of which were authorized and paid for without ever being used. He also talked about corruption within Afghanistan’s government and banks as it relates to waste, fraud, and abuse of money targeted for reconstruction projects. Mr. Sopko expressed his concerns with a lack of accountability and proper oversight at the departments of State and Defense, and argued that this prohibits them from effectively managing the Afghanistan budget. He also expressed the need for national security to be seen as a non-partisan issue when dealing with the lives of American soldiers. close