Is Afgahnistan sustainable?
To take the issue of the "affordability" of Afghanistan a bit further, a new Congressional report highlights the costs:
'One example cited in the report is the Performance-Based Governors Fund, which is authorized to distribute up to $100,000 a month in U.S. funds to individual provincial leaders for use on local expenses and development projects. In some provinces, it says, â??this amount represents a tidal wave of fundingâ? that local officials are incapable of â??spending wisely.â?ÂBecause oversight is scanty, the report says, the fund encourages corruption. Although the U.S. plan is for the Afghan government to eventually take over this and other programs, it has neither the management capacity nor the funds to do so.
The report also warns that the Afghan economy could slide into a depression with the inevitable decline of the foreign military and development spending that now provides 97 percent of the countryâ??s gross domestic product.
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The U.S. could "sustain" this indefinitely, but why would it want to?
(AP Photo)