Supply chain nightmare to continue between Iraq and US

In a new report on the last Thursday, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said that the Pentagon could not prove $2 billion of Iraq Train-and-Equip Fund (ITEF) materials were delivered.

The GAO‘s findings contradicted an Amnesty International report, released on Wednesday, which claimed only $1 billion of equipment was improperly tracked.

Waste and fraud are some of the endemic "costs of doing business" in dangerous spots around the globe, Steinberg cautioned, and this scandal simply reflects the systematic shortcomings in the US military. 
He further explained, “In some cases, systems are left behind to be used by host countries unofficially, or off the books.”

Helena Cobban, historian and Middle East analyst, said that the situation sounds like the abuses reported by special inspectors general for Iraq and Afghanistan.

Cobban said the failures exposed in those reports echoed the new revelations of widespread corruption in the US Fifth Fleet operating off Southeast Asia, such as the "Fat Leonard" scandal. Leonard Glenn Francis of Singapore, owner of contractor Glenn Defense Marine Asia (GDMA), recently pleaded guilty to a series of federal charges.

Pentagon spokesperson Eric Pahon stated that the Defense Department denied Wednesday’s Amnesty International report claiming the US Army failed to maintain accurate records on over $1 billion in weapons transfers in Iraq and Kuwait.