WASHINGTON — An American initiative to use private security companies to protect Iraq's oil and power infrastructure collapsed amid reports of possible fraud, missing weapons and destroyed documents, according to a federal audit released Saturday.
Under a program named Task Force Shield, the U.S. paid two security firms $147 million to train and equip tens of thousands of Iraqis to safeguard oil pipelines and transmission towers, the audit found.
The U.S. government's efforts "ultimately proved to be unsuccessful," says the report by the Special Inspector General for the Reconstruction of Iraq, a U.S. government watchdog agency. "The lack of records and equipment accountability raises significant concerns about possible fraud, waste and abuse of Task Force Shield program by U.S. and Iraqi officials."
Task Force Shield was disbanded in April 2005. Its former commanders could not be reached for comment Saturday.
Iraqi insurgent attacks on oil pipelines drain as much as $8 million a day from the Iraqi treasury, and strikes against electrical towers are among the primary reasons that power production remains below prewar levels.
The chief executive of Erinys, the company responsible for training guards to protect Iraq's oil system, strenuously defended its work, saying it had fulfilled all the terms of its contract and delivered a functioning security force.
The oil protection force "was an extraordinary achievement established under conditions never before seen," said Jonny Garratt, who founded the London-based security company.
Officials with ASARS, a Greenbelt, Md., company hired to protect Iraq's electrical grid, could not be reached for comment.
The audit is the latest account of poor oversight by the United States in the reconstruction of Iraq, an effort plagued by reports of billions of dollars of waste, fraud and abuse.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers also blocked efforts by the inspector general to obtain documentation on the program, the audit found. An unnamed Army officer who ran the task force destroyed some documents, the report says.
"It is clear that [the oil and electricity program was] beset with confusing management and inconsistent oversight from its inception," it says.
Under the oil contract, Erinys-Iraq was paid $104 million to train at least 14,400 guards. Government auditors could find evidence of only 11,400 guards who had been trained. They could not determine the location of more than 6,000 AK-47s purchased for the guards.
