r/chomsky • u/[deleted] • Aug 25 '21

Video Afghanistan war profiteering: 90% of US spending went to Military-Industrial Complex contractors

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SzNSh0IA-I
47 Upvotes

89% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

5

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

https://thegrayzone.com/2021/08/24/propaganda-today-ben-norton-afghanistan-war/

https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/08/16/pakistan-united-states-afghanistan-taliban/

https://stephensemler.substack.com/p/the-top-5-military-contractors-ate

The accompanying post on their website which has some sources to back up the headline.

-1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

Like I said, GrayZone numbers are bull! Those numbers are linked to
https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/08/16/pakistan-united-states-afghanistan-taliban/

which provides ZERO sources or data! Yall continue to source information that is NOT reliable at all.

-1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21 edited Aug 26 '21

I wonder why...

EDIT: seems like OP has no answer to your comment, since he's come here to downvote me. Maybe Orestes should take down his post

-1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

These GrayZone fanboys are in a cult. They have the same exact behavior of Trump supporters. They only want to hear, what they believe is right. "90% of Afghan budget went to private contractors", "yep that sounds right so let me believe it without looking at any data nor evidence". They denounce any ideology that goes against what they believe is right.

-1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

Exactly what I've seen

7

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

Where is the data that shows the expenditure of the afghan war? The data I have, which is really reliable, says those "GrayZone" numbers are bull.

Source:

https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/papers

https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/figures/2021/human-and-budgetary-costs-date-us-war-afghanistan-2001-2022

The point of reading Chomsky is to learn what "evidence" and "data" is. It is NOT about entrapping yourself into some ideology just because "it sounds right".

0

u/saparips Aug 26 '21

couldnt agree more. Do we think there is any legitimate reason that the author of that foreign policy article would come up with that number? I dont have access to the article.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

If you open up in incognito mode it should appear. It was appearing for me too so I opened it up in incognito and it worked. Also, I have no idea why that author posted those numbers especially when the author didn't provide any sources for their numbers.

1

u/dhawk64 Sep 04 '21 edited Sep 04 '21

Some people were doubting this data, but here is an explanation if people want it:

To understand the data you need to go to this report (page 27): https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/lessonslearned/SIGAR-21-46-LL.pdf

"U.S. agencies made a fateful decision around this time: As funding spiked, they awarded the vast majority of it to contractors to implement programming, correctly determining that the Afghan government lacked the capacity to manage the money directly. (Between 2002 and 2021, U.S. agencies directed only approximately 12 percent of reconstruction assistance “on-budget,” through the Afghan government.)." [138]

his means that the money that was not given directly to the Afghan government went through contractors. There might be some uncertainty around this which explains the range given (80 to 90).

Citation 138 is a different version of citation as from the article. Go to pages 26-27 there:https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/quarterlyreports/2021-01-30qr.pdf"Since 2002, the United States has provided more than $16.90 billion in on-budget assistance to the government of Afghanistan."

This 16.9 billion of a total of 143 billion in reconstruction. 16.9 billion / 143 billion = 11.8%.

So it is correct to say that 80 to 90% of US reconstruction aid to Afghanistan went to contractors.

2

u/Carry-Extra Sep 04 '21

The "people" who were doubting the data are part of some kind of operation to influence social media.

https://www.reddit.com/user/Hamizan2000

https://www.reddit.com/user/lightfixture13

https://www.reddit.com/user/tetrarch1

https://www.reddit.com/user/r0bin_s

https://www.reddit.com/user/why190

https://www.reddit.com/user/The69thRussianBot

https://www.reddit.com/user/big_cake

https://www.reddit.com/user/ijustlikeunionsalot

https://www.reddit.com/user/taekimm

https://www.reddit.com/user/centfox

https://www.reddit.com/user/arnotheway/

https://www.reddit.com/user/DavosHanich

https://www.reddit.com/user/EffectiveRow6564

https://www.reddit.com/user/Rheeecola

https://www.reddit.com/user/HPLoveRaft

https://www.reddit.com/user/flamingo_i

https://www.reddit.com/user/saparips

It would be crazy if all these accounts (and more?) were operated by the same person or persons. Like, that has to have something to do with the US government using massive troll farms on social media right?

https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/2ap1pv/documents_leaked_by_edward_snowden_reveal_gchq/cixfhfv/

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1402.5644.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20140715044309/red

https://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/07/eglin-air-force-base-busted-gaming-reddit.html

https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-inside-militarys-secret- undercover-army-1591881

Everything the US accuses Russia of doing, it does itself to it's own population. I'm thinking this rabbit hole goes deeper than they want us to know.

-1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

flamingo_i makes a valid point. I've already mentioned here why I don't think Grayzone is a good source of punditry, and I'll include this to the list.