KBR? Ripping Off America? I Can't Believe It!

So an Army official was overseeing the KBR (company motto: "Rape? I don't see any evidence of Rape.") account, and came across a few charges that seemed a bit off. They didn't have the proper documentation for them, or, well, any documentation. Of course, it was a minor amount -- just $1 billion -- but the Army official decided he should probably deny payment, given that the charges, you know, weren't supported by facts.

So -- funny story -- the guy got fired:

Army auditors had determined that KBR lacked credible data or records for more than $1 billion in spending, so Mr. Smith refused to sign off on the payments to the company. “They had a gigantic amount of costs they couldn’t justify,” he said in an interview. “Ultimately, the money that was going to KBR was money being taken away from the troops, and I wasn’t going to do that.”

But he was suddenly replaced, he said, and his successors — after taking the unusual step of hiring an outside contractor to consider KBR’s claims — approved most of the payments he had tried to block.

I'm sure it's just a total coincidence that KBR is a spinoff from Halliburton, the company once helmed by Darth Crashcart, also known as Dick Cheney.

Of course, the Army says there's a perfectly reasonable explanation: KBR blackmailed 'em.

Army officials [...] said that KBR had warned that if it was not paid, it would reduce payments to subcontractors, which in turn would cut back on services.

“You have to understand the circumstances at the time,” said Jeffrey P. Parsons, executive director of the Army Contracting Command. “We could not let operational support suffer because of some other things.”

Yeah! I mean, it's totally reasonable that an American company would sabotage American troops because of a billing dispute, and there's no way that this could be resolved, other than to simply pay $1 billion in taxpayer money to a company that probably didn't do anything to earn it.

Fortunately, there are people other than me who aren't stunned by this revelation:

When told of Mr. Smith’s account, Representative Henry A. Waxman, the California Democrat who is chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said it “is startling, and it confirms the committee’s worst fears. KBR has repeatedly gouged the taxpayer, and the Bush administration has looked the other way every time.”

Well, duh, Congressman! I mean, if the Bushies didn't look the other way, that might eat into profits. And that would be the worst possible outcome for our glorious Iraq adventure.

UPDATE: As Hilzoy helpfully reminds us, this is one of many reasons why the rush to privatize the military was really bad for the country.