Transcripts For CSPAN Q A 20140526

What job dead you did you have gave you the best trach training what you doing now . Probably working for sam nunn and working for john. Two great leaders and two great teachers. Learned how to be fair, how to be aggressive. How to work with the press. Why Inspector Generals should work with congress because we report to them. I think from both of them, both of those men i ran investigations for both men over the years. I assume theres a special category members of congress involved in over sight. Excuse me. Any Congressional Committee can do over sight. Congress pass the laws, passing budget and theyll appropriate money. If you look at the history of congress, over seek is viewed from the beginning as a doable and important function. Over sight is how do we see how the money is being spent. If you look back the history of oversight goes back george washington. Its when i cant remember the general almost the entire u. S. Army is eliminated in indiana by an attack by indians. Congress, i think the first or second congress, sends a letter to excellencecy, president washington, please explain what happened to our army. They eventually send general wayne to handle that. But this is the first oversight. Its basically to our army, youre the chief executive and were the ones that report to the people. Its actually a controversy at that time. The whole issue of executive branch not providing records to Congress Goes back to george washington. Fortunately cooler heads prevail and George Washingtons initial response was, i dont owe them anything. Then he eventually cool heads prevails he provides the information. How many trips you made to afghanistan . I try to go every quarter. Its about my seventh or eighth trip. We have about 60 people over there. I go on a regular basis. Have you met hamid karzai . No, i have not had the pleasure. I intentionally not want to meet the president. My mission is to report to the president of the United States and the congress and the people of the United States. I meet with lower officials. Back in 2012, we had a little bit from a speech he made. Lets watch and get your reaction. [video clip] the afghan President Hamid karzai blamed foreign country for the corruption of government departments. The afghan leader said he hasnt seen any sign of success in tackling corruption but acknowledged the need for reform in his country. Corruption in afghanistan is the reality. The part that exist in our administration represents a small portion, its bribery and its our fault. The biggest part of corruption in our country does not belong to us. Its been imposed on us in order to weaken our government. The scandal surrounding Bank Afghanistan is regularly ranked as one of the worlds most corrupt nation. How is it possible Million Euros is about a billion dollars . How is it possible that money can find its way into the hands of those afghans . Most of that money went to i believe 19 or 20 individuals in the corporation. There have been public statements made by our government and other governments that the afghan ministries didnt aggressively enough pursue the kabul bank dollars. How could it happen . There are crooks everywhere. Most of that money was afghan money. These were the poor people of afghanistan put their money into this bank and it got stolen. Now the impact is still being felt because as that clip eluded to, International Organization have said afghanistan, you have to clean up your act. Dealing with banking oversight and regulation and you have to come up to International Standards on Money Laundering and antiMoney Laundering. They havent met those standards. Just before my last trip, just a few months ago, an International Body came in and downgraded the afghan Banking System because they havent done that. What im being told and my people being told come june, next month, they may very well blacklist afghanistan. That would put them into an elite group of nefarious countries that are blacklisted and it will be difficult for corresponding banks deal with the afghanistan Banking System. It could be difficult for International Aid get there. If they dont clean up their act, its going to be difficult for Honest Companies invest in afghanistan. You need a Banking System. You need that to get afghanistan out of this dependency on the International Community to support them. What do you make of karzai . Hes the elected president of a foreign government. He represents the will of the afghan people. Hes the president of their country. Why has he so often been very critical of this country . Its hard for me to answer that. I really dont know. You would have to ask karzai. I know hes been difficult for our officials deal with. Im looking forward to the future. Theres an election going on. Were looking forward to a new president , whoever it will be. Hopefully well have better relations. Do you have any sense of how much money he personally taken from the United States . I know nothing about that. I dont know. Is it true that he built a compound for himself after he leaves that job . I believe thats been publicly reported. He has a house or a palace or location in kabul. Thats been publicly reported. How big is your organization . Our organization consist of 200 agents and auditors and inspectors and engineers and support staff. We have about 50 or 55 people in afghanistan and were at kabul and other bases. We have the largest u. S. Federal Law Enforcement presence in afghanistan. Where do you headquarter here in town . Across the river in crystal city. I can see the white house, see congress from my office. In arlington, virginia. Correct. Who do you answer to . The way the statute is written, i basically answer to the president. Its a unique office. Its been the best job i ever had. I dont sit inside the department of defense or aid or state. I basically sit above my Government Agency that does reconstruction. Congress set that up by statute. I basically report i have to file my reports with somebody so port to congress and file them with congress. What kind of authority do you have . Full Law Enforcement authority. Full Audit Authority like any Inspector General. We have the right to demand records and demand material and access from any Government Agency doing reconstruction. If we dont get that information, we will file whats called a seven day letter where we notify the head of the agency and congress. We of course do everything publicly if we can because thats the best way to do it. Who do you answer to on the hill . Its interesting. Our authorizing committees are Senate Armed Services and house armed services. Our appropriate committees, were in the appropriation budget for foreign operations. How long are you guaranteed to have this job or to have this budget . Washington is no guarantee. I serve at the pleasure of president of the United States. He can remove me any time or replace me. Our agency by law, goes out of existence at a certain point in time. Its a temporary agency which is good and bad. I totally support temporary agencies. We go out of existence when the amount of authorized and appropriated but not yet spent, its an odd term, funds far below 250 million. We go out of existence six months latesser. Which which is good. Theres approximately 19 billion authorized appropriated not yet spent in the pipeline and approximately approximately 6 to 10 billion. Of the 103 billion that had already been spent on reconstruction. Its been authorizessed and appropriated. Part of that has not been spent. From your investigation, how much of that has been spent incorrectly . I like to give you an exact number. I cant. Percentage . I cant even give you a percentage. I can say a lot of money. I focus on trying to stop waste and trying to catch people who did in the past. To go out and figure it out and add it up, say 50 , 30 , i think were spending a lot of money. My staff time can be better spent trying to find the problems, identify the problems and help correct them. If i ask you, have the American People gotten their moneys worth . Their full moneys worth, no. Definitely not. Theres been some good things done. We have a lot of hard working people at aid and state and dod, department of agriculture. Lot of people gone over. Department of commerce gone over. Lot of people devoted their lives and energy over there. Have we gotten the beggest bang for the buck . No. Thats what we find all the time. Poor planning, poor execution. Heres a part of an nbc report. [video clip] defense officials call it a big White Elephant nobody wants. Located in southern afghanistan, its a brand new stateoftheart military headquarters. Pentagon Inspector General john sopko call it a total waste of taxpayer money. The building will probably never be used and it maybe destroyed. At a cost of 34 million and 64,000 square feet, its larger than a football field. Complete with a war room, theater and enough office space to accommodate 1500 workers. Long before it was built, Major General Richard Mills said he didnt need the building and didnt want it. There will soon be no one to use it. Americas draw down from afghanistan, the number of forces has fallen from 20,000 to 7000. That was 2013. How did that happen . Whats what were trying to find out. We dont really know. We have an Ongoing Investigation special projects looking at how did we end up like this. Were building a building basically we wasted 34 or 35 million for a building that nobody wanted. The general said i dont want it, edont want to use it. General allen, who was his supervisor said, we still trying to identify who in the pentagon or who in the military dead did it and why. We cant find records. It is shocking by the lack of candor were finding. I looked at that case in particular because somebody had to do something. I asked the dod if he wanted to look at it. They were overwhelmed. They say, you have people there, you do it. Department of defense we coordinate our work with the dod and the Inspector General. There are two general officers took me aside separately and said, you have to look at that. Because that is indicative of the problem of military construction. It starts and it never stops. I trusted these two generals. They know whats going on. I went back and later talked to sam nunn and talked to some other people that worked for sam nunn. They say you have something thats got to be looked at. Were looking at it. Were trying to find out. I dont know what the end result is going to be. We will find out. That it one of the problems that clearly comes out from the work weve done. Nobody is being held accountable. Im in the accountability business. Ive been tong that doing that sense i left law school in 1977. The 1978 Inspector General act was created. Which we follow. You got to hold people accountable. If you dont, this keeps being repeated. Thats why were going to find out who did it and find out why. When was your office created . It was created in 2008. Who was behind the creation of it . You know its funny. Both people when it was being run by predecessor, nobody takes credit for it. I dont actually know. The history is kind of a take on who introduced the legislation. But it was based upon the theory that was used in iraq. They created a special Inspector General for iraq. As we started spending more reconstruction money, the idea was to create a new one. I cant tell you which senator or congressman was pushing it. You know the image in the media of whats being on in afghanistan is more and more of this kind of thing. Were not getting our moneys worth. You say you cant find the place where somebody is responsible . How can that happen . We still dont have a central database of where we spend the money . Why not . Thats a question. The department of defense still cant give us audit of financial records. He said john, you realize we put the defense procurement on high risk list in 1991 and it still hasnt gotten off. Thats one of the things i want to tray to elevate. Thats part of my job. I view this as my last federal job. I have seen these problems time and time again. We have a different approach i think most i. Gs. Were going to try to fix some of the bigger problems that are indicative of afghanistan. What you see in afghanistan is what you see in procurement that the Defense Department carrying out programs at the state or u. S. Aid around the world. We need to highlight these programs. We need to hold people accountable. You know, again, you have the president of the United States and his cabinet officers in both state and Defense Department. Why wouldnt they turn and say, get to the bottom of this . Its a lot of easier to say than do. You talking thousands of people below them. Youre talking about cultures. You havent even had really aggressive Inspector Generals and defense and state and aid. They had Inspector Generals . Im happy that the president appointed aggressive Inspector Generals. If you have an acting i. G. , the agency you got to have a permanent one. An actually i. Acting i. G. Is always looking over his shoulder. He never has the authority of the full blown Inspector General. You need an i. G. To approach this as important issue. We need to get to the bottom of it. Thats what im hoping to energize. Heres some video. Whats this . This is another example of just sheer waste. The decision was made based upon concerns from iraq that we were using burnt pits and we were hurting the g. I. s. We were hurting our troops from smelling and breathing all of those horrible fumes. So congress enacted law said youre going to use sophisticated incinerators in afghanistan. We built them and we dont use them. This thing was built and it was poorly constructed. Looks nice. If you look at it and look closely, it cant be used. Were finding these incinerators all over afghanistan. Not used, underused or in this case, its built, cant be used and its actually been torn down. Who builds it . U. S. Contractors or afghan contractors or whatever. It was poorly designed for the system. What im looking at somebody, they had no pump down there so the system will fall apart. The garbage will go in there and wont come out. Its just horribly designed system do we know who wanted these incinerators . Congress said you have to use them. But they didnt designate which incinerator. Somebody procured them and built them. Most of them going to be torn down or have been torn down because were turning over the bases to the afghans. This is another example of millions of dollars of taxpayer money being wasted. Whats the most successful thing you seen built over there with that 103 billion . Ironically, the best built building is the one you showed in the camp. The problem is, its not going to be use and it probably be torn down. Its hard for me to say whats been the best use of taxpayer money used in afghanistan. Im looking for that. To be honest with you, i have to write a number of Lessons Learned reports to help congress and the administration. I can base those Lessons Learned report on failures or i can base them on successes. Last year, i sent a letter to the secretary of defense, secretary of state and aid administrator, the leader of aid and asked them for money. Their ten most successful project programs and ten worse and tell me why. They didnt answer the letter. None of them . None. They didnt give me the ten programs. I said maybe ten is too hard. Just give me some of your most successful ones and why. They again didnt answer. They gave me anecdotal information. Healthcare has improved, afghan children are going to school. The military is aggressive and fights well. I came back and said, that doesnt help me. What program led to better education . What program led to and why to Better Health or better roads. Theres no connection between general healthcare improvement and a specific program. Thats important because decreasing budget, we have to rack and stack what programs are the best and worse. Otherwise, congress is forced cut across the board. They dont know what worked. I still dont have that answer. Ive actually reached out to the n. G. O. s the Nongovernment Organization to get a list of what works and what doesnt. Im reaching out to corporate america. The corporations who have worked there. Im not taking them totally. Im like ronald reagan, trust but verify. I need that information. The agencies of the u. S. Government arent providing it. Thats a shame how often have you seen in afghanistan a Nongovernment Organization, a charity and you walked away from it and said thats not a charity . Theyre masking as a charity and theyre making money . Well, i havent seen them over in afghanistan its amazing what your definition of charity is. Ive been impress by some n. G. O. S in afghanistan. You say youre impressed . Yes, by some them. Heres an article from the Washington Post that was done may 4th by scott higgum and jessica. Headline is big budge and little over sight in war zone. In so doing, International Release and development increased its annual revenue from 706 million. Most of it from one corner of the federal government of the u. S. Agency for international development. This is a long involved story. You read it and you learn that a lot of people that worked at u. S. Aid have doubled their salary and people are making hundreds of thousands of dollars off something that was supposed to be a charity. If youre an american taxpayer and youre looking at the this and youre saying, when does this stop . You raise a couple of issues. One is why is aid using a particular company or entity. Then in how good a job theyre doing for the money. Thats one issue. Second issue which is a little bit beyond my jurisdiction. That is the i. R. S. Tax code. How you define something thats charity or not charity. I have nothing to do with that. I can look, we have had a number of audits and inspections dealing with this company in particular i. R. D. Should it be a charity or not, i have no opinion on that. I dont know the tax code that well. I have enough problem filling out my own taxes. The second question is, did they do a good job and have and is there proper oversight. Weve had complaints about the over sight u. S. Aid provided. The question is, this revolving door, has this had any impact on the over sight. U. S. Aid is looking at that and we are looking at that issue. Theres a secondary issue that comes up that is restrictions on i. R. D. Employees on talking to congress or the Inspector General or even aid about problems they see. They are very concerned about that. We announced an information, weve been asked to look at by a number of senators. Were looking at that issue. Thats a separate issue than the tax issue. Heres some footage of the taliban shooting at americans from the documentary behind the taliban mask. Watch this. Its about a minute and 26 seconds. [video clip] [speaking foreign language] important thing there, its an embedded. Its only labeled journeyman. Embedded person with the taliban shooting at the americans. I know youre not in policy development, when you see this, whats your reaction . Well, the reaction is it shows the reality of afghanistan and it shows the danger that our troops have been putting up with and our Foreign Service office or aid officers, my people and the afghans. Its a war. People are trying to kill you. People have to keep that in context. Our aid people are working in a country where people are trying to kill them. They will be happy to kill them. Were giving money to a country where there is a significant war going on. There are people dying all the time. Not many now american soldiers because the Afghan Military is taking over that role. We are in a war. This is not kansas. When people think its over, its not really over particularly since were talking about giving foreign assistance for years to come to make sure afghanistan does not become a home for terrorist who assault us is it going to work when you cant keep track of where your money is going and things are being built by the fed . I an eternal optimist. I think it can work. I think individuals can make it work. We have to be smarter, work harder and we have to pause now with the now government coming in and say okay, what are you going to do about corruption . What are you going to do about these other things to ensure we can give you that money and our people can feel confident it will be spent wisely. We have to do it better. We have to think better. This is not kansas. When you send somebody over there, dont think youre dealing with u. S. Business and u. S. Court system. You have to realize what youre dealing with. Im optimistic. Theres something called the National Priorities project that keeps track of how the money is being spent. By the time this runs, it will be will be higher. Cost of the war in afghanistan over all 718 billion so far. Cost of the war in iraq since 2003, 816 billion. Total 1. 5 trillion. You worked in congress for how many years . Almost a quarter century. How was it that we were able to fight these wars without paying for them . Boy, that is above my pay grade. Youve been an inspector and investigator. How could that physically happen . Well, you pass the budget. I dont know if i can answer that question. Something must have led you to get into this job. You angry going into this job about what you thought was a misspent american budget over there . I wasnt angry. I just felt i could help. Why . Because ive been doing this for i came to this town in 1982. We kind of overlapped you here in cspan. I remember seeing cspan grow. It was such a pleasure working on hill and being able to see the senate familiar because of you. We didnt have to listen to all the bells and whistles and all the stuff to find out what our members were doing. I thought i can help. I still do think i can help and try to change this mentality of just spending money and Holding People accountable. I will show some video of your appearance on this network in 1987. This was your first appearance that we know of on the network. This is you and another job. [video clip] as previously eluded to by senator cohen, on evening of saturday november 2, 1982, kbg agents walked out of a georgetown restaurant and entered the defector history. Particularly in the soviet union and behind the iron curtain, the event surrounding his alleged escape that can be expected of any fugitive to the west. What were you doing there . I was growing a beard at that time. I was working for senator sam nunn for the committee of investigations. We have a conducted a long term investigation into the handling of defectors by u. S. Government. These were defectors from the former soviet union and other communist countries. I was talking about a exkgb agent redefected and he was trotted out in the Foreign Press saying how bad the United States was. What did you learn from that experience . That we needed to improve our program for handling defectors. We did mishandle it. Hear you are 12 years later. [video clip] the staff statement that follows and was introduced today encompasses summary of result of a two year investigation that included two Fact Finding Missions to europe, as well as equal number of interviews with foreign officials, smugglers, scientists and Foreign Policy makers. This is our third interim staff report on this subject senator nunn. On the basis of investigation, staff believe what is is currently known about trafficking and materials and know how, demonstrates a threat this nation cannot ignore. The specktor what we dont know, however, is even more the threat of trafficking from the former soviet union is our nations Number One National security threat. The threat is not theoretical but real as evidenced by documents of we were investigating loose nooks and weapons of mass destruction. One of the great successes is we convinced Ukrainian Government to give up all their Nuclear Weapons. We did that in car zack all of these countries that had Nuclear Weapons was deteriorating. Senator nunn is still working on the issue. Its still something the global proliferation of weapons of mass destruction are still a big issue here you are in 2005. Another issue. [video clip] im not pessimistic. Ive looked up screwed up agencies and screwed up issues for 20 something years. This too will pass. Im certain we will get our act together. What im hoping what i was told when i originally came to the hill back in 1982 and sam nunn was tutoring me and said that National Security is a nonpartisan, its a bipartisan issue. Just remember that. He was correct at that time. I only hope that the partisanship that weve seen, particularly the partisanship on terrorism can dissipate. Maybe because this isnt a president ial year. Well actually have a nonpartisan approach to this problem. Which is the only way we can successfully deal with it. You said back then as you said here, youre not a pessimist and youre an optimist. Nine years later, probably spent 10 trillion in debt since then. How are you doing otherwise . Well, i hope National Security still remains a nonpartisan issue. So many republicans and democrats from when i started said that when we go to the border, we lose our political affiliation. You make me think about a lot of people have died over that. And we shouldnt look at this as a republican or democratic issue. Excuse me. When you get shot at over in afghanistan or korea or wherever, theyre not shooting at are a republican or a democrat, theyre shooting at an american. I dont know why that struck me. We got to stop this craziness about making everything partisan. Its u. S. Government. Its the u. S. Interest overseas. Its not the democratic party, its not the republicans its not the tea party. Its our interests. It made me think of when you showed that clip, we got a Major Investigation going on in afghanistan rake now. Its been ongoing. Its about contractors who didnt do the right thing as a result of americans died. American dieds, not political party. It struck me, anyway. Thats an issue i remember there was a story, i think we lost 9 billion in iraq. What happened to it . What happened to the business folks who got involved in this or the government . Some got indicted, some lost their ability to contract. But a lot didnt. What im trying to say is that fraud kills. Its nonpartisan fraud. We got to do something about it. We dont have unlimited budgets. Must be gets wasted on a building thats never going to be used is money that could have helped some other afghans. It could have helped some people here in the United States. You keep seeing this again and again. Im very proud to work for this administration. I think its important that people realize i was appointed by the president. Inspector generals are independent. Its important that the people see that the government does care. There are a lot of people. There are people in aid and state and pentagon who care about wasting money. They are trying to fix it. My job is to help them fix it. This is something we need to focus on. Too many people think that nobody in the government cares. Im sort of the spokesman for those who do. Its those general who call me up. It will be the people who see cspan. I investigators say when you call cspan, our up tick on complaints on the hot line goes up. It helps us. Thats why we work with the press because the success brings success. There are people in the government, there are thousands of them who are trying to do a good job. We just got to listen to them. Here you are in january of this year. [video clip] chairman, why should we be concerned about this situation . Even though little of this opium hits american shores, we all know that the narcotics crisis in afghanistan is a National Security concern. Because it distorts the afghan economy, poisons its banking sector, fuels a growing illicit economy, undermine the Afghan Government by stoking corruption and nourishing criminal network and providing 35 of the Financial Support to the taliban and other groups. It also puts at risk the fragile reconstruction gains we have made over the last 12 years. Whether in health, education, womens issues, or governance. From everything you read, the poppy crop is a far more lucrative today than its ever been. Why . Why havent we been able to stop that . Because it hasnt been a priority. Thats the answer. Hasnt been a priority for us and hasnt been a priority for the afghans. Its lucrative. But its the 800pound gorilla in the room. It could spoil everything. Theres going to be more and more evidence coming out, i think youre going to see. That opium is reaching our u. S. Shores. They produce 70 or 80 of all opium in the world. Thats one of the things over the last 12 years. Im told by my people that this crop, this year is going to be even bigger than last year which was bigger than the year before. If we dont address that, what you basically have is a Funding Source of 30 of the money that the insurgents get comes from opium. We got an automatic Funding Source and many areas, very interesting you over lay the opium production areas with the areas controlled by the government. Thats kind of a pretty good match. Because the drug dealers dont want a Central Government to work. The drug dealers dont care about honesty. Drug dealers dont care about womens issues. They dont care about healthcare or education. Unless we address that drug issue, youre going to have a second government operating. Its going to be cartel like. Its going to be grim organization who are giving money to the taliban. This is an issue. Again, i dont do policy. I just do process. You tell me what the policy is. The policy is to create a stable Afghan Government that will keep terrorists out of the country who wont attack us. What we say is, you got to focus on narcotics issue. We havent been doing that. Go back to that just the taxpayer there, theyre sitting there watching this. They see you uncovering all the misuse of funds there. They see the poppy cropping. They watch hamid karzai criticize us constantly about all of this stuff. Why are we there . Youve watched this town for 30 something years. What needs to change . Something has to change. Why wont it change now . Well, again, i dont do policy. What im just saying is the process to carry out our policy has to improve. We have to do the programs better. I think it can change if people of like mind get together. If people know what the issues are and know what the facts are and they can try to address it. Why are there . The stated reason is to make assure that country doesnt become a safe harbor for terrorists who will attack us and attack our allies and to help do that, were helping the afghan people. Thats our stated policy. My job is to try to help our u. S. Government officials and congress understand the issues and try to make the money go further and do what it was supposed to be intended to do. I found this on your website. Its complicated im going to read it and you can help us. It has a point. Sigar, which is you, special Inspector General for afghanistan, identified this is from the 2012 base construction schedule, you all identified 52 projects that may not meet the interNational Security assistance forces. December2014 construction deadline. Increasing costs and over sight risks if these projects are continued. Sigars assessment is different from what is that . That was set up by the allies in the u. S. Government to give assistance. Its part of the u. S. And Coalition Operation to give assistance to afghanistan. You go back to what you said, identify 52 projects that may not meet the security forces. Its different from which estimated only one felt worth 16 Million Dollars would not meat the 2014 construction deadline. In other words, 52 projects and they say only one doesnt meet it. Thats a difference. Its almost a 98 deference. I dont specifically remember that finding. The reason i brought it up, all the different sigars, how does anybody keep track of who really has the authority and who can stop these kind of things when theyre not working . Well, thats a good question. The best we can do is we follow our mandate and we put everything out in the public domain. We try tourette it to write it in such a way. That sames to have been writ in gibberish and not english. We issued a report which actually everybody uses including people in the government and afghan use it to find out whats going on. We tray to put the information out there. My first job was a paper boy in cincinnati, ohio. I forget the newspaper, cincinnati posting time star i think it was. Their logo was a light house. Give them the light or theyll be free. Cincinnati post. Yes, cincinnati post. I was a little paper boy. It remainedded reminded me of what our job is. Our job is to get the information out there. Hopefully the policy makers will look at it and use it to the betterment of our country and betterment of Afghanistan Reconstruction. How would you rate this job so far that youve had compared to all the other jobs . Best job i ever had. Why . Great challenge. Great people. I think the best group of federal Civil Servants i ever worked for or worked with. I think an important issue. I think its an opportunity to get something done. I view this as my last federal job. Ive seen problems going back. Youve shown some of the hearings. You seen he lose hair. Ive been doing this since the late 1970s. Its an tent to get people opportunity to final get people to fix some of the problems. If you read about the u. S. Military, rotating troops in and out has been a problem since world war ii. Were seeing that same problem there. People with six month rotation. At the love these problems we have seen. We got to do something. Thats what were hoping we can do at sigar. University of pennsylvania law. No, undergrad. Where did you get your law degree . Case western reserve in cleveland. What projects are on your plate as Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction that were going to see you release in the next couple of months . Well, going to have a little project coming out on the control overral of the guns weve given and weapons weve given to the afghans. We got a serious problem about where they are. Thats a serious problem. Where are they . Nobody knows. We cant account for all the weapons weve given the Afghan Military. That will be an important project. Were going to be doing a major project on the energy issue sector. Were looking also at the health sector, seeing what weve done there. We going to have a little job thats going to come out, we didnt know we bought a navy for the afghans. Our job is to try to find out what happened to the navy. We think its in boxes some place in norfolk. We bought a navy. Its not a big country. We trying to figure out why we bought a navy. What did we buy . Its a boat. Must have been a good idea for some contractor or some procurement guy. Its still in boxes. So the afghans havent seen it. Were going to be trying to answer the question of why we bought an airplane for the afghans that cost over 600 million and cant fly. We bought 20 of them and cant physically fly. Theyre falling apart. Theyre too dangerous to fly. Question is, who in the air force or who in the u. S. Government decided to pick this airplane and why did we pick that airplane and why did we pick that refurbished package for these airplanes . Its a disaster. Ill be going to afghanistan soon and im certain ill find some interesting stories. The president called you, what do you need to make your job easier, what would you tell him . I would think wouldnt mind getting a i dont know. I actually dont know. Youve stomped me which is difficult to think. I kind of wish i had been appointed four years before. I think we could have done more. I would think the best thing he can do for afghanistan i believe is make certain everybody pauses for a minute with the new government. Lets do a real close scrubbing and assessment of the program and make certain were doing the right ones. Our guest has been john sopko. Special Inspector General for afghanistan and reconstruction. Live 2012 and we thank you sir. Thank you very much. For free transcripts or give us your comment about this program, visit us at q a. Org. Next, live your calls and comments on washington journal. Live at 11 00 a. M. , president obama taking part in memorial day ceremonies at Arlington National cemetery. In some respect, apple and google arguably started at the same time. Apple obviously started in the 1970s but steve jobs got fired from the company and apple went through a period of say 10 or 15 years where its fortunes really declined steadily. It wasnt really until 1997 when steve jobs returned that apples fortunes really began to rebound. In fact, i guess pretty well known among people who Pay Attention whats going on, when steve jobs came back, apple had about 90 days of cash left before it was going to go in. In some respect, you can say both companies started right around the same time. Tracing the origins of apple and google. Tonight on the communicators at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan two. This morning on washington journal, author and president ial historian douglas looks a the significance of memorial day and the historic contributions by fallen soldiers. Then military times record later peter president and ceo discusses the availability of jobs of returning service members. And well take your calls and you can join the conversation at facebook and twitter. Washington journal is next