BAD BUSINESS AT THE PENTAGON

According to sources at the Pentagon, the United States is buying Russian-made helicopters for the government of Afghanistan, which has upset some members of Congress. If that is true... we need to identify all those Congressional leaders who are not upset by this program and either impeach them or vote them out of office.

Every member of the House and the Senate, as well as every American in this country should be outraged by this stupidity.

The United States government has spent $648 million dollars to buy or refurbish 31 Russian Mi-17 transport helicopters for the Afghan Air Corps. WHY NOT AMERICAN? According to some legislators, the Pentagon never even considered alternatives to the Russian purchase, which has prevented competitive pricing and will enable Russian defense contractors to gouge prices.

This is outrageous... so where is the outrage?

Legislators on both sides of the House have said that this program has close to no oversight, and there has been massive waste, cost over runs, schedule delays, safety concerns and major delivery problems. If this is true, as are the reports that there are substantial no bid contracts being handed out in this program in which our government is paying significantly higher than the going market rates for these choppers, there should be even a bigger concern -- Corruption.

All that said and done, why Russia? Pentagon officials have outlined a number of reasons why they believe that the Russian made choppers are best for Afghanistan, but are they? If we're using the same people to make that decision that allowed these no bids contracts with massive waste, cost over runs and delivery problems, we may want to take a serious second look at the requirements, and who can fill them. More so... IT'S RUSSIA! The same country with that has these cushy relationships with Iran, North Korea and Venezuela. At the rate we're going, maybe we can buy some helicopters from Iran given they have much of the same terrain as Afghanistan, NO?

This program and these contracts are stupid and should be stopped immediately.

Russia is not an ally, a friend or a business partner. Why are we giving them this business and worse, why are we spending more that we should.

This is a bad business, bad management and bad government.