It's no secret that war is expensive, but a report out Wednesday says the U.S. has wasted billions in Iraq and Afghanistan. More tax dollars will go down the drain unless the government makes big changes.
CBS News correspondent David Martin reports that in ten years of war, the U.S. has paid contractors $206 billion to do everything from building schools to guarding diplomats. Today, a blue ribbon commission put a number on how much has been lost not to violence but to mismanagement and corruption.
Commission on Wartime Contracting Chairman Christopher Shays says: "We are wasting between $30 and $60 billion during the course of our engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan."
Shays says $30 billion in waste can be documented; Everything from leasing four-wheel vehicles at "grossly exorbitant rates" of about $40,000 a year, to a $124 million prison renovation that was never finished. The larger $60 billion figure includes an estimate of how much money lined the pockets of corrupt officials and even the enemy.
