The Pakistan Aid Abyss

From the not-surprising-in-the-least category comes a NY Times article on the lack of oversight of US aid to Pakistan. In a nice understatement, an anonymous "senior American military official" said, "I personally believe there is exaggeration and inflation. Then, I point back to the United States and say we didn’t have to give them money this way."
So how seriously can anyone take the statement of Assistant Secretary Of State For South And Central Asian Affairs, Richard Boucher, who testified before the Senate on December 6 that "all of our assistance programs are directed toward helping Pakistan achieve" objectives including "its transition to an elected civilian-led democracy, to become a moderate, democratic, Muslim nation committed to human rights and the rule of law"?
One problem is what "directed" can possibly mean in the absence of oversight and accountability. Recent Congressional efforts to require accountability from Pakistan and the Bush Administration can't be seen as serious. As the Times puts it, "lawmakers in Washington voted Thursday to put restrictions on the $300 million in military financing, and withheld $50 million of that money until Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice certifies that Islamabad has been restoring democratic rights since Mr. Musharraf lifted a state of emergency on Dec. 16. The measure ha(s) little effect on the far larger Coalition Support Funds reimbursements."
No kidding. These "Coalition Support Funds" (CSF) are where the real money is. CSF is described by the Center for Public Integrity as "a program controlled by the Defense Department to reimburse key allies in the global war on terror." In May the center reported the results of an investigation by its International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). They found, among other things, that "Pakistan's increase in U.S. military aid in the three years after 9/11 is a stunning 50,000 percent, growing from just $9 million in the three years before the attacks to nearly $4.7 billion in the three years after."
According to Larry Korb of the Center for American Progress, since 2001 the US has given more than $10 billion to Pakistan, of which 60% has gone toward CSF and is "considered by the U.S. administration to be a repayment rather than assistance. However, since there has been little accountability or transparency of this funding, it is uncertain if in fact these funds are being used to fight the GWOT (Global War on Terror)."
The remainder goes to "security assistance" efforts (involving major weapons like F-16s) and efforts aimed at "macroeconomic stability and to free up funds for social spending [although] few transparent accountability mechanisms are built in."
And the remainder of US aid to Pakistan? K. Alan Kronstadt of the Congressional Research Service says "only about 10% of the more than $10 billion provided to Pakistan since 2001 (including coalition support) has been specifically devoted to development and humanitarian programs."
As Robert Hathaway of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars put it, "the administration has justified virtually all U.S. assistance to Pakistan in terms of counterterrorism. To the extent that the Pakistani security apparatus has been employed since November 3 in rounding up lawyers, opposition politicians, journalists, and human rights activists, it is difficult to argue that unconditional backing for Pakistan’s military supports the war against terrorism."
No wonder the administration doesn't seem unduly concerned about the relatively weak restrictions established by Congress last week in its $300 million funding for Pakistan. When you have vast amounts, numbering in the billions, of Coalition Support Funds tucked into defense spending, a little $300 million slice of aid lets Congress have its oversight public relations coup.
Meanwhile, the real coup in Pakistan is effectively met with indifference.