not raising our hands when we should have won requirements are defined, going back to the basic principles in construction. we were trying to stay out of the way of operations, we were not fully integrating with the operators on the ground and tried to please the customer firth and that what -- customer and i want to build this facility and go back and say we can do that when we know the kinetics are not right. we promised and delivered something in 12 months that we know it will take 18 months, that is over-promising. we need to make realistic promises and live up to those promises we have made. -- made to the customer. >> i will push on a couple more places. site preparation, you leave that to the contractor to determine. >> there have been some cases where the geotechnical services that have to be done and the

design for the foundation for building is part of the contract and the contractor is required to do that. we are required to -- there have been some cases where collapsible soils or in an area and the design did not take into account there was collapsible soil. that was corrected letter on but that is something we should have caught and we should have provided more oversight. >> why don't you? >> we are providing more oversight. >> why don't you take on the responsibility of doing that report? >> doing the prep work ourselves and doing the design ourselves. >> mm-hm. >> we could but there are cable design agencies out there, contractors who can do theth. they are -- he

capable. we owe our customers that. >> in your statement, you said they were not compatible with local customs and capacity, a different issue than the soil issue and the technical side prep issues. >> exactly. if you are in an area where to cool building, you have the choice of installing a complex air moving system, an hvac system, if you design the building different, they would be more main tenable in the repair parts would be more available and it would make sense to do that. >> you have learned those lessons. >> we have. >> you are continuing to contract out the responsibility for coming up with those things. >> i am mixing metaphors.

the standard designs for a barracks, we provide that to the contractor. this needs to be adapted to that site. there are differing soil conditions on a construction site that go into the design. adapting a site requires further engineering and we need quality assurance and oversight of. >> i will pick out your statement. the challenges in filling critical conditions -- positions. i appreciate there were new guidelines put out last fall in 2010. we have been at this construction in war zones for a lot more than six months. why can't you get critical positions filled? >> we're getting better at it. the last couple of years have been historic in terms of the corps of engineers workload, depending on how you normalize

the dollars. with base realignment and closure, the army's transformation has been a record workload in the states so demands in the states and the forward deployed theater were pretty substantial. probably a year or year-and-a- half ago, the workload in afghanistan added on to the workload in iraq at the time, had this working pretty hard. the with the situation has evolved, -- the way the situation has evolved, the pool of volunteers that we drawn to go over is more focused on afghanistan right now. with the increased workload that is coming, we're sending a team to do the planning. it is important to make sure that this is planned out. over 90 days we will grow 90

people. we have a much more robust pool of volunteers that we're able to draw from. just the nature of the workload. >> my time is up. i addressed my question to you but i would say at the state department and the air force and usaid, we are learning lessons but we keep making the same mistakes over and over, including getting enough people into the area to recognize that contract is such an important part of our overall mission. i am done. >> with your indulgence, could i interject a quick question as a follow-on to the earlier line of questioning to you about you understand the site selection is

bad for a project is not consonant with local culture but you do it and the customer finds out. substantial amount of funding come from customer phase? >> the size of our organization, the amount of people we put to a project comes from supervisory and administrative fees. >> we were speculating as to why you might not point this out when it is clear that these are going to be issues. does that have anything to do with the fact that you do not want to tick off the customer by telling them what the customer wants to do does not make sense? >> i do not think so. sites are selected based on best available information. >> you said in your response to

the comments that there were times when you knew that it would not make sense and nothing was said. why is that the case? >> back to the comment. this is a war zone. we're trying to -- if you are building a security point on the border at a crossing point, to provide security or provide security -- >> we know it is a war zone. let's take the issue of soil. whether the soil can sustain the building has nothing to do with the war zone. that would be true in peace time. it has been the case that there have been times when you have known that the site selected would not sustain the project. the project was billed nevertheless and millions of dollars wasted. why don't you explain that early on? >> it was the case that a

building could not be built. the designer that did the evaluation and did the design and execution of the construction to a short appropriate compaction was not done to the standard should have been. our quality assurance should have done that because the building could have been built there. if we had paid more attention to make sure that the soil design was correct and we were watching construction execution as closely as we should have to make sure compaction was done the way it should have. >> thank you. >> i have two pictures. are you aware of what that is? >> that is the gazi boys' school. that is the current school

training the kids that are part of the school. for background, the reason i want to bring this up is this was a un op partnership contract which i know you know. it got off to a bad start because of failed contract or drawings. the people that they had doing the drawings. they are a european firm that does not spend a lot of time in theater and there rely on others. we went out there and that was an interesting trip. it is the only time in afghanistan where i looked around intently as we, our security detail was taking us out because we were traveling down some rugged roads without anything around except low formed buildings.

does the usaid have any hand in identification of the specifications and design or do you turn it over to your partner? >> i am sure that we must. i do not really know exactly in the case of the gauzy -- gazi school. oiu do not suggest yuo are too long on the you sure you must. are you aware of what that glassed in area? >> it is an atrium. they had a two-story area.

they thought it would be great if they had an atrium were then put in plants. it is one-third of the area of this is you can see. three stories, open their air- conditioned and he did. it is an atrium. -- three stories, open air air- conditioned and heated. you had to do a lot of scrambling because there was not a lot of oversight. usaid -- it was a challenging car trip. you had to get another set of drawings. someone designed a facility. someone asked if it was handicap

accessible. their solution was they got a walkway that is wide as this table. it goes from the third floor, maybe football field length to the bottom and it is concrete. polished and all that and that is the emergency exit. i have friends, everyone has wheelchair bound france. if an american high school had that, it would be an incredible skateboard track but it would not be much for an emergency exit because people would be falling. i say that because when you walk in, it looks wonderful. there are a lot of schools that would die -- that is a bad

choice of words -- they would be appreciative to have a school like that. the bathroom facilities and the like, they are american standard great. the reason i put that up is that is what they are replacing. it needs replaced, super. how much is enough? could that be a goal? do you need an atrium in and outside the wire school? do know what the answer was? there are a few important people who have their kids there that go there and it is kind of fake prestigious school. we want to knock them dead with the school. to really have a great facility. that is wrong. that is why i bring the picture of. to give you a chance to look at

that and understand that is a better standard then we have in america. i would encourage you to get more pictures. i am not here to debate it as much as to show it. i come down to the point of my question. on large projects and complex projects, usaid is invaluable. this is not a knock on their mission. their track record is great. in complex or large construction projects, my question is, are you out of your leg? should you be having an organization such as colonel cassidy having -- doing that for you that do these large projects the to the very effectively? is it possible that you have

been asked to do something that is outside your capability? >> there's no question in my assessment and this is not a recent phenomenon that the capacity of usaid as many folks came to know the agency worldwide were hollowed out. our ability to undertake large construction projects, the size of staff was dramatically reduced and that happened over the course of a few decades. i believe that it is in the interests of the american people and the government that usaid have some capacities. we have work to build some of them in some of the areas that we work. i think that what is my concern when you talk about our capacity at the moment, one hand is large construction and do we have the capacity to do the sorts of specifications reviews that you talk about. the other hand is the oversight.

the oversight is something that we can, must, and are making greater progress on. we cannot have the situation like we had in 2007. we had three contracting officers in afghanistan. we have a live in today and we ordered a doubling of that number. there is no question that if we are going to do this work, we need to enhance our oversight capacity. >> thank you. commissioner? >> i will be brief. i wanted to start with this letter, this article that was read earlier. bout the symbion claim they could have done the work on this kandahar plant. the questions are a couple of

old. since there were doing the work presently, in kabul, it is unclear to me why the source of justification says there was no alternative. there could have been trouble with performance. since the bulk of the work was subcontracted, why was that alternative not pursued? >> symbion was the subcontractor on the project and they left the site and that issue of their performance was subject to the lawsuit. at the time that this decision was made, symbian was not under consideration. if you are asking whether there were under consideration as a sole source, what we had was an existing agreement with [unintelligible] that had changed their

performance. >> that leads to the second question. if that is the case, if that was the criteria for deciding to do the sole source award, i would have thought that would be reflected in the justification. there is no mention of that. can you account for that? we have a key factor in the decision. why was that not mentioned in the document? >> what was not mentioned was our belief in their capacity to perform positively. >> there was no justification for that other than the conclusion they could do it. if there was this dramatic improvement, don't you think you would list that? under these circumstances when it was clear it would be a controversial decision? >> i believe that from the report and our work that it had

become clear they were performing. i do not know if there was a requirement or thought that the past history would be represented. we found it important to analyze their capacity to undertake it and include that in our assessment. >> what is the present status of the full and open competition process? are you on track to do it? it will happen in two fiscal year 2011. when can we expect you have procedures in place? >> i will have to get back to you on what date we expect that process to be fully completed. we -- competed. ism six months or six years from now? >> i am sure it is somewhere between that. i will get back to my staff.

>> is it closer to six years? >> it is closer to six months. our reliance on a single soul source contract that was completed in 2006 was not acceptable practice going forward. we realize that and it is a priority for us to put these new competed mechanisms in place. i was interested in your testimony which was rather self congratulatory, i thought. not personally but, this sentence on page two. any time a problem is identified, we will involve the relevant law enforcement agencies. it is established that this problem at the prison was not the under -- the uncovering was not done by the staff but by the inspector general. >speaking of the ig's

investigation, we are trying to establish the time line. you say here that after that investigation your office suspended them and the suspensions took place on august 26 of last year. when did the oig completed suspension? i am trying to see how prompt that was. >> we were brief oed on may 10. may 10. >> yes. >> inl took action may 11 with regard to information received and regarding the individual who appeared to be involved. >> can you get this back to us with the time of the oig

investigation? >> yes. >> you terminated the corps involved. >> may 11. the process for the dealing with the contractors was a different time line. i give you some of the key dates there. >> please do. the initial action to alert the company that there was a problem was when a letter of concern was transmitted from our procurement executive -- the oversight body. very 10. >> february 10, 2010.

>> one was the investigation completed? >> i cannot speak for them. we were briefed in may. it suspended the company in february 2010? >> the individual in the company, they were issued a show cause order in september. as i understand the process for when the company was doing work to do with an adequate performance, there is a specific contractual procedure under our federal regulation. that was the first action. with the company. there were terminated in -- they were terminated in november and january 4 the other. >> i strongly commend you to

bring us back a chronology and try to remember what you said and correct it. you will need to corrected. i have done a chronology here and it includes because it was a 90 day contract with two engineers in february. that is what led to the may briefing. if anyone needs reminders, tim johnson and bill campbell. you are correct. suspension;''s letter was in august and he left and is in malaysia. this is an interesting story that people were sitting there

explaining this is what happened and look at me -- looking me in the eye. i am hearing chronology that does not make sense. if you send it to me, i have my notes and the people i talked to and maybe we can make sense out of it. i would commend you not to be taking to the bank those paper notes that are floating up there. >> we are happy to double check and make sure they are accurate. >> if you would. >> thank you. commissioner green. >> your impression. is the schedule for the increased afghan national security forces realistic from your perspective i am looking at the requirements >.

>> it is a lot of work to get done, so we are looking at ho government furnished materials, anything we can do to be able to do it faster to standard and that is part and parcel why we seaddled up this team. i cannot tell you for sure. >> 400 folks is a lot to billet . if it gets to that. did any of your contractors recommend significant efficiencies that can be put in place?

that would reduce the government's cost? >> they do. in the case of over in theater, we dialogue with our contractor all the time. we take a value engineering approach to what we design and we're looking for efficiencies and better effectiveness in what we are putting on the ground. we take the input if there is a better way of doing business. >> you do not have any examples. >> when i asked the contractor, that answer was we are watching the air conditioner filters rather than replacing them. which was not a lot of dough. nevertheless. usaid. >> how -- what dialogue has there been in light of

president karzai's pronouncement on security contractors? what dialogue has there been and handling that if that comes to fruition? >> the has been in intensive and almost constant series of engagements with all those parties since august, figuring out how to move forward with the implementation of the to transi. >> have any of your partners

indicated they may not remain in country of that occurs? >> partners have expressed concern about what would come next. they have made clear both from a personal security perspective as well as from an insurance perspective that the arrangements that are going to be put into place need to satisfy both of those concerns. there will not able to continue their efforts. >> you are prepared to deal with those insurance changes of necessary? >> we're going to work with the afghan government, our implementing partners to work on that. we still do not know what that outcome is in terms of the timeline is impossible to say ors will bemente affected. >> will be the power plant to death, whether it is diesel or gas or natural gas or donkeys.

what arrangements have you made, what coordination has been done with the afghan government to take over its operation and maintenance of that specific facility once the u.s. money runs out? >> we have done two things right now. we have a five yearlong contract to work with the afghans to increase their capacity building so they will be able to take over operation of the plant from a technical perspective. we have worked with them to establish their authority, responsible for managing the plant and selections. dramatically increasing the amount of money they're collecting payments for electricity on and they are paying the fuel costs out of that money. >> all of the fuel costs? >> smyth understanding is as of today, the fuel costs as it is

being operated is being paied for by the afghan government. confirm the understanding i have from a day of discussion and to part in -- i took part in. the corps has saved a large fraction on projects including power projects in the war zones by doing fixed price on these, not cost plus and full competition, not sole source. that happens to be true about what we're talking about today, namely diesel power plants in

kandahar city. the army corps is contracting for two 10 megawatt power plants and awarded this after competition, firm fixed price to $51 this past august for million. are we talking about -- i am looking for an order of magnitude on what you saved, what the low bid tends to be by going the way you go rather than the high-priced way. my experts on the staff who have job experience with the project bidding for in afghanistan tell me on something that would cost in this power generation area, $275 million as

a sole source cost plus when you are done, you might save one- third on if you went fixed-price and fully competed. on $275 million, you might save up words of $100 million. the low bids come in that way. what would you say on that? >> i would begin to figure out what the differences. when standing is in iraq, we had large contracts with large international firms that were cost-type projects because of the nebulous requirements and the security situation. we were able to define requirements that we found in that environment and the in ferment in afghanistan that you

can use fixed-price type contracts successfully. in allocating risk between the government and the executors. >> a couple of things. you said during the earlier testimony that the decision was made to omit a transition line across the valley. that was my and standing and i think you said the same. it became the kandahar power initiative. you were going to check on what was meant by the components that could potentially be issued. you have reasons not to do so. i am trying to understand what was being talked about by components. if the transmission line to

kandahar was not going to be built and if you knew you were going to have to hook up diesel plants in kandahar by different contractors because the army api.'s contract was with were those potential components to be put apart? >> i want to read the sentence. >> would you say which components were a part? >> it says "this package of activities is interlinked and must be implemented simultaneously." >> i thought you were going to read the sentence.

>> i want to introduce how we got to that sentence. "a number of contracts could be issued to conduct the work needed to implement kpi, but the risk factors and management considerations make this option unfeasible. >> what was the different components? >> there were six different components. >> which could be awarded? you do not do each of the six. the power plant and hydro electric plant. >> if you wanted to, you could break out any of the components. >> you have no idea? throughyou are going other parts, you discussed components winter four and five and six, one is the helmand province dam and the other is the local distribution center

system. aren't one through four one component and five and six another component? >> the components could be separated in different ways. >> could one through four and five and six be separable? >> two is a junction. your staff did not tell you? another two times. could they not potentially be separated? >> i said they could be separable. the decision was made they were could be so we could be successful in delivering the power this was intended to do. >> i got that point. louis berger decided that you

would not suspend the bar. they defrauded the u.s. government big time with known false billing. they put in doubt a system we have found throughout iraq and afghanistan. wouldn't you consider that as negative past performance, if they come along and they want to bid, when you evaluate their performance which is often 30% of n-word. >> i believe it can and should be. >> thank you. >> thank you. bob? >> i want to get at this issue that mr. green raised about private security contractors.

you are dependent on private security to do their job. is that accurate? >> if the decree was amended, that could have had a dramatic impact. there may have been a massive exodus of implementing partners of $8 out of the country if they could not have private security, right? >> that is correct. certain of the firms would not continue to operate in afghanistan without proper security measures. they would just pack up and go. the mission would come to an end without the necessary security. >> it affects some of our programs. some were done through partners that do not use security partners and some are through government entities. it would affect not all are -- all of our mission. >> these contractors, whether

they are u.s., third country for locals, do they significantly affect the life, will redeem, and property of persons -- can they affect the life, liberty and property of private persons? >> are they there to protect the life, liberty, it and property of persons? significantly affect the life, liberty, and property of private persons? >> of the people they're protecting? >> yes. >> they are performing a function where they

significantly affect the life, liberty, and property of private persons? does the course of their duties require the exercise of discretion? >> in engagements? >> just discretion. simple to get outside of d.c. -- take it outside of d.c. >> they make decisions about how to conduct themselves. >> would you say that it is in our public interest to develop afghanistan? it is in our public interest to stabilize afghanistan. >> to do that would require contractors implementing partners, government agencies and they require contractors. my conclusion would be their performance of duties is

intimately related to the public interest. is that a fair conclusion? >> i want to confirm that we agree with the karzai government that is phasing out the use of private security contractors is in our best interest. >> the idea is to have a government that could provide security. does this require the exercise of discretion and government authority or things that are related to the public interest? it is interesting that you said the contractors are doing that same thing. that isth the bottom line. they are doing things that people in a better world would be doing. >> i believe that it is in the

best interest of the u.s. and the afghan government that we move to phasing out private security contractors for provision of security. >> does the presence of armed troops support or undermine the legitimacy of the host government? the karzai government? >> i believe it has done both. behavior and presence has undermined that and in others it has allowed us to undertake critical work. >> your written statement is interesting. security is the challenge in the root cause of our problems. you have adopted methods to mitigate security risks. you say an assessment must be made to determine if the project area is safe and if it is not,

you send combat engineers. to perform the construction function. can you talk about the distinction? between where you can and cannot send people? facility, build a securit depending on what the facility is and what function it will perform, if it has to be there the that -- and the security situation is such that a contractor going in would not able to accomplish that, get materials there, be able to operate safely and security on that side to do it, -- site to do it, engineer and construction units in concert with a military operation could go in and secure the area and do the construction if it were within the hour with all of the unit's ability if there were equipped unable to do it. >> that is a change of

assessment. we will look at an area and determine if it is too hot, we must send in soldiers who are combatants. >> i do not know if that is a change in policy. that is a convocation in what was put out in guidelines. it gathers in one document a piece of doctrine that gives a logical step by step process in determining where and when you will construct something. it determines what method and means you will use. >> is it fair to say we are sending non-combatants into combat zones? securitye are issues. we have u.s. army corps of engineers employees who

volunteer to go and provide quality assurance oversight or engineering and design. >> what is their status? army corps civilians? >> i would consider them noncombatants. >> have we sent them into combat zones where it is unsafe? >> they are on the ground in afghanistan and we have deployed 10,000 core of engineers civilians. >> how many civilians have lost? -- have you lost? >> not contractors. i do not think we have lost any. we have lost three. these are civilians. >> thank you for your testimony.

>> thank you. i have a follow-up. what do you know about the contractors, the others that your colleagues are using? >> within the -- >> have you -- do you know what your rate of input is on that? how much performance your actual captioning -- capturing? >> in terms of every contract that has been performed, it has been documented. i do not have that right now. >> and you do not know about the civilian agencies?

you said you are in the d of the world. >> at this level, i cannot tell you right now. in theater, everybody exchanges information. there is a concern for corruption. the task force that is going on. i think that all agencies deal with that. >> have your people been using that? >> absolutely. >> how about taking information? >> absolutely. 's the state department's acquisition bureau is the center of all our information in contracting for other agencies. they would have a complete picture of a coordination with the department of defense and a id. -- and aid we do a lot together

and are often -- for example, we are reverting back to the department of defense. we had conversations on how not work. indirectly, we are not involved in the decision of who gets it or who would be able to do the work based on the conditions. >> you talk about a prison in particular and you say the embassy has identified the company. do they get that information from your colleagues or with a share it once they get it? >> kernel cassidy? >> man, we use the federal rating system for contractors. contractors worked in theater all the time.

they get to know the people that are with them and to build a relationship with them. >> how does that information it to you? >> then how does it get to your colleagues? are you aware of the companies that use of contract with? >> we are aware of them and we watched them -- we are building resources as we go through so that we get more information than we had in the past. as far as sharing that information back and forth, that is left up to the primes. we do not recommend subcontractors in theater. >> you do not have to recommend, but being aware of the performance of the sub country -- contractors would not interfere with the performance.

>> i agree. >> mr. -- that is reviewed when an award is going forward. >> i am going to ask you a question that you do not have the answer to. how is that going? what percentage of your contracts do you have someone actually putting the information on the primes and the subs. i understand that it is not whether or not a system exists, is whether it is being used and i understand that it is not. for a variety of reasons. the information that we need to get around a lot of the problems we have talked about today is making sure that the knowledge

of these companies' performance could be a good decision on our part. >> thank you, commissioner. i am really glad that you ran that thread out on the line of questioning. i would ask for general dorko to -- the reason i ask that is because when you give the information, i asked a question about the design engineer. are you aware of any work anywhere else that is done by company? i asked the question if you picked up the phone and called them -- call them? they just pull something off the

shelf and grow it in three others, the mick significant mistakes. i would ask you, for the record, to follow up. you cannot act on what to do not know. you have worked in afghanistan and i need to know if you had an opportunity to coordinate. >> commissioner hinky had a ball. >> one of the key questions i have is that you can be a hero to everyone in the room, but are we nation-building in afghanistan? i do not mean it as a trick question. just a yes or no if you can. >> i believe the answer to that is no. >> are we transforming failed states into quasi democratic countries?

>> i think that is more accurate. it is closer to our goal to stabilize a failed state in afghanistan. >> it is interesting because you entered a book in 2009 and it was the future of afghanistan and you wrote the introduction. we thought you were it a construction expert. -- you were a construction expert. it seems we have a difficulty saying nation-building. >> i think that afghanistan is a nation. it is not our intention to build the nation unless the in san -- build the nation of afghanistan. >> what is the difference? >> i do not know what you mean

by nation-building. i think that afghanistan is a nation and have been a nation for hundreds of years. we are trying to get them on their feet again. they did relatively well in the 1950's and 1960's and than 30 years of horrible tomorrow. our intention is to help them rebuild some of their institutions so that they can be stable and prevent al qaeda from coming back into their country. i think that is our goal. >> thank you. >> before i thank you, this is an opportunity for us to learn in for you to share. it is never -- there was a different tenor in our fact- finding than there was with general fields coming up because of the nature of what he was trying to do verses what you were trying to do and what we are trying to do.

i have to just thank you for that. you're doing something -- i have a guy that i council with. i will not give his name. he always tells me i am bringing problems. you guys are looking in a mirror. i urge you to continue to do that in the text of process improvement and the like because it is critical. the last thing, with absolute respect meant, because i have admired it the whole hearing, on your epitaph, you certainly deserve, "and they didn't pin me down." i watched to see if you would buckle. i say that with a little bit of admiration. gentlemen, thank you very much.

what we are going to do because we have a drop dead date on time is disappoint probably our third panel, with my apologies. there was so much that you were sharing that i was reluctant to cut off or push through and then have to push through that. so we are going to schedule another hearing with as many commissioners as we can obtain. we are going to push your testimony in the record now, but we are going to offer our apologies because we have to be out of the room by two o'clock p.m. due to a promise that we made. i want to thank you and please except our apologies and we will work something to accommodate you. with that, this hearing is concluded. thank you, gentlemen.

>> you learn something. >> yes. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] >> the commission on wartime contract and in iraq and afghanistan will issue its final report to congress in july.

>> tonight, president obama delivers the state of the union address to a joint session of congress. our live coverage begins at 8:00 p.m. eastern with our preview program followed by the president's speech at 9. then the republican response from paul ryan of wisconsin and your phone calls and reaction live on c-span. , sees them radio, and online at c-span.org. you can also add your own comments to our facebook page and twitter. you can see reaction from members of congress following the president's address live on c-span 2. >> "washington journal" is next with headlines and your calls. the house is in session at 10:00