Steve Peacock's U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor

Disturbing Truth Behind Obama's Travel Madness (WND)

My latest from WND. -- S.P.

Supporters of Barack Obama tout his dedication to the responsibilities of the presidency by noting that he had taken 96 days of vacation at the point in his term that President George W. Bush had taken a reported 335.

But they admit that 51 of Bush’s trips were to his Texas ranch, while records show that Obama’s destinations have ranged from exotic European and African locales to pricey digs to Hawaii, where he’s sometimes traveled separately from his family, effectively doubling transportation costs for taxpayers.

The records released are partial, meaning no firm travel-expense total can be assembled. But individual cases are revealing.

Continued at WND.com...

ALSO SEE: CNN Rips Off U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor Story on Biden's Plush Parisian Jaunt

 more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/11/the-disturbing-truth-behind-obamas-travel-junkets/#SMBd76Lp60bvCSCW.99

U.S. Takes Action to Reduce Energy Dependence -- in Europe

The nation faces a critical need to "overcome a number of serious problems" related to economic development and growing energy needs, particularly because of its "strong dependence on energy imports," the Obama Administration has concluded.

Consequently, it has launched a project to increase "competitiveness and energy security" while reducing "greenhouse gas emissions via greater clean energy investments" across the nation.

Across the nation of Macedonia, that is.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) will devote an unspecified amount of funding for the Competitiveness through Clean Energy Investment – Industrial Management Project.

USAID acknowledged in the document  that an "important influence on Macedonian energy policy" is the country‘s objective of becoming accepted into the European Union. According to a project Statement of Work, the agency will hire a contractor over the next 3-4 years to:

(1) Recruit Macedonian industry particpation;

(2) Provide energy management and efficiency systems to selected businesses;

(3) Train various sectors in the use of such systems; and:

(4) Promote energy management across the nation by attending industry association meetings and holding workshops "to engage industry, local consultants, and the financial community."

Source document: Solicitation #SOL-165-12-000005.

U.S. Crafting New Economic Recovery Plan

The damage caused by the global financial crisis requires additional federal intervention, according to the Obama Administration, which is launching a new program to “foster growth and stability at a time of increasing economic turmoil.” This particular endeavor, however, will focus its efforts on improving conditions in Eastern Europe, the Western Balkans, and the “newly independent states,” or NIS, of the former Soviet Union.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is designing this Europe & Eurasia (E&E) regional project in order to “promote trade, investment and regulatory integration; enhance regional competitiveness, and support financial sector stability.”

The agency did not disclose an estimated cost of the program, which remains under development. It is conducting market research of potential contractors capable of carrying out services in the region. USAID may—or may not—release a more detailed solicitation at a later date.

If indeed it executes this project, USAID will target thirteen nations where USAID already has established a presence, “including the Western Balkans (Albania, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia), Western NIS (Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus), Russia, and the Caucasus (Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan).

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According to a Sources Sought Notice that U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor located via routine database research:

Despite the tremendous progress made over the years, many of these countries are still struggling to regain the living standards that they enjoyed under communism and to integrate themselves into the ever more competitive world economy.  Furthermore, the region has been disproportionately adversely affected by the 2008-2009 global economic crisis and, now, by the ongoing Eurozone financial crisis… Several countries in the region have unemployment rates above 20%, labor productivity remains well below the EU standards, and export growth rates have stagnated. 

The four “principal technical areas” for which contractors may provide services include:

            1. Regional Trade Facilitation;  

            2. Private Sector Competitiveness and Enterprise Development;

            3. Business Enabling Environment (meaning, support of “legal and regulatory reform and rule of law issues”); and:

            4. Financial Sector Stability, Growth & Inclusion.

USAID will accept capability statements from interested providers until June 11 at 2 p.m.

Source document: Solicitation #M-OAA-GRO-LMA-12-1002

FOR ADDITIONAL REPORTING ON THE U.S. AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, SEE THE MONITOR'S USAID PAGE.

FOR FURTHER REGIONAL COVERAGE, SEE THE MONITOR'S EUROPE PAGE.

OTHER NATION-SPECIFIC MONITOR PAGES ARE EMBEDDED WITHIN THE ABOVE ARTICLE.

Small Businesses Receive Yet Another Boost from Washington

Another small-business support project is about to be unveiled by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)—this time in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in southeastern Europe.

While the endeavor is significantly smaller than other overseas small-business programs financed by U.S. taxpayers, it comes at a time when USAID is embarking upon other—and bigger—related initiatives. As the Monitor recently reported, for instance, the agency increased to $73 million the Sustainable Achievement of Business Expansion and Quality (SABEQ) project in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. (Monitor, May 16, 2011: Small-Business Initiative Gains Momentum, More Money)

Macedonia Regional Small Business Development, or MRSBD, as the new project is known, involves the anticipated awarding of a $5 million contract to a U.S. firm. According to a Request for Proposals (#SOL-165-11-000004), the selected contractor will provide:

[T]echnical assistance and/or services contributing toward local economic development and job creation through strengthening the micro, small and medium enterprises with growth potential. The proposed project will build upon USAID‘s prior activities related to private sector growth, competitiveness, microenterprise support and microfinance provided over the past fifteen years.

Search of a federal procurement database show that USAID has led numerous prior small business initiatives in Macedonia, including a $9.2 million contract (Award #165-C-00-07-00101-00) in 2007 to CARANA Corporation—an Arlington, Va., firm whose management team is composed largely of former USAID officials and staffers. CARANA was tasked with carrying out the Macedonia Competitiveness for the 21st Century project, or MacComp-21, to “help Macedonia improve its competitive position within the global market place.”

The stated reasons for U.S. support to Macedonia are many, several of which are represented in the following excerpt from a FY 2009 U.S. State Dept. foreign aid statement:

The U.S. Government (USG)’s overarching foreign assistance goal is to build and sustain a more democratic Macedonia that is more fully integrated into European and Euro-Atlantic structures, and able to contribute to the stability of the western Balkans. Sector-specific foreign assistance goals include strengthening Macedonian law enforcement and military organizations; addressing corruption and improving the performance of the judiciary; increasing the ability of the Macedonian educational system to produce a workforce for today’s economy; and increasing business growth, investment, and exports.

The previously mentioned small business-related procurements represent just a fraction of the hundreds of millions of dollars that the U.S. government has provided to or “invested” into Macedonia over the past decade and half, a review of contracting documents and awards indicate.

Likewise, the bulk of this aid—which has come from USAID as well as multiple U.S. defense, trade, education, and law enforcement entities—has flowed particularly since Macedonia began hosting U.S. and NATO troops that support operations in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the region.

$250 Million Contract-Ceiling Set for Global Small-Arms Destruction

As much as a quarter-billion dollars in contracts could be awarded over the next five years to provide worldwide “conventional weapons destruction” (CWD) services on behalf of the U.S. State Department.

In a document released today (May 9) titled “Questions and Answers for the [CWD] Solicitation, the department confirmed that the maximum ceiling for the five-year program indeed was set at $250 million. Since State earlier had designated the endeavor as a “100% small-business set aside,” a perplexed but unidentified contractor had submitted the question, “This seems to be a very big contract for a Small Business. Is this ceiling correct?” State responded in the affirmative, while pointing out, however, that “annual spending on the current contract has ranged from $30 million-$40 million per year.”

A previous, $160 million award had gone to contracting behemoth DynCorp International. In December 2010 DynCorp had received an $8 million sole-source contract-extension to continue destroying weapons and stockpiles in Laos, Montenegro, and Albania that State claimed may “otherwise fall into use by terrorists, criminals, or similar organizations,” according to a Justification for Approval of Other Than Full and Open Competition (J&A) document. 

Separately, late last year RONCO Consulting Corporation received a $3 million extension to a previously awarded $185 million contract to perform CWD services in Iraq and Peru. Similarly, State awarded to ArmorGroup North America a $3 million extension to a previously awarded $78 million contract to perform CWD services in the same nations where DynCorp was conducting such operations: Laos, Montenegro, and Albania.

It should be noted that ArmorGroup lost an even larger contract to provide security services to the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, after the watchdog group Project on Government Oversight helped expose lewd and irresponsible behavior by contractor personnel.

The latest contracting action—which would open up the DynCorp, RONCO, and ArmorGroup projects to competitive bidding—has extended the due date for proposals to May 18.

U.S. Forces in Europe Procuring Tens of Millions of Gallons in Fuel

Over 40 million gallons of fuel are being ordered for military bases in England, specifically for Royal Air Force (RAF) bases used by the U.S. as forward operating locations for bomber units, ammunition supplies, and intelligence-gathering operations, U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor has learned.

The U.S. Defense Logistics Agency this afternoon uploaded a solicitation (#SP060011R0223 ) to a federal contracting database seeking potential vendors to supply these mass quantities of petroleum products over the next three years. The destinations for the fuel include RAF Menwith Hill, RAF Mildenhall, RAF Lakenheath, RAF Alconbury, RAF Croughton, RAF Welford and RAF Fairford.

The U.S. military has occupied several of these sites since the end of World War II, originally as a means of building up a deterrent in Europe against the Soviets,” according to GlobalSecurity.org.

It remains unclear whether the volume of fuel for this solicitation is typical or is indicative of an increase in magnitude, as a database search did not produce comparable requests for multi-base procurements in the United Kingdom. Prior fuel acquisitions found in the database were limited to single-purchases of no more than 1.2 million gallons.

In the absence of that data, the Monitor offers the following summary of the primary functions of the sites for which the fuel is destined.

RAF Menwith Hill is known as one of the largest communications intercept stations in the world. According to the Federation of American Scientists, Menwith Hill is jointly operated by the U.S. National Security Agency and the British Ministry of Defence and is capable of handling up to two-million worldwide communications-intercepts per hour.

RAF Mildenhall touts itself as one of the most diverse bases, housing units from four major commands: Air Combat Command, Air Force Special Operations Command, Air Mobility Command and U.S. Air Forces in Europe. It also accommodates U.S. Navy operations as well.

RAF Lakenheath houses units such as the 48^th Operations Group, which “provides three flying squadrons of F-15C/D/E aircraft capable of accomplishing fighter operations worldwide…” according to a U.S. Air Force official website.  It also is home to the 48^th Medical Group, which “provides direct and operational Expeditionary Medical Support (EMEDS) Capability to the United States European Command, Africa Command and Central Command.”

RAF Alconbury hosts the 423^rd Air Base Group, which provides a variety of “mission support” services while RAF Croughton is home to the 422^nd Air Base Group, which “provides command, control, communications and computer support to Department of Defense and civilian agencies across the European theater…” The Croughton facility “operates one of Europe's largest military switchboards and processes approximately a third of all U.S. military communications in Europe.” Both groups are part of the 501^st Combat Support Wing. 

RAF Welford is a key ammunition compound serving U.S. forces across Europe.

Aside from delivery destinations, the contracting document offered little else with the exception of the fuel category breakdown: “The types of fuel and estimated quantities are: Premium Unleaded Gasoline: 26,241,871 USG; Super Premium (High Octane) Gasoline: 3,816,000 USG; Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel: 11,752,987 USG; Kerosene  Class C2: 10,000 USG.”

OTHER MILITARY- and FUEL-RELATED ARTICLES FROM U.S. TRADE & AID MONITOR

U.S. Spends Lavishly on Foreign Energy Projects; Investment Banker-Turned-Bureaucrat Oversees Billion-Dollar Program

U.S. Could Spend Millions to Aid Turkmenistan Energy Sector

U.S. Military Supplies for Africa Ops Surge

DHS Taking War on Weed to Morocco

The U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) is embarking upon a project to offer training in the Kingdom of Morocco in advanced intelligence-analysis techniques, and intends to outsource that training to a private contractor. The aim of this DHS initiative, which the U.S. Customs and Border Protection's (CBP) Office of International Affairs will oversee, is to reverse Morocco’s position as “the third largest producer of cannabis” and as “the major transit country for transnational criminal organizations moving South American cocaine through Northwest Africa to Europe.”

According to a updated solicitation released late today (April 19) that U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor (USTRAM) located via database research, DHS is calling companies who can deploy instructors with have law enforcement experience in major cities, preferably with an emphasis on organized crime investigation. Vendors also must have significant experience working in conjunction with federal law enforcement agencies as well as a demonstrable record conducting instruction in foreign settings. Ideally, the contractor will already have on hand suitable training materials “ready for CBP to translate into French.”

The selected contractor will travel to Morocco to train that nation’s customs agents in basic intelligence gathering, inferential and critical thinking strategies, and analysis of trends, patterns and relationships, and financial records. DHS will provide air travel, but the contractor “is required to purchase Emergency Evacuation Insurance coverage prior to departure for its instructors,” the solicitation document says.

DHS did not disclose the estimated cost of the endeavor.

Romanian IT and e-Health Projects May Get Financial Boost from U.S.

The subsidization of Romanian information and communications technologies (ICT) and e-health projects are among the latest overseas endeavors for which American taxpayers likely will be footing the bill, U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor (TRAM) has discovered.

According to contracting documents that TRAM has located through routine database research, the U.S. Trade & Development Agency (USTDA) on March 31 hired a consulting firm to “evaluate Romanian ICT sector opportunities for USTDA funding consideration.” New York City-based Actionable Strategies, which also has offices in Europe, Saudi Arabia, and China, was granted a $49,000 contract to prepare a report that will “identify and evaluate potential project opportunities.

Although the overall future  transfer of funds from the U.S Treasury to industry on behalf of the Government of Romania has yet to be determined, what is known is this: according to the Scope of Work (SOW) for the “Romania: ICT Sector Definitional Mission” endeavor, the Romanian software industry already “is one of the fastest growing in Europe…” Additionally, U.S. technology companies already are “heavily represented in Romania and are poised to take advantage of increased opportunities…” the SOW acknowledges. In fact, the agency further acknowledges that currently “more than ¾ of foreign software products in Romania are American.”

Nonetheless, USTDA is prepared to give more so these U.S. companies can gain more.

“Several U.S. companies have expressed interest” in large-scale projects that the Romanian Ministry of Communications & Information Society and the Ministry of Health are planning or considering, the document points out. Such initiatives include plans to improve broadband access nationwide as well as to roll out “an electronic health card project, an electronic health records system, and an electronic prescription system,” according to the SOW.

(Sources: Solicitation #RFQ-C0201121124 and Contract Award #TDA- C0201121124)

Links to U.S.-Romanian Military Base Story Restored

To all visitors and researchers whom have accessed the Oct. 11, 2005, story New U.S. Base in Romania To Be Larger Than Previously Estimated, please be advised that The Peacock Report (TPR) as of Aug. 15 has updated the contracting-document link embedded in that story. FedBizOpps, the federal government's primary procurement-opportunities database, generally archives such documents at some point as a matter of routine database maintenance, thereby changing the original links it previously generated for those documents (although, as TPR reported in the unrelated story U.S. Commerce Dept. Hires Consultant for Iraq Energy Project -- Then Covers Tracks of Contracting Action, sometimes the government archives documents immediately, consequently making such information more difficult to locate).

TPR attempts to update document-links as frequently as possible. We therefore apologize to the hundreds of visitors whom have located this web site through Google Romania in search of verifiable data on the growing U.S. presence at Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base. Stay tuned for further updates on that $100 million Forward Operating Base project of Joint Task Force-Europe (JTF-E).

New U.S. Base in Romania To Be Larger Than Previously Estimated

The U.S. military tentatively plans to further expand its presence in Eastern Europe, specifically in Romania, where it will spend up to $100,000,000 to build a Forward Operating Base for Joint Task Force-Europe (JTF-E). According to an Oct. 11 presolicitation notice that TPR located during a routine search of the FedBizOpps contracting database, the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers is conducting a market-survey of potential contractors who can help build the base, which would be located near the Mihail Kogalniceanu (MK) Air Base, a Romanian military facility.

U.S. forces used MK Air Base in early 2003 to provide logistics and air-transportation services in support of the occupation of Iraq. Also, exactly two years prior to today, Secy. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld visited MK Air Base, when the American Forces Information Service quoted an unnamed high-ranking official who said that any potential U.S. presence in Romania would total no more than "the small hundreds." Today's contracting notice, however, said that facilities for 1,700 troops would be needed at the base. The project, which is slated to begin April 2007 and last approximately "486 calendar days," is still pending final approval, according to the notice: "Funds are not currently available for this requirement. This project will be issued Subject to the Availability of Funding."