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

Feds Hid Spending During Government Shutdown

The Obama administration during the partial government shutdown concealed a plan to funnel millions into yet another project in Afghanistan, where U.S. taxpayers are helping farmers grow wheat instead of illicit crops used in narcotics production.

Iranians and Pakistanis could particularly benefit from the endeavor, according to contracting documents U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor discovered via routine database research.

The U.S. Agency for International Development explicitly identified Iran and Pakistan as long-time recipients of food products exported from the targeted provinces of Helmand, Kandahar and Zabul, which likewise have helped satisfy Afghanistan’s nationwide food requirements.

The Monitor’s discovery of USAID’s purported oversight in public disclosure comes at a time when President Obama and his supporters have escalated their rhetoric about the shutdown’s impact on the nation’s financial and political stability.

Just as Obama was casting blame on Republicans for attempting to wreck the U.S. economy, USAID simultaneously failed to notify the American public, as required by government regulations, of its $125 million award to contracting behemoth Chemonics International.

Chemonics secured the award Oct. 7, at the end of Week One of the budgetary stalemate among both houses of Congress and the White House.

USAID did not publish the award notice until Oct. 17, the day Obama signed the bill to end the partial shutdown and raise the federal debt ceiling.

The agency, however, did not attempt to blame the delay on the shutdown nor could it realistically attempt to do so, as the FedBizOpps online contracting system was fully operational during that period.

Rather, the agency offered an uncertain excuse for its procrastination, claiming a “systems integration and/or transmission error resulted that the award notice was not posted.”

USAID admitted it should have publicly announced the award “on or before” Oct. 10

Chemonics will carry out the Regional Agricultural Development Program, or RADP-South initiative, “to improve food and economic security for rural Afghans in the targeted areas.”

“This sustainable agricultural development program will support the consolidation of licit economies to fuel economic growth, including providing alternatives to poppy cultivation,” according the project’s Statement of Work.

As this writer reported for WND, the U.S. Trade & Development Agency – an independent White House agency – offered to pay a consultant $300,000 to guide Kenyan and other East African power companies on how to tap into Obama’s multi-billion-dollar Power Africa scheme.

The administration slipped in the contract one day prior to the shutdown.

Five days later, Obama separately released plans to make available up to $50 million in giveaways to the energy industry and foreign aid recipients, the Monitor now has discovered.

USTDA intends to award indefinite quantity/indefinite delivery, or IDIQ, contracts worldwide “to respond quickly to U.S. business interests and foreign project sponsor needs in the energy sector.”

Despite its global reach, the Multiple-Award Energy Sector Planning Services IDIQ initiative admittedly will place “particular emphasis on sub-Saharan Africa,” USTDA said.

USTDA is the same entity, as this writer also reported for WND last month, that is spending $100,000 to create a manual to teach Mexican officials and U.S. corporate welfare recipients how to get more money from the U.S. government.

While USTDA arguably is a relatively small agency – its FY 2014 budget request is just under $63 million – it consistently undergoes criticism along with calls for closure. Former Republican Rep. Ron Paul and free-market think tanks such as the Cato Institute regularly denounce it as among the most duplicative and wasteful of all federal entities.

USTDA consequently represents one of the most egregious examples of “corporate welfare waste,” the Cato Institute concluded in a 2005 report. These and similar organizations “should be terminated,” contended the report’s author, Chris Edwards.

This article originally was published Oct. 24, 2013 via WND. Under agreement with the publisher, rights have reverted back to the copywrite holder, Steve Peacock.

Have U.S. 'Investments' in Mideast Paid Off? (WND)

My latest via WND. -- S.P.

Contradictory claims of total dollar figures for U.S. foreign aid circulate around the Internet, containing oft-repeated figures that may or may not reflect reality. In response to those conflicting claims, WND has compiled a list of significant U.S. aid totals based on a review of congressional and Obama administration documents and databases.

As the debate often focuses on whether the U.S. receives, in financial parlance, an adequate return on its investment, WND decided to first focus on arguably the world’s greatest hot spot, the Middle East/North Africa, or MENA, home to three of the top 10 recipients of U.S. assistance: Israel, Egypt, and Jordan.

Though the aid totals are significantly less for Saudi Arabia and Gaza/West Bank, we have included them due to the role that the Saudis and Palestinians play on the MENA world stage.

Continued at WND.com...

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Navy SEALs Recruiting Iranians

Military expanding outreach for elite teams to 'Persian Americans'

By Steve Peacock

A U.S. Navy SEAL minority recruitment initiative has added yet another group to its target list of underrepresented populations within the elite Naval Special Warfare units: Iranian Americans.

According to a revised Performance Work Statement that U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor located via routine database research, interested contractors must be able to carry out “awareness and education efforts” in minority communities inclusive of “Persian Americans,” as it referred to people of Iranian descent.

NSW this past week formally reached out to marketing and recruitment-service providers to help correct this “demographic disparity” in the predominantly white SEAL team units.

The Minority Awareness and Education Services Regional Campaigns project initially emphasized the recruitment of African Americans. A draft document released earlier this year had declared that the “widest discrepancy” existed between the percentage of African American citizens and those serving on SEAL teams and as Special Warfare Combatant-craft Crewmen, or SWCC.

The revised document removed that Afrocentric emphasis – indeed, the Navy noted that it intentionally removed the first two pages of the draft solicitation where it made such delineation – and it now appears to place equal weight on recruiting “African American, Hispanic, Asian Pacific Islander, Native American, Arab American, and Persian American” candidates.

Congress likewise has raised concerns about minority under-representation among Navy SEALs as well as in the officer ranks of all the U.S. Armed Forces.

Late last month the House Committee on Appropriations approved a military funding bill and accompanying report that “supports efforts to conduct effective outreach and recruiting programs in minority communities.”

House Report 112-493 directs the commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command “to provide a report to the congressional defense committees not later than 90 days after enactment of this Act on the challenges of recruiting prospective Navy SEAL applicants from underrepresented communities.”

It also would require SOCOM “to provide recommendations to increase the competitiveness and to encourage recruitment of such candidates.”

The NSW project’s main purpose is to elevate “the number of these candidates who can qualify for Navy enlistment contracts.”

It made clear, however, that a quota system was neither desired nor expected, pointing out that the unit will not assess future contractor performance “based on the number or percentage of candidates selected for training.”

On the other hand, the document established minimum expectations for the number of minority males in the 16-24 age range for whom the contractor will arrange participation in public “awareness events and initiatives.”

The revised plan offers a more ambitious vision for the number of such High Potential Candidates, or HPCs, and upped its initial expectations from 1,000 attendees to 2,000.

NSW warned potential contractors to ensure they do not “exclude others who may want to participate in open events.”

However, it simultaneously issued a reminder that the contract’s focus “is on minority HPCs and as such the contractor will only be given ‘credit’ for the target minority males who attend and participate.”

The plan also seeks to bring aboard at least 100 “influencers” – such as athletic directors, coaches, counselors, clergy, and educators – of the targeted population. The contractor will be tasked with developing “friends of NSW” who will have the greatest “influence on career decision-making of potential SEAL candidates.”

NSW ultimately wants to sign up at least 300 HPCs for whom the contractor will craft an individual “education and development plan” on the path to a possible Navy SEAL or SWCC career. It hopes to have a minimum of 100 candidates and 10 influencers sign up and participate in the Training Forum on the Navy SEAL and SWCC Scout Team’s website.

A core part of these individual plans include the development of an HPC swimming instructional component.

“Since the waterborne feature of SEAL training is often the most formidable obstacle for prospective candidates,” according to the document, “especially among minorities with little swimming experience, the swim training program is usually the most challenging of the preparation components.”

Other regional campaign components may include:

• Outreach to male athletes and fraternity members at junior colleges, colleges, and universities with high percentages of minority student enrollment;
• Participation in conferences, events, and engagements, recognition of student leadership awards, and outreach to educators in the minority communities;
• Engagements with athletes, coaches, and influencers associated with predominantly minority high school and collegiate swim and football teams;
• Inner-city schools initiatives providing education to high school students in a “swim with a SEAL” program;
• Relationship building with coaches and influencers, offering mental toughness presentations to select audiences, and delivering appropriate fitness events on a not-to-interfere basis at regional athletic competitions;
• Leveraged social media engagement utilizing existing NSW website (sealswcc.com), Facebook, and Twitter, and consisting of direct first engagements with HPCs, social media “experiences” and “conversations” ultimately to allow for self-selection to begin online;
• A public relations component outreach to deliver serious HPCs to scheduled events;
• Marketing and outreach with a heavy balance of leveraging earned media (versus buying radio and TV advertising);
• Conducting education and swim programs to give serious HPCs the opportunity to complete all parts of the NSW Physical Screening Test.

Depending upon proposals and cost estimates received, 40 percent of the overall project will target one of three major metropolitan areas: Detroit, Miami, or the region between Atlanta and the “Golden Triangle” (Raleigh, Durham, and Greensboro) of North Carolina.

Another 40 percent of the campaign level of effort will center on the mid-Atlantic region, specifically from Norfolk and Richmond Virginia “and north to the Greater Baltimore/Washington DC Corridor.”

The remaining 20 percent will target Southern California, specifically from San Diego, through Orange County, and across the Los Angeles metropolitan area.

Despite targeting minority communities to encourage future SEAL team and SWCC members, the Navy at the same time has embarked upon a separate contractor-supported initiative that simply recruits and prepares the best possible candidates for SEAL officer positions, irrespective of ethnic background.

The two-pronged endeavor – known as the Naval Special Warfare Seal Officer Accession Support and the Fleet Concentration Area Swim Programs initiatives – will target midshipmen from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md.; Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps commands nationwide; Officer Candidate School commissioned officer graduates; and transfers from “active duty warfare-qualified officers from the Fleet or the other Services.”

A similar version of this article originally was published via WND.com on June 27, 2012. Under agreement with WND, rights have reverted back to the author, Steve Peacock.

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WND.com: Navy SEALs Recruiting Iranians

My latest from WND: "Navy Seals Recruiting Iranians -- Military expanding outreach for elite teams to 'Persian Americans.'"

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U.S. Seeks New Means of Predicting Internet Growth Overseas, from Albania to Zimbabwe

The U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) is looking for a contractor capable of developing a new analytical model to predict Internet usage and growth in thirty-two foreign nations, from "A" (Albania) to "Z" (Zimbabwe).

The agency, which runs U.S. government-funded international broadcasting systems such as Voice of America and Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television of the Middle East Broadcasting Networks, said in a Statement of Work (Solicitation #BBG50-R-11-0020) that existing models for predicting growth are inadequate. The SOW said those models solely focus on specific technology sectors rather than the Internet in its entirety:

The ultimate goal is to estimate, using empirical data, the expansion of the number of unique individuals using the Internet on a weekly basis in these markets over the next five years. While various organizations have produced such estimates and prejections for sub-segments of the Internet market, such as mobile Internet use or fixed line broadband, BBG requires estimates of the growth of the entire Internet market, regardless of platform, including use via public access facilities.

Although the BBG attempted to justifiy why it wants a new predictive model, it did not specify why it needs -- nor what it intends to do -- with such a new mode of analysis. The agency said it would apply the model to Internet usage in the following nations: Afghanistan, Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Cameroon, China, Egypt, Georgia, Ghana, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Syria, Tanzania, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, Vietnam,  Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

The BBG said the selected contractor should be able to complete the work within an eight-week period. It did not offer an estimated cost of the project.