Defense Secretary James Mattis has told lawmakers it’s probable that federal officials will file criminal charges as part of an ongoing investigation into a series of contracts the Army issued to help establish security forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The contracts were supposed to be used to help those nations build their own intelligence gathering capabilities, but audits thus far have pointed to tens of millions of dollars in potential fraud connected to at least one vendor, including for luxury vehicles and six-figure salaries paid to its employees who performed no discernible work.
The ongoing criminal investigation involves a series of agreements, beginning in 2007, that wound up costing $458 million.
According to an audit the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction published in July, the lion’s share of those funds went to a single subcontractor, New Century Consulting (NCC). But SIGAR concluded that because of poor recordkeeping and a reliance on vendors to grade their own performance, it’s almost impossible to determine whether the contracts’ objectives were ever met.
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Then the contracting office realized that the specific division of the company they wanted to work with was in a joint venture with Chinese smartphone maker 
Created in 2012, 
How fast? Request proposals, evaluate the options, and award a contract in 12 months or less, said Ellen Lord, defense undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics.
The leaders of the House and Senate Armed Services committees committed to reforming the bloated defense acquisition system a couple of years ago. So far they have devolved acquisition power to the military service chiefs and reduced paperwork burdens for program managers.
