Solid summary of Defense Department Inspector General report on the lamentable misuse of funds intended to support military service personnel. According to the report, $9 million US has been siphoned off into a series of brainless and inbred PR programs to fool the public into thinking that the Department of Defense was actually assisting military personnel.
A Defense Department project, supposedly designed to support U.S. troops, was used instead to channel millions of dollars to personal friends and allies of its chief. The “America Supports You,” or ASY, program was led in a “questionable and unregulated manner,” according to a Department of Defense Inspector General report, obtained by Danger Room. At least $9.2 million was “inappropriately transferred” by the project’s managers. Much of that money served only to further promote ASY, instead of assisting servicemembers.
In time, however, the program grew. Pro-troop rallies were organized. Special wristband and dog tags were made. Special-edition comic books were printed up. Processions were held on the National Mall, on the 9/11 anniversary. Sesame Street characters were enlisted to make DVDs that encouraged families with young children to talk about overseas deployments. America Supports You became a kind of umbrella group for all sorts of charity-related work for service members and military families.
Meanwhile, ASY began to spend millions — not to help the troops, the Inspector General says, but to help itself. “Instead of focusing on its primary mission of showcasing and communicating support to the troops and their families, the ASY program focus [turned to] building or soliciting support from the public,” the Inspector General’s report notes. In 2006 and 2007, for instance, more than $600,000 was spent ginning up support for America Supports You among schoolchildren. Another $165,000 went to a pro-ASY concert aboard the USS Intrepid, docked on Manhattan’s west side. And $15,000 went to actor and musician Gary Sinise’s “Lt. Dan Band” to play a separate show. The report calls all of these “questionable and unregulated actions.”
By mid-2007, allegations began to surface that the Pentagon official in charge of the program, Armed Forces Information Service chief Alison Barber (pictured, left), was improperly redirecting millions of dollars in public funds.
From fiscal years 2004 to 2007, the Inspector General’s report notes, Barber funneled $8.8 million in contracts to the public relations firm Susan Davis International — to set up the myriad events, and to promote the ASY “brand.” The work was incredibly lucrative; Davis’ executives made as much as $312,821 to $662,691 per year. “Paying a public relations contractor annual salaries approaching three-quarters of a million dollars does not appear to be a cost-effective means to support the ASY program and the war fighter,” the report observes.
But what made it even harder to stomach was that Davis was a friend of Barber’s, and a well-known Republican operative, according to former Defense Department lawyer Diane Beaver. Another half-million went to media consultant Mitch Semel, for web work.
As a PR professional, I take particular offense at the idea that a government agency would steal money from services to military personnel in order to pretend that it is actually serving military personnel. If an agency is doing a good job in the first place, good PR will accrue from beneficiaries by word of mouth--FREE. It is impossible to cover up negligence and failure with PR for long. I hope to see detailed investigations, and prosecutions of any and all illegal actions, from negligence to collusion.