$500K Afghan Training Center Melts Down

An inspection by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction found that a U.S.-built firing range for Afghan police is actually melting. The dry fire range, which cost about $500,000, was designed to replicate a typical Afghan village and is used for simulated police search and clearance exercises. But just four months after its 2012 completion, its buildings began disintegrating. SIGAR blames it on the range’s contractor, Qesmatullah Nasrat Construction Company, which failed “to adhere to contractual requirements” and used “substandard bricks and other building materials.” SIGAR does acknowledge in its report, however, that “this problem was compounded by poor oversight on the part of the responsible U.S. government officials.”