Should Three Officers Who Failed To Halt The Construction OF A New Command Center In Afghanistan Now Be Held Accountable?

Just add it to the cost of other items that were never used. Or hell, what about all the equipment that was turned in to be destroyed? Where is the uproar for this and who should be held accountable for the wasteful destruction of this equipment?

I vote yes because it was a big waste of money and are they not capable to
Explain the situation to Congress

Sometimes it’s easier to go along to get along. There isn’t enough info to know if they knew it wasn’t going to be used. I would think the building still may have some value. The DOD is a slow moving giant.

Don't know the regulations on this nor any details about if they formally protested or objected to this going forward. Did the mission objectives change after construction started and were they always in the loop of they did. To many questions to answer objectively but it does piss me off that we're going to leave this for those who plot against us.

The cardinal rules for federal budgeting are: Purpose, Time, and Amount. They had no purpose for the construction, so they broke a law.

If there is proper investigation of this and wrongdoing is found, certainly. Normally, when the need for a project is established and contracted, it can be stopped with appropriate cancellation charges.

Once a contract has been awarded, it is cheaper for the government to let the construction be finished rather than halt it. Something similar happened in the early-90's in Orlando, FL when the former Naval Training Base in Orlando was closed; contracts for the construction of buildings had been awarded and the construction had begun, but rather than pay out "fines" to the contractors, the government just let them finish building structures that would never house/train a single Sailor. My father lives about 2 miles from the old base and while it was still functioning I would hit the BX for smokes when I visited him.

MAJ (Join to see) - I don't believe enough information has been provided to make an educated judgment about this.

There are many reasons the construction could have been allowed to continue. What penalties would accrue by cancellation? They could actually be more than the actual cost of construction. What agreements had been made with the host country that could not be breached? Was there consideration given for potential future use if the situation in Afghanistan changed in our favor or in case of commitment of more troops at a later date.

It is easy to see something like this and make a knee-jerk opinion without knowing all the facts that impacted the decision.

Case in point ... My dad was the commanding officer of Fort Polk in the early 60's, when it was being closed down. At the same time it was being closed, new facilities were being constructed. Even though I was but a child at the time, it appeared to me to make no sense and I remember asking my dad about it. He told me that it was actually less expensive to continue the construction than to stop it due to default penalties, etc. As it turned out, Fort Polk never actually totally closed and, instead, was reopened into a robust, important posting of an Army division there.

At what point in the process was it deemed, the would not be needed.
I do not believe a crystal ball was issued with those stars.
Politics, playing the blame game

This is one of those ugly, 'It Depends', answers that everyone has a reason why they are right. Sure, some officers did not see the need for the building and they feel justified in their counsel to stop the project. owever, other Officers (or our civilian leadership) had the responsibility to look at the strategic or operational value of the project(s) and trying to predict how long our presence in Afghanistan was truly going to be. In the end, we didn't need the project but I will challenge folks to think about what we would need to do if our course of action changed and we remained in the theater. If that course of action had been put into effect, the decision to complete the building would have looked brilliant as it would have provided better, more hardened facilities to fall in on and a small price to pay for security and personal safety of our troops... Instead, we have the 20-20 hindsight that appears to make this a complete waste of funds... Not an easy issue and we all need to look at all sides of this Gordian knot before passing judgment.