A contract to develop the Afghan National Army’s capacity to maintain its growing fleet of vehicles has more than doubled in cost, reaching a total of $423 million, a recent Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction [SIGAR] report found. See SIGAR 16-49, July 2016,Afghan National Army: DOD Has Taken Steps to Remedy Poor Management of Vehicle Maintenance Program,https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/audits/SIGAR-16-49-AR.pdf. The contract — known as the Afghan National Army Afghanistan Technology Equipment Maintenance Program, or A-TEMP — was awarded in December 2010 as part of a five-year firm-fixed-price contract with a projected cost of $182 million, not including the cost of spare parts or supply chain management, the report said. However, after 68 modifications, the total obligated amount of the contract — which was awarded to the Afghanistan Integrated Support Services JV (AISS) — increased to $423 million and was extended by nearly a year and a half, the report said. The program’s massive cost overruns were the result of a series of errors made by the Army Contracting Command and the Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan, it said. The organizations “made inaccurate assumptions about the capacity of the Afghans to manage the supply chain and conduct maintenance, (2) underestimated the cost of spare parts and (3) established performance metrics that did not accurately assess contractor performance or progress towards contract goals,” the July report said.
