The case for infrastructure projects

The Washington Post is running a series of articles highlighting failed projects funded by the U.S. military in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nearly $5 billion in funds has been appropriated through the Commander’s Emergency Response Program (CERP), which gives military forces in combat money to put toward humanitarian assistance and development projects that advance the war effort, to include reducing unemployment and building support for U.S. objectives. The articles highlight numerous projects that have been abandoned once under the control of the Iraqi and Afghan governments, with the implication that the programs were scandalously wasteful. And that may be right in many cases; but the Post articles also give no context for whether CERP funded projects are more or less successful than other development assistance. Here are three points they ought to have addressed but did not.

No. 1: A project that is abandoned now does not mean it wasn’t beneficial.
I realize it’s a difficult argument to make that wasted money is a good thing; but CERP funds aim for short term effect in a combat zone. They are not projects for the ages, they are designed to affect the here and now decisions of insurgents and the population that may permit them to operate with impunity. The Post concludes that "have created no more than a temporary illusion of progress," but temporary progress can be vital in creating or sustaining momentum in warfare. If the Iraqi government does not now make a water park (one of the projects) a priority, that does not mean it wasn’t a hopeful and useful sign to Iraqis three years ago when we were trying to convey that violence was dramatically down, it was safe for Iraqis to engage in normal pursuits, and our objectives were a peaceful and prosperous Iraq.

No. 2: Development assistance is an inherently speculative undertaking.
What proportion of businesses started here in the United States fail? Add to that the complexities of societies coming out of authoritarian governance or decades of war, developing law and judicial practice while democratizing, and it’s not at all surprising that a large number of projects will be abandoned or unsuccessful. If we expect a guaranteed return on investment with our development assistance, we would actually not be assisting development very much. Those projects tend toward large infrastructure guaranteed by local governments, and even those are often rife with corruption and mismanagement. Part of what development assistance does is teach the practices of capitalism, and failure is a part of capitalism, so we should not balk at failed attempts.

No. 3: The U.S. military is not particularly good at development assistance.
It’s not their job. They will optimize funding to projects that advance their war fighting objectives, predominantly near-term security. To make the military good at development assistance, as Carl Schramm has advocated in his Expeditionary Economics article in Foreign Affairs, would require a major diversion of effort from fighting and winning the country’s wars. We actually have a branch of the U.S. government whose job it is to provide assistance; that would be the Agency for International Development. The real disappointment of so much money being channeled through CERP is that our government proved incapable of working together to prioritize and fund both near-term and long-term assistance in Iraq and Afghanistan when they are essential to our war efforts.