A brand-new U.S. military headquarters in Afghanistan. And nobody to use it.
The U.S. military has erected a 64,000-square-foot headquarters building on the dusty moonscape of southwestern Afghanistan that comes with all the tools to wage a modern war. A vast operations center with tiered seating. A briefing theater. Spacious offices. Fancy chairs. Powerful air conditioning.
Everything, that is, except troops.
The headquarters has its origin in 2009, when President Obama decided to surge more troops to southern Afghanistan to beat back Taliban insurgents. Army planners in South Carolina and at the Pentagon determined that Camp Leatherneck, which had been selected as the headquarters for Marine forces in the south, required a sophisticated command-and-control facility.
When Marine officers in Helmand heard of the plans, they objected. The commander at the time, then-Maj. Gen. Richard P. Mills, believed his plywood-walled headquarters was sufficient and made that clear to his superiors in Kabul.
His assessment went unheeded. Staff officers in Kabul drafted specifications for the building and asked Air Force contracting officers to find a private company to construct it. The construction order went to a British firm, AMEC Earth and Environment, which began work in November 2011, according to military documents. By then, Obama had announced the end of the surge. The bulk of the withdrawal would occur in Helmand.
As the Marine presence in the southwest went from 20,000 to about 7,000 in 2012, workers laid the foundation, placed the beams and strung electrical wire. The building was designed to accommodate about 1,500 personnel. There are now fewer than 400 headquarters-level staff on the base.
Even after Obama decided to remove an additional 34,000 troops this year, the project continued apace. Cubicles filled the floor. Theater seats arrived. The contractor made modifications to address problems with emergency exits.
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