Report: Whistleblower Claims Many U.S. Interpreters Can’t Speak Afghan Languages

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by Colby Hall | 9:12 am, September 9th, 2010

» 10 comments

The U.S. military may have officially ended combat operations in Iraq, but the war in Afghanistan is still ongoing. And while many are still questioning both our mission and endgame in that theater, it appears that our troops may be even more hindered than perviously thought. Reporting for ABC News, Brian Ross claims that more than one quarter of the translators working with U.S. troops in Afghanistan are working with unprepared or incompetent translators.

Writing for ABCNews.com, Matthew Mosk, Brian Ross and Joseph Rhee report:

More than one quarter of the translators working alongside American soldiers in Afghanistan failed language proficiency exams but were sent onto the battlefield anyway, according to a former employee of the company that holds contracts worth up to $1.4 billion to supply interpreters to the U.S. Army.

“I determined that someone — and I didn’t know [who] at that time — was changing the grades from blanks or zeros to passing grades,” said Paul Funk, who used to oversee the screening of Afghan linguists for the Columbus, Ohio-based contractor, Mission Essential Personnel. “Many who failed were marked as being passed.”

After being asked about the allegations, U.S. Army officials confirmed to ABC News they are investigating the company.

ABC News, ABCNews.com, Afghanistan War, Brian Ross, Joseph Rhee, Matthew Mosk, U.S. Interpreter

More Liberty

Just more BS from a corrupt and incompetent federal government.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Ken-Hansen/1696941384 Ken Hansen

Are these contractors to the military or military personnel? If they are contractors I can understand the motivation (per head profit), if they are military personnel the motivations are a bit murky…
felixw

Only the US government would hire translators who can’t translate. Just wait until those same bureaucrats start deciding what healthcare we all get.
notsofast

U.S. Interpreters Can’t Speak Afghan Languages??

Shit, most govt. workers can’t speak English!!
marcus.lewis

How is this the federal government fault and why so vague with the critique? This specifically is a fault of the pentagon and illustrates how the free market is screwing american soldiers. I have had enough of this contractor bullshit. If we wanted to reduce the amount of money we are spending, then stop with the contractors. A US serviceman gets paid around 40k, while those contracted to wage war are paid over 100k and are often vets whom contractors have leeched away from the US military.
felixw

marcus.lewis said:
How is this the federal government fault and why so vague with the critique? This specifically is a fault of the pentagon and illustrates how the free market is screwing american soldiers.

Huh? The government wastes taxpayer money by hiring incompetent people, and doesn’t even pay attention to their incompetence. And this is an indictment of the free market system? Whooooh!
jk76

it’s cool it’s for OHIO, that’s the new capitol.

so is DoJ involved? Congressional commitees? So many ethnicities in A-stan, so many languages, and more dialects

but that video is fuckin crazy, that is some serious shit that should be leading the news and having offices raided
Nachi

But if they’re true, modern Murcuhns, they probably can’t speak proper English either. Thank Geesuss & the RayGun/BushDrunks (pl) educational system values.
remmick

A lot of the reasoning in this story is specious. Company statement refutes things pretty well:

http://missionep.com/news/press-release?id=25

Hard to take the accusations seriously when the guy making them is also suing them for a lot of money.
http://gordonbloyershow.com gordonbloyershow

Of course we all know that we don’t have those interpeters because the Army kicked them out because they are gay.
Didn’t you know the gays are the backbone of the military. The Army can’t run without them.

Some Gays join the military because that is where the men are.
Some Gays join the seminary because that is where the men and boys are.