Campaign for a U.S. - Afghanistan Partnership

This article is part of the Center for Media & Democracy's spotlight on front groups and corporate spin.

The Campaign for a U.S. - Afghanistan Partnership (CUSAP) is, according to its website, "a membership organization for U.S. and Afghan citizens who believe Afghanistan can be a strong, prospering nation, but continued support of the United States is necessary to ensure this will happen."

Aram Roston reports in the The Nation magazine on December 22, 2009 that CUSAP is a front group. "As President Obama prepares a massive military buildup in Afghanistan, a House subcommittee has launched an investigation into whether Defense Department contractors are paying off the Taliban to protect American supply lines. ... One of the contractors under investigation is NCL Holdings, a US firm headed by Hamed Wardak, the Afghan-American son of Afghanistan's defense minister, General Abdul Rahim Wardak. ... Parallel to his business ventures, he's been running an aggressive foreign policy campaign in Washington to keep the US heavily vested in Afghanistan. A confidential lobbying memo obtained by The Nation shows that Wardak commissioned a blue-chip lobbying firm to push for an extended US presence in Afghanistan -- a potentially lucrative outcome for NCL. Earlier this year Patton Boggs LLP, Washington's most monied lobbying firm, established a nonprofit front group (Campaign for a U.S. - Afghanistan Partnership) on Wardak's behalf to act as the 'face' of a campaign for increased US engagement in Afghanistan, according to confidential legal records."

Blogger Steve Hynd first began to expose this front group in on October 29, 2009.

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• Hamed Wardak
• NCL Holdings
• Patton Boggs

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