 I think Milt realized that things were going so badly in Afghanistan that people would be willing to talk about this.”

Former US ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad criticized TFBSO for setting up a bidding process on an Afghan oil contract that favored a state-owned Chinese firm against private Western companies.” He called TFBSO’s bid selection process “bad for U.S. business, and bad for the rebuilding effort in that embattled country.”

A report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) noted that “TFBSO’s perception that it did not have to coordinate with other U.S. agencies resulted in TFBSO electing not to share information with USAID in multiple instances.”

Several US State Department officials criticized TFBSO's efforts to revive state-owned enterprises for being in contradiction with free-market principles.The "Washington Post" described tensions between State and TFBSO as a “bureaucratic knife fight over the best way to revive Iraq's moribund economy" and that "under pressure from Congress to demonstrate progress on the ground, the military often favors immediate solutions aimed at quelling violence.That has prompted objections from some at State who question the long-term consequences of that expeditious approach.”

Amidst these concerns, Congresswoman Betty McCollum (D-MN) fought to have TFBSO defunded, arguing that “helping companies make money is not the role of the Department of Defense