Creation The Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction was created with the enactment of
Public Law 110-181, which President
George W. Bush signed into law on January 28, 2008.
Leadership In 2012, President
Barack Obama selected John F. Sopko to serve as the special inspector general. Sopko had more than thirty years of experience in oversight and investigations as a prosecutor, congressional counsel, and senior federal government advisor. He came to SIGAR from
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, an international law firm headquartered in Washington, D.C., where he had been a partner since 2009. Sopko's government experience includes over twenty years on Capitol Hill, where he held key positions in both the Senate and House of Representatives. He served on the staffs of the
House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the Select Committee on Homeland Security and the
Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. The inspector general post was previously held by Steve Trent (acting), Herb Richardson (acting), and Arnold Fields. While serving as inspector general, Sopko testified multiple times before Congress on behalf of SIGAR. Gene Aloise joined SIGAR on September 4, 2012, as the deputy inspector general. In this role, he oversaw day-to-day operations of the agency and assisted the inspector general in executing SIGAR's mission. Aloise came to SIGAR from the
Government Accountability Office (GAO), where he served for 38 years. He has years of experience developing, leading, and managing GAO domestic and international work. His experience included assignments with congressional committees as well as various offices within GAO. John Sopko was among the inspectors general illegally fired by Donald Trump in late January 2025. Gene Aloise led the agency in an acting capacity after Sopko's dismissal.
Staffing and locations According to the organization's October 2014 report to Congress, SIGAR employed 197 individuals. The report noted that SIGAR had twenty-nine employees at the U.S. embassy in Kabul and eight other employees in Afghan locations outside the U.S. embassy. SIGAR staff members were stationed at four locations across the country, including
Kandahar and
Bagram Airfields, Mazar-i-Sharif, and the U.S. embassy in Kabul. SIGAR employed three local Afghans in its Kabul office to support the investigations and audits directorates.
Recognitions • In October 2014, over two dozen SIGAR staffers were recognized for outstanding achievements at the 17th Annual Inspector General Community awards ceremony. The awards included the Sentner award, two awards for audit excellence, and two awards for excellence special act. • In October 2012, SIGAR Audit and Investigative Teams won CIGIE Awards for Excellence. The awards included the Sentner award, an award for audit excellence and an investigation award for excellence. • In May 2012, SIGAR special agents received a Public Service Award today from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia for their work in a major bribery case in Afghanistan. • In October 2011, a SIGAR audit team was presented the Sentner Award for Dedication and Courage for its work in Laghman Province auditing the
Commander's Emergency Response Program. • In October 2011, another SIGAR team won an Award for Excellence for its audit of Afghan National Security Force facilities.
Non-governmental organization (NGO) recognition and assistance SIGAR, and its reports, findings and information have also been widely discussed and distributed on Capitol Hill, the
US Congress and with U.S. policymakers, by the Washington, D.C.–based Afghanistan Foundation, a non-profit public policy research organization (
NGO). SIGAR's efforts have helped educated and inform policymakers in public policy research organizations, and think tanks, about issues regarding U.S. assistance programs, aid levels, and various projects, in Afghanistan, including problems of
corruption in Afghanistan, the
Kabul Bank crisis, and other important matters.
Investigations The Washington Post has filed
FOIA lawsuits for government documents related to documents produced by the agency's
Lessons Learned Program. While the legal matter is pending before Judge
Amy Berman Jackson of the
U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia, unedited transcripts of interviews have been released which reveal a pattern of disinformation on the part of U.S. government officials.
Activities after the 2021 Taliban takeover of Afghanistan After the
fall of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan on August 15, 2021, and the
US troop withdrawal from that country, SIGAR investigated the root causes of the collapse of the Afghan government and the
Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF), releasing a pair of reports that recounted each failure: •
Why the Afghan Government Collapsed November 1, 2022 •
Why the Afghan Security Forces Collapsed February 1, 2023 In April 2023, SIGAR told the Congress that they can't assure American aid to Afghanistan is not currently being used to fund the Taliban government. ==Oversight activity==