- Halliburton and its subsidiary
Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) have been making hay in the burning Iraqi
sun for years now. It is, of course, no coincidence that the man sitting
as vice president played a key role with his influence in obtaining the
lion's share of contracts in Iraq for the company he was CEO of prior to
his self-appointed position. Yet none of this is news.
-
- What is news,
however, is that the ties that bind Cheney to Halliburton also link him
to groups with even broader interests in the Middle East, which are causing
civilians on the ground there, as well as in the US, to pay the price.
-
- Cheney had much
more at stake than pure altruism in making sure Halliburton/KBR obtained
so many no-bid contracts in occupied Iraq. Despite his claims of not having
any financial ties to Halliburton, the fact is that in both 2001 and 2002
he earned twice as much from a deferred salary from his "old"
company as when he was CEO.
-
- But that wasn't
the beginning. When Cheney was US Secretary of Defense in the early 1990's
under Big Bush, Halliburton was awarded the job of studying, then implementing,
the privatization of routine army functions such as cleaning and cooking
meals.
-
- Following this
study, when Cheney was finished with his job at the Pentagon, he scored
the job as CEO of Halliburton, which he held until nominating himself for
the position of Little Bush's running mate in 2000. Remember, it was Cheney
who was given the task of finding a running mate for Bush. After searching
far and wide across the US, Cheney ended up generously offering his own
services for the job.
-
- As if Cheney
didn't already have enough conflicts of interest, it is important to note
that he assisted in founding the neo-conservative think tank, the "Project
for the New American Century (PNAC)," whose goal is to "promote
American global leadership," which entails acquiring Iraqi oil. Complimenting
this, Cheney was also part of the board of advisers to the Jewish Institute
for National Security Affairs (JINSA) along with John Bolton, Richard Perle
and Paul Wolfowitz (all PNAC members) before becoming vice president. JINSA,
self-described as a "nonsectarian educational organization,"
does things like nominate John Bolton for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize and
works to "explain the role Israel can ... play in bolstering ... the
link between American defense policy and the security of Israel."
-
- Their Mission
Statement adds, "The inherent instability in the region [Middle East]
caused primarily by inter-Arab rivalries and the secular/religious split
in many Muslim societies leaves the future of the region in doubt. Israel,
with its technological capabilities and shared system of values, has a
key role to play as a US ally in the region," which happens to be
quite similar to the stated goals of the PNAC for the region, but I digress.
-
- By the end of
2002, Cheney owned at least 433,000 unexercised Halliburton stock options
worth over $10 million. And that was before the invasion of Iraq, when
the games really began.
-
- In March 2003,
the month the invasion began, Halliburton was awarded a no-bid contract
worth $7 billion from the Pentagon. The blatant awarding of this "reconstruction"
contract to Halliburton even led Representative Henry Waxman to comment,
"The administration's approach to the reconstruction of Iraq is fundamentally
flawed. It's a boondoggle that's enriching private contractors."
-
- Of course the
invasion and occupation of Iraq aren't only about oil.
-
- Remember, it
was Cheney himself who, at a VFW convention in August 2002, said "Many
of us are convinced that Saddam will acquire nuclear weapons fairly soon.
Just how soon, we cannot really gauge."
-
- Cheney then,
solely in the interests of protecting the American and Iraqi people of
course, made sure the US would go into Iraq and take care of that nuclear
trouble-maker Saddam Hussein.
-
- Just to be safe,
Halliburton was paid $40 million for providing housing and transportation
for teams searching for non-existent weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
For with each contract Halliburton is and was awarded, Cheney's bank account
grows.
-
- The one place
where there were remnants of a nuclear program in Iraq, albeit over 20
years before the 2003 US invasion, was the Osirak Nuclear Research Facility
on the outskirts of Baghdad. US-made Israeli warplanes bombed it back on
June 7, 1981, and when I visited the place in January 2004, all I found
were empty warehouses which the American military wasn't concerned about
enough to prevent from being looted.
-
- Villagers in
nearby al-Tuwetha, ignorant of radioactive waste stored in old drums, looted
them in the chaos following the invasion and had been using them as water
containers - thus irradiating the entire village.
-
- One example of
what it looks like on the ground in Iraq when Halliburton fails to fulfill
its contractual obligations is the life of Adel Mhomoud. The 44-year-old
beekeeper in al-Tuwetha told me, "I have cancer, and I know I'm dying.
My white blood cell count is 14,000, and I don't have enough red blood
cells. We are all sick; our joints ache, my hips are killing me, and my
blood is bad. But nobody will help us here."
-
- Certainly not
Halliburton.
-
- Cheney, who received
no less than five military deferments during the Vietnam War despite being
a supporter of that war (Sound familiar?), had shamelessly told the veterans
at the VFW, "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein
now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them
to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us."
-
- So that was the
door Cheney took to bring Iraq his Halliburton.
-
- And of course,
once through that door, Halliburton promptly went to work.
-
- Aside from the
aforementioned awarding of no-bid contracts worth billions of US taxpayer
dollars, as early as December 2003, the US Army found out Halliburton was
overcharging the government $61 million for fuel transportation and $67
million for food services in Iraq. I remember being in Baghdad when this
occurred - seeing the enormously long gas lines at petrol stations whilst
knowing Halliburton, not only failing to provide Iraqis with their own
petrol, was even charging the US taxpayer three dollars per gallon for
fuel that local companies could have imported for under one dollar.
-
- But that was
barely the beginning.
-
- Let's take a
brief glance at some of the more recent Halliburton/KBR rogueries:
- · 27 February 2006 - US Army
decides to reimburse KBR nearly all of its disputed costs on a $2.41 billion
no-bid contract to deliver fuel and repair equipment in Iraq, despite Pentagon
auditors identifying over $250 million in charges as "potentially"
excessive.
-
- · 17 February 2006 - KBR executive
hired to fly cargo into Iraq pleads guilty to inflating invoices by $1.14
million to cover fraudulent "war risk surcharges."
-
- · 6 February 2006 - KBR employee
in Iraq, speaking on condition of anonymity, says "We pay our locals
[in Iraq] $5 to $16 dollars a day and you can see where [KBR] put it down
[on the military requisition] as $60 a day." Military requisitions
reveal KBR to be paying between $5-$16 per day in wages to third world
laborers in Iraq whilst billing US taxpayers between $50-$80 per day.
-
- · 30 January 2006 - Bush administration
settles dispute between Pentagon and Halliburton by agreeing to pay company
$199 million in disputed gasoline charges in Iraq. To date KBR has been
awarded nearly $16 billion in total revenue from Iraq contracts.
-
- · 23 January 2006 - Halliburton
fails to alert American troops and civilian contractors at US base in Ramadi
that their water was contaminated. Despite allegations which came from
Halliburton's own water quality experts, the company denies there was a
contamination problem.
-
- · 27 December 2005 - KBR, linked
to human trafficking-related concerns via its work in Iraq (such as forced
prostitution and labor), Halliburton benefits from Defense Department's
refusal to adopt policy barring human trafficking.
-
- · 1 December 2005 - UPI reports
KBR workers in Iraq ("third country" nationals) found to be paid
as little as 50 cents an hour.
-
- · 5 November 2005 - UN auditing
board finds that US should repay Iraqi government $208 million from Iraqi
oil revenue for fraudulent contracting work.
-
- Then there is
how these "policies" Halliburton is following in Iraq affect
US soldiers and contractors, including its own employees.
-
- With contracts
in Iraq now worth up to $18 billion, there is nothing stopping Halliburton
from abusing the lack of oversight and obvious conflict of interest between
their free reign and their ties to the vice president.
-
- An example of
this is Jim Spiri, who was hired by Halliburton/KBR in January 2004 to
work as a logistics coordinator. Sent to Camp Anaconda in Balad, Iraq,
he worked the flight line handling passenger movements, as Spiri had 20
years of aviation experience.
-
- "During
my time there, I assisted nightly with medevac [medical evacuations] operations
and was highly respected among all military medical folks," he told
me this week. "I had a good name throughout the theatre."
-
- But problems
were immediately apparent to him.
-
- "I witnessed
much alcohol abuse, in an environment where alcohol is strictly prohibited.
I made note of this and reported it to my superiors, who actually were
the ones abusing the system. It was obvious that the fox was guarding the
hen house, so to speak."
-
- He told me his
entire flight line operation was "run in a gang-like manner"
and "the work was never done in an efficient manner." Instead,
according to Spiri, the motto was, "Do as little as possible for as
much as you can, for as long as you can."
-
- On February 5th
of this year, while working the night shift which he had for the last two
years, Spiri witnessed something that made the thought of continuing to
work for KBR intolerable.
-
- After watching
a fallen soldier loaded onto a plane without the proper ceremony of honor,
Spiri told me he "wrote an account of what I experienced that night."
After this, "It was published, and ... all hell broke loose about
36 hours later."
-
- Spiri was fired
by KBR after writing an article detailing the event and criticizing Halliburton's
policies in Iraq.
-
- Now he wants
to shine light on how KBR operates in Iraq. "What they don't want
to let out is the type of workers they have over there, that it's the largest
gravy train operation, it's the largest welfare system I've ever seen in
my life. It's pathetic," Spiri said in a recent interview while adding
that over half the people KBR employed in Iraq were "grossly under-qualified
and highly over-paid."
-
- His work entailed
three people, but by the time he left there were 10 people on his team,
most of whom "sat around listening to their iPod's and DVD players."
-
- Yet firing an
employee for raising awareness about corruption and his questioning of
policy is minor compared to the treatment of Iraqis meted out by the company.
-
- When I was in
Amman last May, I met Ahlam al-Hassan, a young Iraqi woman who had worked
for KBR in Diwaniyah.
-
- Two gunshots
by assailants who attacked her for collaborating with occupation forces
left her blind, and her former employers would not return her calls or
requests for assistance.
-
- For her three
months of work for KBR she was paid $475, having taken the job to support
her family. "My two bosses at KBR, Mr. Jeff and Mr. Mark, were very
good and gentle with me," she explained to me in Jordan, "They
told me it wasn't dangerous to work for them." But after spending
months in hospitals for what happened to her on her way to work, "After
this, they have made no attempts to contact me."
-
- Note that on
May 31, 2004, an Army Corps of Engineers email revealed that Cheney's office
"coordinated" Halliburton's multi-billion dollar Iraq contract.
Cheney, like most common criminals, denied having anything to do with the
no-bid contract.
-
- More recently,
on January 26th of this year, Halliburton announced that its 2005 profits
were the "Best in our 86-year history," as all six of its divisions
posted record results. Halliburton stock price doubled in the last year,
and Dick Cheney's tax returns indicate that he earned $194,862 from his
Halliburton stock in just the last year.
-
- Loot Dick, Loot!
-
- Is that clear
enough?
-
- All of this begs
the question: Do you approve of your tax dollars being used in this fashion?
-
- If not, then
what are you willing to do about it?
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