Cheney's boundless Iraq profiteering

[Guest guest]

T

Tue, 9 Aug 2005 10:15:19 -0700 (PDT)

Cheney's boundless Iraq profiteering

 

 

 

 

Cheney's boundless Iraq profiteering

July 31, 2005

 

Things are going well in Iraq for the invaders. Well, at least for

some people, such as US Vice-President Richard Cheney. He is receiving

more than $US1 million ($A1.3 million) a year from Halliburton, the

company of which he was CEO from 1995 to 2000, in " deferred

remuneration " while he is VP. He is worth every penny.

 

Last week, two Democrat senators and a house member wrote to Secretary

of Defence Donald Rumsfeld asking if he knew about Halliburton's

latest money-making dodge in Iraq. Keep in mind that Halliburton and

its subsidiary, Kellogg Brown and Root, have a nice little earner

going in supplying support for the US Army and for, ostensibly,

putting out oil well fires. The Centre for Public Integrity in

Washington counts Halliburton's windfall at more than $US10 billion -

a little bit coming from the US Treasury but most coming from Iraqi

oil revenue that is supposed to be used to reconstruct the country for

the benefit of the people. The centre counts another 30 members of the

Defence Policy Board with ties to American companies with $US76

billion (as of 2002) in largely uncontested and un-auditable military

contracts.

 

The Democrats reckon that Halliburton may have overstepped even its

sloppy moral line by making life impossible for another American

company that has committed the crime of undercutting the

Vice-President's company.

 

In their letter to Rumsfeld, the Democrats say that US company

Lloyd-Owen International is being prevented from delivering fuel to

Iraq from Kuwait (Who says the liberation hasn't been a success? What

next? Ice to the Inuit?) by forcing LOI trucks to use a civilian

crossing where the checks are so slow that the company can't get its

140 trucks a day through. The speedy, wave-'em-through military

crossing is controlled by who? The Iraqi military? The US military?

Nope, by the Vice-President's firm, which is also in the fuel delivery

business.

 

The Democrats say that the LOI crime is delivering fuel to Iraq for 18

US cents a gallon while Halliburton provides the same service at

$US1.30 a gallon. The LOI spokesman says he could understand if

Halliburton simply doubled the price, to 36 US cents a gallon. But at

$US1.30 a gallon even a Texas carpetbagger should blush.

 

Halliburton has a $US2.5 billion contract for managing the fuel

distribution system in Iraq. The man from LOI says that " we have not,

to date, seen a functioning KBR (Kellogg Brown and Root) piece of

equipment to where we deliver " . He also says that his chaps have only

come across one KBR employee at these sites.

 

LOI needed Defence Department ID cards to make its deliveries and, in

order to get them from - you guessed it - Halliburton, they had to

make a delivery for Mr Cheney of construction material to Fallujah

last month. The convoy was attacked and three men were killed and

seven injured. KBR staff were ordered not to provide any assistance to

the injured. " Many people volunteered to help, but were told not to by

our management, " according to a Halliburton employee. Presumably the

convoy crew were a bunch of mercenaries, in Iraq to make a buck.

 

As George the Smaller told an audience at the West Point and Virginia

Military Institute, America is " the single surviving model of human

progress " .

 

http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/cheneys-boundless-iraq-profiteering/2005/0\

7/30/1122144052021.html?onfiltered=true