Top Ten War Profiteers of 2004
"You know it's bad when Halliburton is #7"
From Guerrilla News, excerpt below:
1) AEGIS
In June, the Pentagon’s Program Management Office in Iraq awarded a $293 million contract to coordinate security operations among thousands of private contractors to Aegis, a UK firm whose founder was once investigated for illegal arms smuggling....
2) BearingPoint
Critics find it ironic that BearingPoint, the former consulting division of KPMG, received a $240 million contract in 2003 to help develop Iraq’s “competitive private sector,” since it had a hand in the development of the contract itself. According to a March 22 report by AID’s assistant inspector general Bruce Crandlemire, “Bearing Point’s extensive involvement in the development of the Iraq economic reform program creates the appearance of unfair competitive advantage in the contract award process.” ....
3) Bechtel
Schools, hospitals, bridges, airports, water treatment plants, power plants, railroad, irrigation, electricity, etc. Bechtel was literally tasked with repairing much of Iraq’s infrastructure, a job that was critical to winning hearts and minds after the war....Although Bechtel is not entirely to blame, the company has yet to meet virtually any of the major deadlines in its original contract. In October, according to AID, the CPA had restored only 4,400 MW of electrical generating capacity target, falling short of its goal of 6,000 MW by end of June (AID’s goal was 9.000, a level that existed in the country before the first gulf war). According to a June GAO report, “electrical service in the country as a while has not shown a marked improvement over the immediate postwar levels of May 2003 and has worsened in some governorates.” ....
4) BKSH & Associates
Chairman Charlie Black, is an old Bush family friend and prominent Republican lobbyist whose firm is affiliated with Burson Marsteller, the global public relations giant. Black was a key player in the Bush/Cheney 2000 campaign and together with his wife raised $100,000 for this year’s reelection campaign. BKSH clients with contracts in Iraq include Fluor International (whose ex-chair Phillip Carroll was tapped to head Iraq’s oil ministry after the war, and whose board includes the wife of James Woolsey, the ex-CIA chief who was sent by Paul Wolfowitz before the war to convince European leaders of Saddam Hussein’s ties to al Qaeda). Fluor has won joint contracts worth up to $1.6 billion. ....
I really suggest reading the whole article, though it will make you quite angry.
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