Shias fight back as resistance spreads

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=454799

The oil briefly flowed again, but US casualties are mounting in a worsening struggle with Saddam supporters and opponents
By Patrick Cockburn in Baghdad
19 October 2003


Iraq resumed pumping oil to Turkey yesterday, two months after its main export pipeline was sabotaged. But after two hours the flow stopped again because of a leak.

It was a frustrating end to a week in which the number of US combat deaths since the war was declared over reached three figures, symbolising the uphill struggle of the American and British occupation authorities in their efforts to restore normality in Iraq.

The deaths of three US military police in a clash with Shia Muslim militiamen during a gun battle in the holy city of Karbala, in which eight militiamen and two Iraqi police were also killed, underlines how US soldiers are now dying in a much larger area of Iraq, and at the hands of a more diverse group of Iraqis, than was true two months ago.

<snip>

Wow, Dubya. Guess you need to talk to the British press too. I don't think they got your memo about how great things are in Iraq!

[brainshrub]

1. I leak you say?

Suuuuure it was a leak. :eyes:

[mbperrin]

2. Shore it was!

Big f***ing hole in pipe = "leak", right?

Hey, wait a minute! I thought * said no more leaks!!!!

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

3. I'm sure it was a leak because Centcom or Brenner would NEVER

hide the fact that there's no way in hell they can protect a pipeline without the cooperation of the general Iraqi populace.

It was just a teeny-weeny leak and they shut it down for ecological reasons.

[nolabels]

4. This whole farce from * is like sending 147,000 soldiers to the moon

When a person is the military and goes to an overseas duty station they get kind of a cacooned life but certain aspects of the country support the outside aspects of the US military there. With Iraq nothing is there. This is going to assist in Bankrupt the US faster than anything.

http://www.occupationwatch.org/article.php?list=type&type=10
Corporate Invasion/Labor Rights/Economy


Commerce Chief Says Iraq Violence Should Not Discourage Investors
by Alex Berenson and Edmund L. Andrews , New York Times
October 16, 2003
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Oct. 15 — At a heavily guarded warehouse at the Baghdad airport, which ordinary Iraqis cannot enter without American permission, Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans said on Wednesday that violence in Iraq is isolated and that foreign investors should seize opportunities here.


Halliburton Overbills in Iraq
by Reuters , New York Times
October 15, 2003
A U.S. Democratic lawmaker on Wednesday accused Halliburton (HAL.N), the Texas oil services company once run by Vice President Dick Cheney, of overcharging the U.S. government for gasoline the firm imports into Iraq.


12 Million Iraqis Believed Out of Work
by Associated Press , Associated Press
October 15, 2003
Six months after America's lightning war in Iraq, the vast majority of Iraqi workers are unemployed. The Labor Ministry estimates 70 percent or more, some 12 million Iraqis, are without jobs.


Iraqi Official Urges Caution on Imposing Free Market
by Thomas Crampton , New York Times
October 14, 2003
SINGAPORE, Oct. 13 - Iraq's interim trade minister warned on Monday against forcing his nation's economy to mold itself rapidly into a free-market system, saying that a swift change would fuel unemployment and heighten political instability.


Contractors in Iraq accused of importing labour and exporting profit
by Nicolas Pelham , Financial Times
October 14, 2003
US sub-contractors are importing cheap migrant labour from south Asia to Iraq, despite high local unemployment and complaints from Iraqi contractors that they are being overlooked by the US-led administration in Baghdad.


Iraq announces a US$13.5 billion budget for 2004
Associated Press
October 14, 2003
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Iraq's interim administration has unveiled its 2004 budget, with projected spending US$13.5 billion and a deficit of US$600 million expected to be covered by unspent money from the U.N.-administered oil-for-food program.


New agency for Iraq contracts
by correspondents in London , news.com.au
October 14, 2003
THE United States will create a new agency, under the aegis of the Pentagon, to oversee the distribution of contracts to rebuild Iraq, a US defence official told a conference today.



Firms get ready for business in Iraq
by Ewen MacAskill, diplomatic editor , The Guardian
October 14, 2003
About 100 private companies, mainly from Britain and the US, gathered in London yesterday to discuss investment opportunities in post-Saddam Iraq.

The companies, mainly oil and banking, are being invited by the US and British governments to move in as soon as security is restored. The fast-food chain McDonald's, which has a branch in most parts of the world, was predicted by the conference organisers to open in Baghdad next year.




Iraq official warns on fast economic shift
by Thomas Crampton , Herald Tribune
October 14, 2003
Iraq's interim trade minister on Monday warned against forcing the war-torn economy to move rapidly to a free-market system, saying that a swift drive would fuel unemployment and heighten political instability.


Spoils of war
by Brian Whitaker , The Guardian
October 13, 2003
For centuries, pillage by invading armies was a normal part of warfare: a way in which to reward badly-paid or unpaid troops for risking their lives in battle.


Iraq 'asset-stripping' warning
by Faisal Islam , The Observer
October 12, 2003
Controversial plans to privatise all of Iraq's non-oil assets have been attacked by Nobel-prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz. The former World Bank chief economist has warned that laws signed off by US and British occupation forces 'risk social stability and Russia-style asset stripping'.


Ex-SAS flock to Iraq - and earn £1,000 a day as bodyguards
by Andrew Alderson , The Telegraph
October 12, 2003
Former members of the SAS and other elite British regiments are earning up to £1,000 a day providing armed protection for Western businessmen in Baghdad, Basra and other Iraqi cities.


The Iraqi Gold Rush: "The Privatization of U.S. Foreign Policy"
Democracy Now!
October 10, 2003
As the U.S. Congress takes its first step toward approving the $87 billion President Bush has requested for U.S. operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, we take a look at the corporations poised to make a killing as private contractors flood into Baghdad...We go now to Deborah Avant, professor of International Affairs at George Washington University and an expert on military private companies. Welcome to democracy now!


Iraq's economy declines by half
by Steve Schifferes , BBC News Online
October 10, 2003
The scale of the task facing the United States and the international community in Iraq has been highlighted by the first detailed figures since the conflict ended on the state of the Arab country's economy.

(snip)

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

5. Great concise post. Brings a few points to the surface.

[nolabels]

6. Bankruptcy is a one word concept, It means your bills are more......

than you take in and produce. It’s not really hard to figure out; it’s just hard to admit when you have brought it all on yourself (collectively in the place of US Government)