'Iraq was awash in cash. We played football with bricks of $100 bills'

[deminks]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,1734939,00.html

At the beginning of the Iraq war, the UN entrusted $23bn of Iraqi money to the US-led coalition to redevelop the country. With the infrastructure of the country still in ruins, where has all that money gone? Callum Macrae and Ali Fadhil on one of the greatest financial scandals of all time

In a dilapidated maternity and paediatric hospital in Diwaniyah, 100 miles south of Baghdad, Zahara and Abbas, premature twins just two days old, lie desperately ill. The hospital has neither the equipment nor the drugs that could save their lives. On the other side of the world, in a federal courthouse in Virginia, US, two men - one a former CIA agent and Republican candidate for Congress, the other a former army ranger - are found guilty of fraudulently obtaining $3m (£1.7m) intended for the reconstruction of Iraq. These two events have no direct link, but they are none the less products of the same thing: a financial scandal that in terms of sheer scale must rank as one of the greatest in history.

At the start of the Iraq war, around $23bn-worth of Iraqi money was placed in the trusteeship of the US-led coalition by the UN. The money, known as the Development Fund for Iraq and consisting of the proceeds of oil sales, frozen Iraqi bank accounts and seized Iraqi assets, was to be used in a "transparent manner", specified the UN, for "purposes benefiting the people of Iraq".

For the past few months we have been working on a Guardian Films investigation into what happened to that money. What we discovered was that a great deal of it has been wasted, stolen or frittered away. For the coalition, it has been a catastrophe of its own making. For the Iraqi people, it has been a tragedy. But it is also a financial and political scandal that runs right to the heart of the nightmare that is engulfing Iraq today.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

1. Quote:

>>But it is also a financial and political scandal that runs right to the heart of the nightmare that is engulfing Iraq today.<<

This is your democracy on GOP.

[butterfly77]

45. They are johnny on the double to get the money..

back from katrina victims.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

50. Oh yes they are..... simply amazing... and they shouldn't call them

Katrina victims, they should call them Repictims.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

2. The documentary is on Channel 4, Monday night at 8pm (Brits only, sorry)

[rodeodance]

3. glad you get to see it though.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

7. thanks - I'll keep a look out for it online

Quite a few British docs end up online - FYI here's a couple of recent-ish ones about Iraq:

Iraq: The Reckoning

Peter Oborne reports on the West's exit strategy for Iraq. He believes the invasion of Iraq is proving to be the greatest foreign policy failure since Munich. Oborne argues that the plan to transform Iraq into a unified liberal democracy, a beacon of hope in the Middle East, is pure fantasy.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11999.htm


Beneath Iraq and a Hard Place]

What has happened in the two years since the troops arrived in Iraq? In 48 minutes of sketches, monologue, animation and reworked archive, Rory brings us up to date and tells the tale of life between Iraq and a hard place.
http://www.indybay.org/news/2006/01/1794821.php

[Greeby]

17. Beneath Iraq and a Hard Place is depressing

Mainly when Rory Bremner does the alternative universe stuff with Blair averting war :(

[mom cat]

19. Could you see if you could provide a link to the video of this? Thanks.

[wordpix2]

33. awww-when will it get to USA so repukes can see how repuke pols

fritter away their hard-earned dollars? 37% of them still don't get it...
It's the WAR ECONOMY and CORRUPTION, stupid!

[ClintonTyree]

43. The 37% that "still don't get it" are the ones that are benefiting......

from bush's war, either directly or indirectly. It's no wonder that Corporate America is so keen on continuing this "war". They're stealing two countries blind, Iraq and America, and there's NO oversight of their crooked, low-down thievery. War profiteering at it's absolute worst, brought to you by the GOP. It's foolish of me to think that these criminals will be brought to justice one day, but I have to keep that hope alive or I'll fall into a pit of despair.

[rodeodance]

4. "Which sounds like the way Saddam used to run the country"

The coalition's health programme was by any standards a failure. Basic equipment and drugs should have been distributed within months - the coalition wouldn't even have had to pay for it. But they missed that chance, not just in health, but in every other area of life in Iraq. As disgruntled Iraqis will often point out, despite far greater devastation and crushing sanctions, Saddam did more to rebuild Iraq in six months after the first Gulf war than the coalition has managed in three years.

Kees Reitfield, a health professional with 20 years' experience in post-conflict health care from Kosovo to Somalia, was in Iraq from the very beginning of the war and looked on in astonishment at the US management in its aftermath. "Everybody in Iraq was ready for three months' chaos," he says. "They had water for three months, they had food for three months, they were ready to wait for three months. I said, we've got until early August to show an improvement, some drugs in the health centres, some improvement of electricity in the grid, some fuel prices going down. Failure to deliver will mean civil unrest." He was right.

...

Another experienced health worker, Mary Patterson - who was eventually asked to leave Iraq by James Haveman - characterises the Coalition's approach thus: "I believe it had a lot to do with showing that the US was in control," she says. "I believe that it had to do with rewarding people that were politically loyal. So rather than being a technical agenda, I believe it was largely a politically motivated reward-and-punishment kind of agenda."

Which sounds like the way Saddam used to run the country. "If you were to interview Iraqis today about what they see day to day," she says, "I think they will tell you that they don't see a lot of difference".

· Dispatches: Iraq's Missing Billions produced by GuardianFilms is broadcast tonight on Channel4 at 8pm.

[rodeodance]

5. and what do the Irag's get for 23B?--new prisons & militarybases.

[lanah]

6. Since when did incompetence become an acceptable excuse?

[dbt]

25. This is NOT incompetence. It is INTENT.

The bu$h regime is NOT incompetent. From the moment it sat on its Collective Ass and LET those planes hit the World Trade Center, every supposed blunder has served to put more money and/or more power into fewer hands.

No group of people can be as incompetent as the bu$h gang appears for this long without a few of them getting picked off by Natural Selection. They are quite content to be seen as fools as long as they get what they want.

The same also looks to be true of the Democratic Party.

[RedSock]

27. ding ding ding ding

we have a winner!

they only look incompetent because they are playing a brand new game -- we are still thinking about the old game and the old rules.

[Raksha]

30. We have a winner!

That's a great way of putting it: "From the moment it sat on its Collective Ass and LET those planes hit the World Trade Center, every supposed blunder has served to put more money and/or more power into fewer hands."

[Marie26]

36. 23$ Billion dollars

can buy a lot of "looking the other way." The war contractors have contributed incredible amounts of money to both Democrats & Repubs. on Defense committees; and maybe even more under the table.

[54anickel]

16. That Mary Patterson quote got to me. It's the Bushco way!

"...rewarding people that were politically loyal. So rather than being a technical agenda, I believe it was largely a politically motivated reward-and-punishment kind of agenda."

No wonder she was asked to leave by that Bushco crony, Haveman:

To supervise the reconstruction of the Iraqi health service, the Pentagon appointed James Haveman, a former health administrator from Michigan. He was also a loyal Bush supporter, who had campaigned for Jeb Bush, and a committed evangelical Christian. But he had virtually no experience in international health work.

[ClintonTyree]

44. Another "committed evangelical christian" with the morals of a rabid dog.

This is not an indictment on all christians but it seems there are more "good christians" in bush's administration that break commandments with an ease that is alarming. This reinforces my idea that these supposedly "good christians" don't believe in religion one iota. They merely use it as a tool to control people, enrich themselves, appear honest and give themselves that "get out of jail free" card of "redemption and forgiveness" if they're caught with their hands in the cookie jar. It works on the ignorant masses every time. They're all so willing to forgive one of their own if they should happen to "stray" :eyes: , and there's a LOT of "straying" going on in the good, christian Republican party.

[bluesbassman]

52. Oh they believe in religion......

it's just that their church is the church of the all mighty dollar. What they don't believe in the Gospel. Jesus denounced virtually everything the neocons stand for. His was a message of love and tolerance. His only commandment was to love one another, just as He loved us (John 15:12) Every time He came down hard on someone or some group, it was because they were mistreating their fellow man or misapplying the law. The neo-christians don't follow the Word, they only cherry pick certain scriptures to validate their own greed, avarice and hatred. Try asking one of these "christians" why they don't follow the teaching found in the book of Acts (Acts 4:34-37)? No, I guess they wouldn't want to follow that, it would make them communists.

[MrModerate]

8. I can attest to the devil-may-care way . . .

. . . they handled cash.

When I was in Iraq between May and November of 2003, on at least two occasions I rode on C-130s with pallets of bundled bills, generally thought to be about $30 million. We were always told that the local commanders were using the cash for ad-hoc infrastructure projects in their AOR ("Area of Responsibility"). And, in fact, I believed them (and continue to do so, having worked with a number of these commanders who struck me as straight shooters who were really there with the intent of making life better for Iraq and the Iraqis).

These particular cash caches were the ones found stashed in various government buildings around the country early in the occupation, and not the money supposedly siphoned off from oil sales. However, there was NO accounting that I was aware of associated even with these amounts.

For yucks, here's a photo I took of one of these hauls, being carried from Baghdad to Kirkuk (or Tikrit, I don't remember) in July 2003 or so.

http://www.kritzberg.com/DU/$30M_edited_r1.jpg

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

10. Looks to me like it's...

Some kinda Tony Montana thing goin' on.

Ever hear the one about the large cash transfer that took place clandestinely, and what sure "looked" like Afghanistan, on 12 Sep 2001?

[MrModerate]

12. Don't know that story, but . . .

Did hear rumors about some of the non-coms who found the first caches as coalition forces advanced across the country and how not "all" the bricks got reported to their superior officers. Never heard anything official, however.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

14. Not surprising.

Frankly, we both know it happened.

[Blue_Tires]

11. wow

for one tenth of one percent of that, i could be set, instead of the shitty situation i'm in now, financially....

it should surprise no one about the amount of profiteering going on

[Canuckistanian]

9. Wasn't there a single flight

That contained the largest amount of US currency ever to be exported out of the country? That landed in Iraq?

Anyone know the story?

[hootinholler]

13. 363 tons

Search for 363 tons as the thread title. I'd dig for it, but my star evaporated. (which reminds me...)

-Hoot

[Canuckistanian]

26. Found it - American Conservative article

http://www.amconmag.com/2005/2005_10_24/cover.html

[Marie26]

34. Wow

That article makes me feel like rioting.

"The CPA brought in scores of bright, young true believers who were nearly universally unqualified. Many were recruited through the Heritage Foundation website, where they had posted their résumés. ... One such volunteer was Simone Ledeen, daughter of leading neoconservative Michael Ledeen. Unable to communicate in Arabic and with no relevant experience or appropriate educational training, she nevertheless became a senior advisor for northern Iraq at the Ministry of Finance in Baghdad. Another was former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer’s older brother Michael who, though utterly unqualified, was named director of private-sector development for all of Iraq. ...

The 15-month proconsulship of the CPA disbursed nearly $20 billion, two-thirds of it in cash, most of which came from the Development Fund for Iraq that had replaced the UN Oil for Food Program and from frozen and seized Iraqi assets. Most of the money was flown into Iraq on C-130s in huge plastic shrink-wrapped pallets holding 40 “cashpaks,” each cashpak having $1.6 million in $100 bills. Twelve billion dollars moved that way between May 2003 and June 2004, drawn from accounts administered by the New York Federal Reserve Bank. The $100 bills weighed an estimated 363 tons.

"Money also disappeared in truckloads and by helicopter. The CPA reportedly distributed funds to contractors in bags off the back of a truck. In one notorious incident in April 2004, $1.5 billion in cash that had just been delivered by three Blackhawk helicopters was handed over to a courier in Erbil, in the Kurdish region, never to be seen again. Afterwards, no one was able to recall the courier’s name or provide a good description of him.

Paul Bremer, meanwhile, had a slush fund in cash of more than $600 million in his office for which there was no paperwork. One U.S. contractor received $2 million in a duffel bag. Three-quarters of a million dollars was stolen from an office safe, and a U.S. official was given $7 million in cash in the waning days of the CPA and told to spend it “before the Iraqis take over.” Nearly $5 billion was shipped from New York in the last month of the CPA. Sources suggest that a deliberate attempt was being made to run down the balance and spend the money while the CPA still had authority and before an Iraqi government could be formed."

[lovuian]

15. Nobody kept track either

Massive stealing!!!

[Trevelyan]

31. Galloway spoke about the billions that disappeared in Iraq and said the US

didn't count the money or even weigh it.

Congresswoman Louis Slaughter asked us to sign her petition to start a Truman-like Commission about the theft of US tax payer dollars by the war profiteers like Halliburton.

http://www.votelouise.com/page/petition/truman/

Go to Sites: HalliburtonWatch and Know Your War Profiteers for playing cards with Kissenger/Condi Ect. War Criminals

http://www.warprofiteers.com http://www.ruckus.org

http://www.publicintegrity.org/wow/

[lanah]

38. AND the oil meters are still broken

Halliburton has been pumping oil but the meters are broken- apparently they cannot fix those.

[Marie26]

40. Apparantly

:eyes: They can build nuclear bombs, but they can't fix a meter? Who are they trying to kid?

[butterfly77]

46. We want our money back from the katrina victims...

Right away! They knew about this along time ago and they have done nothing! This is where a large portion of bush supporters come from, they are on the gravy train and have been for a long time.

[Catrina]

18. Custer Battles and Stein, Duke Cunningham et all 'only the tip of the

iceberg'!!

And Congress just gave this bunch of thieves more billions this past week??? What is going on in this country? I just read that article and it's mind-blowing!! And the American people are paying and paying for these criminals as well as the Iraqi people! I keep thinking I can't get any more angry and each time, I'm wrong ~

To see Cheney, one of the main thieves, on TV, having the gall to face the public, when he knew all along, he, Bremer, Bush, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld. Where could that much money go??

Those two little babies died, and how many more? This has to be the most criminal administration EVER in the history of this country.

Every dime made in profit from this war should now be frozen. I don't know who can investigate all this, because it seems they were all involved.

Did the Founding Fathers make a provision for when the government completely implodes, Congress and the Executive branch? Can the people set up their own Committees to really look into all these crimes?? Because if this is known, why have there not already been loud demands from Congress for a complete and thorough public investigation??

I am once again, stunned by the sheer magnitude of the crimes they have committed ~

[Amonester]

22. I don't know what to say except call the Republicans' offices all...

over the country and ask them why there is NO SERIOUS investigation into all these crimes?

(Maybe, tell their staff you're "an honest" conservative (I know it's tough to lie...), and you just can't take it anymore, and that if they don't do anything about it, you're gonna stay home in November instead of voting.)

"In a free fire zone you can shoot at anybody you want. In a free fraud zone you can steal anything you like. And that was what they did."

Free to kill? Free to steal? WTF? :banghead: <- future taxpayer...

[gunsaximbo]

20. gee where did it all come from?

any guesses?

[oblivious]

41. It was Iraqi money being held in trust by the UN, who gave it to the US.

Bastards

[dailykoff]

21. Morans at war.

It just keeps getting better and better. :cry:

[Marie26]

23. Can you imagine how much money they have?

- $23 Billion dollars "disappeared" from Iraq.

- $2.3 TRILLION dollars "missing" from the Pentagon records. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml

- $8.2 Billion dollars in Halliburton contracts in Iraq, w/no oversight.

- $8.8 Billion dollars in Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) funds unaccounted for. http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0821-01.htm

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. This has got to be the single most blantant, shameless embezzlement scheme ever.

[donco6]

24. And yet, in my school district . . .

I have to submit a report to the state to explain a $12.00 discrepancy in one of my federal grants.

Jeebus . . .

[Lisa]

39. that's because they're the "party of fiscal responsibility"

Anything the GOP says about money must therefore be true, even if involves billions of dollars! While everyone knows that us libruls (especially the ones in the public sector) are irresponsible and sticky-fingered, so we must be audited ruthlessly if so much as a penny is unaccounted for.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

28. I've sometimes wondered if their free and fair elections attended

by a "majority" of the country aren't just simply conditioning of the people by Saddam to attend such events, only these days the US is the one demanding the attendance. I remember watching the news during the Saddam days right after an election and everyone was smiling and talking about the "free and fair election" where Saddam got 100% (or 99.9) of the vote.
Americans get so excited that Iraqis show up to the elections but in truth, this is what they have been programmed to do for years. The real question is, does the country still operate under the same old theory of, "You better vote this way if you know what's good for you."

[Trevelyan]

29. Sickening and criminal. If you post at neutral sites and the FReepers

start talking about how we are giving Democracy and voting and freedom to the Iraqis, cut and paste this article.

'are found guilty of fraudulently obtaining $3m (£1.7m) intended for the :freak:reconstruction of Iraq:freak:. These two events have no direct link, but they are none the less products of the same thing: a financial scandal that in terms of sheer scale must rank as one of the greatest in history.:argh:

At the start of the Iraq war, around $23bn-worth of Iraqi money was placed in the :freak:trusteeship of the US-led :freak:coalition by the UN. The money, known as the :freak:Development Fund for Iraq:freak: and consisting of the proceeds of oil sales, frozen Iraqi bank accounts and seized Iraqi assets, was to be used in a
"transparent manner", specified the UN, for:freak: "purposes benefiting the people of Iraq"'.:argh: :freak:

[Marie26]

32. Infuriating, isn't it?

Newsweek also has a very good article about the corruption & greed of US contractors in Iraq.

"Follow the Money - Watchdogs are warning that corruption in Iraq is out of control. But will the United States join efforts to clamp down on it?" (I'm guessing - no.)


'Fraud-free zone': Willis (center) in Iraq with two CPA colleagues, preparing to pay a contractor in 2003.

April 4 issue - By many accounts, Custer Battles was a nightmare contractor in Iraq. The company's two principals, Mike Battles and Scott Custer, overcharged occupation authorities by millions of dollars, according to a complaint from two former employees. The firm double-billed for salaries and repainted the Iraqi Airways forklifts they found at Baghdad airport—which Custer Battles was contracted to secure—then leased them back to the U.S. government, the complaint says. In the fall of 2004, Deputy General Counsel Steven Shaw of the Air Force asked that the firm be banned from future U.S. contracts, saying Custer Battles had also "created sham companies, whereby fraudulently increased profits by inflating its claimed costs." An Army inspector general, Col. Richard Ballard, concluded as early as November 2003 that the security outfit was incompetent and refused to obey Joint Task Force 7 orders: "What we saw horrified us," Ballard wrote to his superiors in an e-mail obtained by NEWSWEEK.

Yet when the two whistle-blowers sued Custer Battles on behalf of the U.S. government—under a U.S. law intended to punish war profiteering and fraud—the Bush administration declined to take part. "The government has not lifted a finger to get back the $50 million Custer Battles defrauded it of," says Alan Grayson, a lawyer for the two whistle-blowers, Pete Baldwin and Robert Isakson. ...

The administration's reluctance to prosecute has turned the Iraq occupation into a "free-fraud zone," says former CPA senior adviser Franklin Willis. After the fall of Baghdad, there was no Iraqi law because Saddam Hussein's regime was dead. But if no U.S. law applied either, then everything was permissible, says Willis. The former CPA official compares Iraq to the "Wild West," saying he delivered one $2 million payment to Custer Battles in bricks of cash. ("We called Mike Battles in and said, 'Bring a bag'," Willis told Congress in February.) Willis and other critics worry that with just $4.1 billion of the $18.7 billion spent so far, the U.S. legal stance will open the door to much more fraud in the future. "If urgent steps are not taken, Iraq ... will become the biggest corruption scandal in history," warned the anti-corruption group Transparency International in a recent report. Grassley adds that if the government decides the False Claims Act doesn't apply to Iraq, "any recovery for fraud, waste and abuse of taxpayer dollars ... would be prohibited."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7306162/site/newsweek/

[tocqueville]

42. is that Custer's last stand ?

sorry couldn't help it...

[dipsydoodle]

54. Good analogy

The first one , by all historic accounts, was proveably a war criminal as well.

[leveymg]

35. $23 billion buys a lot of vacation houses and bass boats.

Kinda like the big payoffs to the Roman legionaires at the end of that Empire's campaigns.

Wasn't there also a big ripoff of Sadam's gold and dollars during Desert Storm?

That kind of payoff buys a lot of silence.

[butterfly77]

47. How many schools and inner cities and jobs could have

been created in this country.

[donco6]

48. Just to give you an idea:

Our school district of 5,700 kids spends $32,000,000 in its General Fund each year. That pays for everything except capital construction, food service, insurance, and bonded debt. So you can imagine what an impact this could have.

And we're stuck trying to figure out how we're going to keep art, music and PE because we can't afford a few more teachers.

[oblivious]

49. But it was Iraq's money!!!! Held in "trust" by the UN.

[AzDar]

37. This article just upset my ulcer....to think of all the good that missing

and squandered money could have done in non-corrupt hands...Sickening.

[brentspeak]

51. You know the majority of money-grabbers will get away scot-free

There's $8 billion sent over to Iraq that's unaccounted for, the greatest unknown accounting debit in the history of the United States. A ton of Bush cronies and various other vermin have gotten filthy rich with the American taxpayer's hard-earned money -- and Bush and the Republicans refuse to discuss the missing funds.

on edit: And not enough Democrats have raised the necessary amount of hell on this issue. This is the kind of thing that would resonate throughout the nation; why aren't our people on the stick with this? (besides Henry Waxman, who did try to bring attention to the issue.)

[dipsydoodle]

53. I doubt most sincerely it will ever be shown your side

Close to the end of the film you see one of the twins, mentioned in the narrative, die. The doctors had done everything possible to keep the poor little mite alive but in the absence of even the small needles necessary to provide a re-hydration drip to a baby it was all in vain.

It is the saddest film on the subject of the whole appalling debacle over there that is ever likely to be made.

Crucifixion would be too good for the perpetrators and their leaders.

[dipsydoodle]

55. Channel 4 video clips

Check this link occasionally - clips of the film may be posted here within a day or so.

http://www.channel4.com/news/video/index.html