That's like saying it would be irresponsible to demand that the bull leave the china shop.
http://www.madhattersimc.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=2824&mode=thread&order=0So that was, that set me thinking what the hell is going on? It's just the opposite of what you would have thought. Then we come into Baghdad. It's a long car drive. It's about twelve hours total. We come in and of course the one thing I expected to see all over Baghdad was construction. Remember, we're reconstructing Iraq. You've heard about this, right? We're reconstructing Iraq. We're spending 20 billion dollars to reconstruct Iraq so there must be a lot of reconstruction.
And amazingly, there was nothing, and I'm not kidding. In all our times going around Baghdad I saw two buildings with construction crews. If I had gone around New Delhi in the same amount of time I would have expected to see about 50, and New Delhi hasn't been bombed recently. Baghdad is a city full of bombed out buildings. Not a huge number but a substantial number of bombed out buildings and there's no construction being done.
So I am seeing this and I'm saying what in God's name is going on here? What could be happening? And this is born out by everyone, everyone I've talked to. You ask, I asked one reporter who has been there since May, is there any reconstruction in Baghdad? He said well, I saw some guys putting some paint on something a couple times. We actually saw some people painting an underpass some horrible lime green color for no reason I could imagine, but that was all the reconstruction we saw in Baghdad, a whole city of six million people.
http://www.umrc.net/downloads/Iraq_report_1.docUnemployment levels in major urban areas exceed 70% to 80%. Those employed receive salaries 20% to 30% of pre-war income levels. There is a robust underground economy, the trading and bartering of goods and services, but it is cash poor. A new social and economic elite is comprised of those engaged in selling goods and services to the Coalition, business and government operations permitted to function by the Coalition, and those few commercial and civil organisations linked to the Coalition-sponsored, Governing Council.
The Coalition is refusing many businesses and factories the permits to resume business activities. The largest group of newly employed and the widest distribution of US dollars is to the IP (the Coalition controlled, newly formed and fast swelling ranks of Iraqi Police).
The narrow and short economic supply-chain is insufficient to trickle resources or cash down and out to the majority of unemployed Iraqis.
Contrary to disparaging western press reports about local Iraqi looting and rampant civil disruptions by “loyalists and rebels”, Iraq is experiencing the brunt of pre-planned, organised crime, raping the country of its liquidable assets. For example, sponsored from adjacent countries, Iraq suffered organised and well-finance theft (demonstrated by witnessed convoys of heavy equipment and transport trucks) of thousands of kilometres of high-voltage power transmission cables – dismantled and sold for their copper and aluminium content.
In deference to overly enthusiastic and badly researched western press reports claiming wide-scale, disorganised looting and vandalism, Iraq has been systematically dismantled. A second organised program of theft extracted tens and perhaps hundreds of thousands of pre-cast, galvanised steal door and window frames, virtually destroying in the process, every undefended government, military, state enterprise and private commercial building in the country.
This program began before the launch of OIF and continued until the Coalition became organised, well after the end of the combat phase of the war. Building materials were loaded and transported on commercial trucks under the watchful eyes of the Coalition, taken to neighbouring countries and reserved for resale – pending the planned, multi-billion dollar urban renewal program. The crime was very sophisticated; using decoy tactics of setting fires, indiscriminate high profile looting designed to feed western video cameras, and inciting riots to attract security forces. Supervised theft succeeded in destroying all major buildings in Baghdad (that survived the bombing), collecting all heavy equipment, construction and building materials’ stockpiles, heating, air conditioning, plumbing and electrical equipment and all commercial and government inventories.
This theft was deterred only where Iraqis made a concerted effort to defend their personal businesses, protect public property and their homes. Iraqis complain and accuse the Coalition of intentionally facilitating the theft and looting, refusing to protect homes, businesses and government facilities.
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