| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Harry Hope" |
| Date: |
24 Oct 2003 10:47:56 AM |
| Object: |
Friday, October 24: Three U.S. soldiers killed in mortar attack, shooting |
From The Associated Press, 10/24/03:
http://www.boston.com//dailynews/297/world/Three_U_S_soldiers_killed_in_m:.shtml
Three U.S. soldiers killed in mortar attack, shooting
By Tarek Al-Issawi, Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP)
Two U.S. soldiers were killed and four were wounded Friday in a mortar
attack on their base north of Baghdad, and another American died in a
shootout in the northern city of Mosul, the U.S. military said.
Elsewhere, 13 other soldiers were injured Thursday night in a mortar
attack near Baqouba, 40 miles northeast of the capital, the command
said.
Witnesses reported that a roadside bomb wounded several other troops
Friday in Fallujah in the sixth attack by insurgents there in as many
days.
Separately, two children were killed and three adults wounded in a
grenade attack on a police station in the northern city of Mosul,
police said.
The latest U.S. deaths occurred when a mortar struck a forward
operating base near Samara, 70 miles north of Baghdad, about noon
Friday, the U.S. Central Command said.
In Mosul, a soldier from the 101st Airborne Division was killed by
small arms fire before dawn Friday in the western end of the city, the
command reported.
Names of the victims were withheld pending notification of kin.
The deaths bring to 108 the number of American soldiers killed by
hostile fire since President Bush declared an end to major combat May
1.
U.S. officials also said 13 soldiers, from the 4th Infantry Division,
were wounded Thursday night when a mortar round struck at hangar at
Camp War Horse near Baqouba, about 40 miles northeast of Baghdad.
Three were seriously wounded and evacuated but the others were treated
at the local aid station, the command said.
U.S. troops fired back and pursued the attackers, the command said,
but there was no word on any insurgent casualties.
_________________________________________________________
(Situation in Iraq) `better than you probably think,'
Georgie W. AWOL Bush
"My answer is: Bring them on."
Georgie W. AWOL Bush
"There will be no retreat."
Georgie W. AWOL Bush
"Americans are not the running kind."
Georgie W. AWOL Bush
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/campaign2000/news/One_year_gap_in_Bush_s_Guard_duty+.shtml
One-year gap in Bush's National Guard duty.
Harry
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| User: "dapra" |
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| Title: Re: Friday, October 24: Three U.S. soldiers killed in mortar attack,shooting |
24 Oct 2003 01:53:55 PM |
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Harry Hope wrote:
From The Associated Press, 10/24/03:
http://www.boston.com//dailynews/297/world/Three_U_S_soldiers_killed_in_m:.shtml
Three U.S. soldiers killed in mortar attack, shooting
Well, but they are dyeing for a good course, aren't they?
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EJ24Ak02.html
Middle East
Dying for a McDonald's in Iraq
By Herbert Docena
MADRID - In London on October 13, an investors' conference entitled
"Doing Business in Iraq: Kickstarting the Private Sector" was agog with
reports that McDonald's, among other corporations, may begin selling
burgers and fries in Iraq by next year. Attracting up to 145
multinational prospectors, the London conference was held less than a
month after the United States announced its economic masterplan for
Iraq, a blueprint which The Economist heralded as a "capitalist dream"
that fulfills the "wish list of international investors".
Whether Ronald McDonald cuts the ribbon in time and makes the dream come
true, however, will depend to a large extent on the outcome of a
US-convened donor's conference that was scheduled to open in Madrid on
Thursday.
As the US struggles against popular resistance in Baghdad, it battles
its cash-flow woes in the balmy Spanish capital. Behind closed doors at
the Campo de las Naciones, representatives of creditor countries and
multilateral financial institutions will meet for two days to determine
how and when McDonald's and other multinational corporations will
finally be able to open their doors in Iraq.
In exchange for allowing the entry of their corporations to Iraq, rich
creditor nations will be pledging hundreds of millions of dollars to
finance the occupation in order to make sure that it goes on unhampered
- long enough for the Golden Arches to rise by the Tigris and the Euphrates.
Those who will pay the price for the burgers and fries, however, will
have no seat at the table.
What's at stake?
In this donors' conference, the US will be asking the "international
community" to finance an occupation it can no longer afford on its own.
At first, the US hoped that Iraqi oil revenues and assets, as well as
its own taxpayers' money, would be enough. "We are dealing with a
country that can really finance its own reconstruction and relatively
soon," Defense Undersecretary Paul Wolfowitz confidently told the US
Congress before the war, assured that Iraq's oil would be able to rake
in as much US$50 billion to $100 billion in the next two years.
Regular sabotage of oil pipelines by the Iraqi resistance as well as the
reluctance of a cautious oil industry to start their operations has all
but shattered these initial plans by causing severe cash-flow problems
and a palpable budget crisis. Edward Chow, a former international
executive with Chevron and now an analyst with the Carnegie endowment,
predicts: "Costs will far exceed what oil revenues will reap in the
short term and the long term."
This has forced the Bush administration to reluctantly turn to US
taxpayers with an $87 billion budget request that had to surmount
unexpected resistance from the Bush-controlled Congress. When it was
finally approved, the funding came out with an embarrassing twist: that
the money to be spent will have to be exchanged with IOUs, and not just
sweet thank-yous.
Taking all the money from the pockets of the Iraqis and the American
taxpayers would have allowed the US to unilaterally determine which
corporations would get all the contracts for what. At more than $100
billion and counting, this has been deemed the largest post-war
rebuilding business opportunity since World War II. With the
disappointing oil revenues dashing expectations and with US taxpayers
reluctant to part with their money, however, the US has been forced to
give up its exclusive claim over the post-war reconstruction bonanza.
A way to get in on the ground floor
Armed with the latest 15-0 United Nations resolution legitimizing the
occupation, the US will be turning to the other rich creditor nations
and multilateral lending agencies with one enticement in exchange for
their cash: a piece of the action.
"We're telling them that this is not just about writing checks or
sending troops, but about having a stake in Iraq so their government
agencies and humanitarian groups are involved in a sector when a new
government is in power in Iraq," a high ranking US official recently
disclosed. "It's a way to get in on the ground floor. That's the selling
point."
Indeed, the well-heeled representatives with fat pockets and blank
checks who will gather at the Campo will not be pledging their money for
nothing. As a recent Financial Times editorial put it, "Washington is in
a mess in Iraq, and needs help from its friends. The friends are
prepared to assist, but they will demand a price."
The price comes in the form of a long sought-for guarantee giving the
donor countries a crack at the multi-billion dollar business
opportunities in Iraq - an access to the ground floor where the action
is. With the recent announcement of plans to sell all but a few of
Iraq's crown jewels for dirt-cheap prices, other countries can't afford
to miss the post-war garage sale. If they don't want to be locked out,
they better pay the entrance fee to be collected personally by Coalition
Provisional Authority head L Paul Bremer and US Secretary of State Colin
Powell, who are both in Madrid. Also present is US Treasury Secretary
John Snow.
Opponents of the war - in particular, France, Germany and Russia - have
made it clear they are not ready to forgive and forget and contribute so
readily to Iraqi reconstruction. Delegations from those three nations,
as well as many other countries, will be headed by lower-level
officials. Only Spain, Italy and Japan - all supporters of the US policy
on Iraq - will be represented by their foreign ministers. United Nations
Secretary-General Kofi Annan and World Bank President James Wolfensohn
will also be in Madrid.
So who pays?
The amounts to be pledged at this conference could, therefore, be seen
as an investment with expected returns. How big or small that investment
will depend on what each donor thinks the prospects for profits will be.
This in turn depends on how big a piece of the pie the US is willing to
give up. Those in Madrid will need to report back to their capitals with
an answer to the question: was the donation worth every cent?
What they won't be eager to tell the folks back home, however, is where
the money they just donated came from and to whom it is being given.
Representatives will beat their chests and package their donations as
acts of charity towards those poor and war-ravaged Iraqis.
The rhetoric about helping Iraqis rebuild their country will hopefully
drown out the fact that the people who will be paying for the occupation
will not be the same people who will be profiting from it. The money
that participants to this donor's conference will be bringing to the
table is not theirs to give away.
Hence, as the conference opens, it will be important to come up with a
simple - though perhaps not exhaustive - list of those who will pay for
the reconstruction of Iraq, as opposed to those who will gain from it.
Those who will be made to pay are often not aware what their money is
being used for and - as the opposition to the war by majorities in
almost all countries indicate - will most likely object if they only
knew. Those who will profit, however, will have the most to gain from
keeping the transactions in the dark.
Iraqis: Paying with their future
First, the Iraqis. All of the past and future revenues from the sale of
their oil as well as all of their former government's assets deposited
anywhere in the world have been turned over to the UN Security
Council-created but US-controlled Development Fund for Iraq.
What will be paid to US-chosen contractors such as Halliburton and
Bechtel - at a price set by these contractors themselves - will be paid
out of this fund. Not only that, the fund will also be used by the US
Export and Import Bank for extending credit to any US company that hopes
to start business in Iraq or that wishes to buy any of the formerly
Iraqi-owned corporations that will be sold off by the US as part of
Iraq's massive privatization scheme.
The Iraqis will, therefore, be paying American corporations for
rebuilding the bridges, the hospitals, the schools, the irrigation
systems, the power grids and almost everything else which the US - as
prodded on by these corporations - destroyed. They will also be paying
US investors to take over the corporations that the Iraqi people
previously collectively owned, but which will now be sold off without
their authorization.
Just as they had no say over the bombing of their country, however, so
will they have no say over how their money will be spent for bringing
the pieces together. When some members of the US-installed Iraqi
Governing Council (IGC) tried to make a fuss over what they think were
unreasonably priced purchases two weeks ago, for instance, they were
promptly reminded about their place in the occupation's pecking order.
"If we had voted [on the spending decisions], we would have rejected
it," one IGC member was quoted as saying. He was all too aware, of
course, that the IGC members would never have been allowed to vote
against those who put them in power.
Those who are hoping for at least a little prudence in the way that the
fund will be used can take comfort from what a lawyer for companies
hoping to strike gold in Iraq recently said. According to Washington
lawyer Robert Kyle, the fund will be "subject to a less formal approach
in their allocation than those from USAID [US Agency for International
Development] which used [US] taxpayers' money."
By "less formal", the lawyer must have meant spending $6,000 for a
mobile phone that normally costs $495 only per set, $33,000 for a pickup
truck that normally costs half that, and $55,000 for a prison bed that
usually costs only $14,000 - as current details provided in Bush's
budget request for Iraq shows when compared with actual market prices of
these items.
And it's not just their present income with which the Iraqis are paying
the Americans to occupy and reconstruct their country. Even their future
is being mortgaged. Just last week, the US Senate voted to convert the
$10 billion that will be used on Iraq from grants to loans. Should the
World Bank and the International Monetary Fund decide to lend money to
Iraq, they will also come with strings attached in the form of the
economic conditionalities to be imposed by these banks.
In other words, the Iraqis will be forced to borrow money from the US
and international banks without their consent - and at interest rates
and with conditions that they did not agree with - in order to spend on
things over which they have no say whatsoever.
It's a small price to pay for being liberated.
The taxpayers: Paying with their work
But since the Iraqis' oil and assets are currently insufficient, the US
Congress has also just reluctantly passed Bush's request for $87
billion, around 78 percent of which will be spent for military costs
alone. Senator Tom Daschle came out of the session stressing that US
taxpayers could not "go on shouldering this burden virtually alone".
Meanwhile, each American will now be giving away $300 for the continued
control of Iraq. According to independent estimates, this total amount
is more than enough to wipe all of the budget deficits now plaguing a
number of state governments; enough to pay for all of the country's
unemployment benefits for two years; seven times what the US federal
government spends for low-income schools and 10 times the total spent
for environmental protection.
The donors' conference, however, is really an attempt to shift the
burden from American taxpayers to say, Japanese, British, Spanish,
French, German, Canadian, Kuwaiti and other rich nations' taxpayers.
Japan is said to be donating up to $5 billion to the pot, Britain $835
million, Spain $300 million, the European Union $230 million and Canada
about $200 million.
These amounts will not come out of nowhere. Giving these millions to the
occupation means squeezing off some health care expenditures there,
bumping off some educational items here, maybe cutting away some housing
funds there, eliminating some unemployment benefits a little here, etc.
Every cent spent for corporations to do business in Iraq is a cent not
spent somewhere else. It's a small price to pay for being protected from
terrorists and their weapons of mass destruction.
Soldiers and civilians: Paying with their lives
But while the American and the rich countries' taxpayers are
contributing cash, others are paying with their lives. According to
various estimates, as many as 10,000 up to 30,000 Iraqi civilians have
died; more than 100 American soldiers and scores of allied troops have
been killed during the war and pacification.
With no less than the chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff admitting
that the US military is now overstretched, the US has been pleading with
other countries to pledge non-monetary contributions to Iraq in the form
of warm bodies that will attempt to stabilize the occupied country and
make it safe for corporations like McDonald's. Once in Iraq, these
soldiers and neo-Gurkhas will be moving targets for Iraqis who - for
some incomprehensible reason - are mad enough to resent being colonized
and mad enough to fight back.
Interestingly, with a few notable exceptions, most of those who are
being asked to pack their bags and go to Iraq are those who'd give
anything and go anywhere for a job. Over the past few weeks, the US has
been courting mostly countries from the south, such as India, Pakistan,
Bangladesh, Fiji, the Philippines, Thailand, El Salvador, Honduras,
Nicaragua, etc to deploy more troops to Iraq so that their weary
soldiers can go home and fight another day - in a different part of the
world.
These soldiers are happy to go to Iraq because the per diem there would
be so much more than what they'd get staying at home. Domestically, one
of the strongest arguments for fielding them in Iraq is the promise of
dollar-denominated remittances to be sent home. These gun-strapped and
cash-strapped governments are happy to send their boys away in exchange
for more military aid from and stronger military ties with the US.
Senator Edward Kennedy has asserted that the US has been bribing foreign
governments to induce them to go against domestic popular opinion
against the war. He says that up to half of the $4 billion that the US
spends monthly on Iraq could not be accounted for by the Congressional
Budget Office.
In this occupation, what the US is asking for from different countries
interestingly reflects international realities as well: capital from the
north, cheap labor from the south. The ultimate price per hour is
apparently cheaper in developing countries than in the developed ones.
Who profits?
Smiling McDonald's attendants may start ushering in customers to their
branch in Iraq next year - but only after Bechtel had switched back the
lights, Halliburton had rebuilt the bridges, Flour had paved the roads,
MCI had set up the mobile network system, Research Triangle Institute
had trained the managers and bureaucrats, Abt Associates had restored
the hospitals, the military-industrial complex and the private armies
had restored security, and the multinational force had pacified the
resistance.
The Iraqis and the taxpayers who are bankrolling the occupation better
not know to whom they're being made to give their checks. Bechtel sold
chemical weapons to Saddam Hussein back in the 1980s and had been
accused of gross overpricing in Massachusetts and Bolivia. MCI was
involved in history's biggest accounting scandal and has totally no
experience building cell networks. Halliburton had been accused of
inflating costs and had even settled a number of fraud charges. Dyncorp
had been accused of covering up sex trafficking. Flour faces a
multibillion dollar lawsuit for exploiting black workers and making
security guards wear Ku Klux Klan robes to attack their workers.
The business records of the recipients are less than flattering.
According to well-documented reports summarizing the histories of those
that had been awarded contracts, they are variously riddled with "cost
overruns, accounting irregularities, financial dereliction, fraud,
bankruptcy, overcharging, price gouging, profiteering, wage-cheating,
deception, corruption, health and safety violations, worker and
community exploitation, human and labor rights abuses, union-busting,
strike-breaking, environmental contamination, ecological
irresponsibility, malpractice, criminal prosecutions, civil law suits,
privatization of public resources, collusion with dictators, trading
with regimes in violation of international sanctions, drug-running,
prostitution, excessive executive compensation, and breach of fiduciary
duty to shareholders and the public".
Lest those donor countries angling for deals on behalf of their own
corporations be misled: This is not the list of requirements for
interested contractors and subcontractors hoping to do business in Iraq.
To be discussed in Madrid is the direction that the occupation takes. At
stake is the future of the "capitalist dream" of multinational
corporations like McDonald's in Iraq. If the money's not enough, the
occupation forces might simply pack up in a few months. If the lending
nations cough up enough cash, they could only have ensured that they'd
get a bang for their buck.
If this happens, then those financing the continued occupation - the
Iraqis, the taxpayers, the soldiers, and the civilians - must at least
be treated to a complimentary combo meal of Big Mac, cola and fries when
the Baghdad franchise opens. They must be dying for a taste of freedom.
(Copyright Herbert Docena)
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