Court Rules KBR And Halliburton Can Be Sued For Iraq Toxic Burn Pits

KBR and Halliburton Can Be Sued For Iraq Toxic Burn Pits, Court Rules (Global Research, April 17, 2014):

KBR and Halliburton – two major U.S. military contractors – can be sued for the health impacts of trash incineration on U.S. soldiers who served in the war in Iraq, according to a new court decision that allows a series of 57 lawsuits against the companies to go forward.

The two companies have been paid some $40 billion for services provided to troops serving in the U.S. War on Terror throughout Central Asia and the Middle East in countries ranging from Afghanistan and Iraq to Kuwait and Uzbekistan. (Most of the contracts were implemented by KBR which was a subsidiary of Halliburton until 2007 when it was spun off into a separate company)

Read moreCourt Rules KBR And Halliburton Can Be Sued For Iraq Toxic Burn Pits

Pentagon Contractor KBR On Shortlist To Run UK POLICE SERVICES

US firm KBR, which helped build detention camp, among consortiums bidding to run police services in West Midlands and Surrey


US Pentagon contractor Kellogg Brown & Root, which helped build the Guantánamo camp, is bidding for a £1.5bn privatisation contract to run policing services in Surrey and the West Midlands. Photograph: John Moore/Getty Images

Guantánamo Bay contractor on shortlist to run UK police services (Guardian, May 3, 2012):

A US Pentagon contractor that was involved in building Guantánamo Bay is on a shortlist of private consortiums bidding for a £1.5bn contract to run key policing services in the West Midlands and Surrey.

The Texas-based Kellogg Brown & Root, which was sold off by the controversial Halliburton corporation in 2007, is part of a consortium which has made it to the final shortlist for a contract that will see large-scale involvement of the private sector in British policing for the first time.

When KBR was still part of Halliburton it won a large share of Pentagon contracts to build and manage US military bases in Iraq after the 2003 invasion. Its former chief executive, Dick Cheney, was US vice-president.

Read morePentagon Contractor KBR On Shortlist To Run UK POLICE SERVICES

FEMA Camps On 72 Hour Notice AND Military Authorized To Arrest = VERIFIED (Video)

Dutchsinse just woke up.

Never heard of NSPD 51 ?

I just saw this video today and the NDAA has already passed Congress and will be signed into law by President Obama, who never really intended to veto this bill, because he himself demanded U.S. Citizens be part of the ‘indefinite detention’ bill according to Senator Levin.

See also:

‘Indefinite Detention’ For American Citizens: Congress Passes $662 Billion National Defense Authorization Act – White House Drops Veto Treat



YouTube Added: 09.12.2011

Description:

For the record, I said months ago that I did NOT believe that there was a REAL plan to round up American/US citizens and put us into “FEMA camps”… being that I am from the “show me state” of missouri.. I felt this claim required more proof that what was offered months/years ago.

Now, the tables have turned, and I surely / sorely stand corrected.

The US congress has approved a bill which AUTHORIZES THE MILITARY to be able to arrest US citizens on US SOIL !!! Not only can they arrest us without cause, they can hold you indefinitely — with no lawyer and no one knowing your location !! ( they can do this now through this “law” that was passed…by labeling you beligerent towards the government thus being a terrorist sympathizer — therefore allowing the military to take you to a secret prison without a trial)

Also this very same short period of days, this week, KBR (security corporation which handles FEMA emergency camps) put out a call to staff these FEMA camps.. and to be ready on a 72 hour notice.

Take these two events together.. same week… FEMA camps being alerted to staff on a short notice, and the US military authorized to arrest people at the drop of a hat.

Who voted yes and who voted no:

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/vote.xpd?vote=s2011-218

Here is the s. 1867 military authorization bill:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:S.1867:

here is the link to KBR security corporation needing to staff FEMA camps with a 72 hour notice:

http://static.infowars.com/2011/12/i/general/kbr-doc.pdf

Read moreFEMA Camps On 72 Hour Notice AND Military Authorized To Arrest = VERIFIED (Video)

Fallujah Veteran: ‘I Served The 1%’

See also:

US Torture Hearings: Sergeant Chuck Luther Tells Congress How Army Tortured Him (Video)

US Soldiers Tell The Truth: Confess to Institutionally-Sanctioned War Crimes!

American Soldiers Are WAKING UP!!!

US Soldier: The Enemy Is At Home


Fallujah Veteran: ‘I Served The 1%’ (Information Clearinghouse, Nov. 08, 2011):

Thoughts on the role of veterans in the Occupy movement

I did not serve my country in Iraq; I served the 1%. It was on their behalf that I helped lay siege to Fallujah, helped kill thousands of civilians, helped displace hundreds of thousands of innocent people, and helped destroy an entire city. My “service” served Exxon-Mobil, Halliburton, KBR, Blackwater, and other multinational corporations in Iraq.

My family in Massachusetts is not safer because of my service, and Iraqis are not freer. I helped oppress Iraqis in a manner far more brutal than what has been experienced by the Occupy movement at the hands of the New York and Oakland police departments.

I was an occupier and am now an #occupier. I once served the 1%, but now try to serve the 99%. That is why I must speak up when I see the Occupy movement being led astray by the same nationalism and “Ameri-centrism,” the same thoughtless praises for U.S. troops and veterans, and the same hypocrisy that led us into the so-called “War On Terror” and the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Many of us have joined the Occupy movement, because we identify as members of the 99%, but the media only began to highlight our participation after Cpl. Scott Olsen was shot in the head by the Oakland police with a projectile on Oct. 25. Olsen was immediately rushed to the emergency room, and his name soon became a rallying cry. A nationwide call was put out for vigils in solidarity with Olsen.

Going to war is not “serving our country”

The Occupy movement was quick to highlight Olsen’s “service” and his two deployments to Iraq. The New York Times noted that “his injury—and the oddity of a Marine who faced enemy fire only to be attacked at home—has prompted an outpouring of sympathy, as well as calls for solidarity.”

Although Olsen appears to oppose the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—he is a member of Iraq Veterans Against the War and Veterans For Peace,—the Occupy movement’s response to his attack has revealed ambivalence on these issues.

The Occupy movement has glossed over the irony that Olsen was put in the hospital by some of the same tactics that his Marine Corps has used against Iraqis. It has not drawn a connection between what happened to Olsen and what happened to Iraqis who peacefully protested against the U.S. occupation of their country—like in Fallujah on April 28, 2003, when the U.S. fired into a crowd of protesters and killed 13 civilians. Countless other identical incidents have taken place, even today as Iraqis also protest unemployment, corruption and lack of services.

When the Occupy movement mentions Olsen’s “service” without clarifying who he served, they hide the lies of the 1% and ignore the more than 1 million dead Iraqis, the millions of refugees and orphans, and the dramatic rise in cancers and birth defects in Iraq.

We must stand for the most affected victims of Wall Street

I watched a Youtube video the other day of U.S. Marine Corps Sgt. Shamar Thomas shouting at the NYPD: “If you want to go kill or hurt people, go to Iraq. Why are you hurting U.S. citizens?” as a crowd of Occupy Wall Street protesters cheered him on.

Over 2.5 million people have watched this video, and Thomas appeared on Rosie O’Donnell’s television show and made several appearances on Keith Olbermann. Everyone championed his “service” and decried police brutality against U.S. citizens. Nobody questioned the dismissal of the value of Iraqi lives.

We should all decry police brutality wherever it rears its ugly head. Yet police brutality and the murder of innocent civilians in foreign countries in service of the 1% are both moral issues, and to decry one without decrying the other suggests a serious disconnect.

These attitudes in our movement are deeply troubling to me. We decry economic injustice at home, but stay silent about the unjust occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. We decry police brutality at home, while the U.S. war machine brutalizes innocent people abroad. We need to understand that Iraqis, Afghans, Palestinians, Libyans and everyone else who has fallen victim to the 1% and its war machine are part of the 99%, too.

We can love our country, but we should not value American lives more than any other. We can set up a Scott Olsen Support Fund, but we should not ignore the rise in cancers and birth defects that U.S. weapons have caused in Iraq.

Veterans have an important role to play in this movement, but we are not heroes because of our participation in the wars, and it is shameful for anyone to use us to appeal to patriotism; that only serves the 1%. What we have to offer this movement is a first-hand account of what the 1%  has done all over the world at the expense of the 99%. We as veterans are in a better position than anyone else to fight against the dangerous beliefs that put veterans on a pedestal. It is our responsibility to speak out against injustice, no matter where it occurs in this world.

The author is a Marine Corps veteran of the second siege of Fallujah and a member of March Forward!. He is the founder of the ‘Justice for Fallujah Project’ which will host various events during the second annual ‘Remember Fallujah Week,’ Nov. 16-19. Click here for more information.

This item was first published at www.answercoalition.org

KBR Selected For No-Bid Military Contract As US Alleges Kickbacks

kbr-selected-for-no-bid-military-contract-as-us-alleges-kickbacks

May 6 (Bloomberg) — KBR Inc. was selected for a no-bid contract worth as much as $568 million through 2011 for military support services in Iraq, the Army said.

The Army announced its decision yesterday only hours after the Justice Department said it will pursue a lawsuit accusing the Houston-based company of taking kickbacks from two subcontractors on Iraq-related work. The Army also awarded the work to KBR over objections from members of Congress, who have pushed the Pentagon to seek bids for further logistics contracts.

The Justice Department said the government will join a suit filed by whistleblowers alleging that two freight-forwarding firms gave KBR transportation department employees kickbacks in the form of meals, drinks, sports tickets and golf outings.

“Defense contractors cannot take advantage of the ongoing war effort by accepting unlawful kickbacks,” Assistant Attorney General Tony West said in a statement.

KBR, the Army’s largest contractor in Iraq, will review the litigation when it is received and “will continue to cooperate with the government,” company spokeswoman Heather Browne said in an e-mail. “Gifts of dinners, baseball tickets and similar items would violate KBR policies and KBR was not aware of these violations.”

Read moreKBR Selected For No-Bid Military Contract As US Alleges Kickbacks

US Government Preparing For Civil Unrest In America

Legislation to Establish Internment Camps on US Military Bases

fema-camps
FEMA Camps Courtesy of Google Earth (Click on image to enlarge.)

The Economic and Social Crisis

The financial meltdown has unleashed a latent and emergent social crisis across the United States.

What is at stake is the fraudulent confiscation of lifelong savings and pension funds, the appropriation of tax revenues to finance the trillion dollar “bank bailouts”, which ultimately serve to line the pockets of the richest people in America.

This economic crisis is in large part the result of financial manipulation and outright fraud to the detriment of entire populations, leading to a renewed wave of corporate bankruptcies, mass unemployment and poverty.

The criminalization of the global financial system, characterized by a “Shadow Banking” network has resulted in the centralization of bank power and an unprecedented concentration of private wealth.

Obama’s “economic stimulus” package and budget proposals contribute to a further process of concentration and centralization of bank power, the cumulative effects of which will eventually resul in large scale corporate, bankruptcies, a new wave of foreclosures not to mention fiscal collapse and the downfall of State social programs. (For further details see Michel Chossudovsky, America’s Fiscal Collapse, Global Research, March 2, 2009).

The cumulative decline of real economic activity backlashes on employment and wages, which in turn leads to a collapse in purchaisng power. The proposed “solution” under the Obama administration contributes to exacerbating rather than alleviating social inequalities and the process of wealth concentration.

The Protest Movement

When people across America, whose lives have been shattered and destroyed, come to realize the true face of the global “free market” system, the legitimacy of  Wall Street, the Federal Reserve and the US administration will be challenged.

A latent protest movement directed against the seat of economic and political power is unfolding.

How this process will occur is hard to predict. All sectors of American society are potentially affected: wage earners, small, medium and even large businesses, farmers, professionals, federal, State and municipal employees, students, teachers, health workers, and unemployed. Protests will initially emerge from these various sectors. There is, however, at this stage, no organized national resistance movement directed against the administration’s economic and financial agenda.

Obama’s populist rhetoric conceals the true nature of macro-economic policy. Acting on behalf of Wall Street, the administration’s economic package, which includes close to a trillion dollar “aid” package for the financial services industry, coupled with massive austerity measures,  contributes to precipitating America into a bottomless crisis.

“Orwellian Solution” to the Great Depression: Curbing Civil Unrest

At this particular juncture, there is no economic recovery program in sight. The Washington-Wall Street consensus prevails. There are no policies, no alternatives formulated from within the political and economic system. .

What is the way out? How will the US government face an impending social catastrophe?

The solution is to curb social unrest. The chosen avenue, inherited from the outgoing Bush administration is the reinforcement of  the Homeland Security apparatus and the militarization of civilian State institutions.

The outgoing administration has laid the groundwork. Various pieces of “anti-terrorist” legislation (including the Patriot Acts) and presidential directives have been put in place since 2001, largely using the pretext of the “Global War on Terrorism.”

Homeland Security’s Internment Camps

Directly related to the issue of curbing social unrest, cohesive system of detention camps is also envisaged, under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon.

A bill entitled the National Emergency Centers Establishment Act (HR 645) was introduced in the US Congress in January. It calls for the establishment of six national emergency centers in major regions in the US to be located on existing military installations. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h111-645

The stated purpose of  the “national emergency centers” is to provide “temporary housing, medical, and humanitarian assistance to individuals and families dislocated due to an emergency or major disaster.” In actuality, what we are dealing with are FEMA internment camps. HR 645 states that the camps can be used to “meet other appropriate needs, as determined by the Secretary of Homeland Security.”

There has been virtually no press coverage of HR 645.

These “civilian facilities” on US military bases are to be established in cooperation with the US Military. Modeled on Guantanamo, what we are dealing with is the militarization of FEMA internment facilities.

Once a person is arrested and interned in a FEMA camp located on a military base, that person would in all likelihood, under a national emergency, fall under the de facto jurisdiction of the Military: civilian justice and law enforcement including habeas corpus would no longer apply.

HR 645 bears a direct relationship to the economic crisis and the likelihood of mass protests across America. It constitutes a further move to militarize civilian law enforcement, repealing the Posse Comitatus Act.

In the words of  Rep. Ron Paul:

“…the fusion centers, militarized police, surveillance cameras and a domestic military command is not enough… Even though we know that detention facilities are already in place, they now want to legalize the construction of FEMA camps on military installations using the ever popular excuse that the facilities are for the purposes of a national emergency. With the phony debt-based economy getting worse and worse by the day, the possibility of civil unrest is becoming a greater threat to the establishment. One need only look at Iceland, Greece and other nations for what might happen in the United States next.” (Daily Paul, September 2008, emphasis added)

The proposed internment camps should be seen in relation to the broader process of militarization of civilian institutions. The construction of internment camps predates the introduction of HR 645 (Establishment of Emergency Centers) in January 2009. There are, according to various (unconfirmed) reports, some 800 FEMA prison camps in different regions of the U.S. Moreover, since the 1980s, the US military has developed “tactics, techniques and procedures” to suppress civilian dissent, to be used in the eventuality of mass protests (United States Army Field Manual 19-15 under Operation Garden Plot, entitled “Civil Disturbances” was issued in 1985)

Read moreUS Government Preparing For Civil Unrest In America

What You Didn’t Know About The War


Added: 22. Oktober 2009

Related information:

Fall Of The Republic – The Presidency Of Barack H. Obama (The Full Movie HQ)

Ron Paul: ‘The more troops we send the worse things get!’

Ron Paul On The US Afghanistan War Policy

Italians bribed the Taleban all over Afghanistan, say two senior Afghan officials

Pentagon spends $400 per gallon of gas in Afghanistan

President Obama quietly deploying 13,000 more US troops to Afghanistan

Scott Ritter: Why are we still in Iraq?

Congressman Alan Grayson on Afghanistan

Read moreWhat You Didn’t Know About The War

KBR: Corporate supremacy above gang raped human being

‘Corporatocracy’ rules America or better the elite that controls those corporations rules America. That is (economic) fascism. And this is not about Republicans vs. Democrats, because they are just two wings of the same bird, puppets controlled by the elite. There is no ‘change’ or ‘hope’ in sight with the Obama administration.

Related articles:
KBR wins Pentagon contract despite criminal probe of deaths
Halliburton accused of supplying rotten food to U.S. forces
KBR, Partner in Iraq Contract Sued in Human Trafficking Case
US Troops in Iraq talk about Halliburton & KBR (Flashback)
Whistleblower says Pentagon putting KBR over soldiers
Army Overseer Tells of Ouster Over KBR Stir
BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions
Rehired KBR driver in Iraq caught with child porn — again
Former workers accuse employees of improper activity, including the stealing of weapons, artwork and gold
DynCorp Manager Used Armored Car To Transport Hookers in Iraq
KBR Named In Report On Soldier Illnesses
Top Iraq contractor skirts US taxes offshore
10-Year U.S. Strategic Plan For Detention Camps Revives Proposals From Oliver North

Jamie Leigh Jones (born 1984)[1] is a former KBR employee who claims that seven KBR employees drugged and gang-raped her on July 28, 2005 at Camp Hope, Baghdad, Iraq.[2][3][4] She has filed a lawsuit against the company and the employees.

She is the founder of the Jamie Leigh Foundation, an advocacy agency for victims of sexual assault.

Jones began working for KBR as an administrative assistant in 2004 when she was 19, and started her contract of employment with Overseas Administrative Services, Ltd. in Houston, Texas on July 21, 2005.

Incident

According to Jones, on July 28, 2005, several of her fellow KBR employees offered her a drink containing a date rape drug, of which she took two sips. The men then allegedly engaged in unprotected anal and vaginal gang-rape upon her while she was unconscious. She was able to name one of her attackers based on his confession to her, but was unable to identify the others due to her unconsciousness. Further, the lawsuit filed by Jones’ attorneys cites the following: “When she awoke the next morning still affected by the drug, she found her body naked and severely bruised, with lacerations to her vagina and anus, blood running down her leg, her breast implants ruptured, and her pectoral muscles torn – which would later require reconstructive surgery. Upon walking to the rest room, she passed out again.”[5] Jones’ account was confirmed by U.S. Army physician Jodi Schultz.[6] Schultz gave the rape kit she used to gather evidence from Jones to KBR/Halliburton security forces, after which the rape kit disappeared. It was recovered two years later, but missing crucial photographs and notes. [7]

Jones was confined by armed guards to a shipping container containing only a bed, under the orders of her employer, KBR. She says she was denied food, water, and medical treatment. After approximately one day, says Jones, a sympathetic guard gave her a cell phone and she called her father, Tom, who in turn contacted Representative Ted Poe (RTX) who contacted the State Department. Agents were dispatched from the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and removed Jones from KBR custody.[citation needed]

In May 2007, a State Department diplomat recovered the rape kit from Halliburton and KBR. However, notes and photographs taken by Schultz (of Jones the morning following her rape) were missing, undermining any chances of bringing the case through the criminal courts.[8]

Source: Wikipedia


post-human

We are fast approaching the time of the next great battle over evolution. The Neo-creationists will be corporations, and they will argue that they could not possibly be descended from human beings.

This isn’t science fiction. Just the other day 30 Republicans voted in the U.S. Senate to deny justice to a human victim of rape in order to protect the so-called sovereign rights of corporations.

I’m not much for slippery slope arguments, but when we’re buried in mud at the bottom of a slope, it might be prudent to see what we slipped on. In this case, as Thom Hartmann and others have pointed out, it was a court reporter’s memo attached to an obscure 1886 Supreme Court case. The memo summarized the court’s alleged opinion that the 14th Amendment applied to corporations. Corporations were people, too.

The rape case of Jamie Leigh Jones was just a logical step forward in the long-standing Republican effort to lock Americans out of the nation’s courthouses, an effort undertaken on behalf of corporate supremacy.  A woman is gang-raped by her fellow employees at government contractor KBR. The company says her contract prohibits her from seeking justice in court.

Thirty Republican U.S. senators voted to safeguard corporations from lawsuits in rape cases. You read that right the first time. The amendment they voted against, by Sen. Al Franken, D-Minnesota, would withhold government contracts from corporations that block employees from going to court when raped or sexually assaulted on the job.

The case – and the vote – stirred a little outrage, but not enough.

Read moreKBR: Corporate supremacy above gang raped human being

KBR wins Pentagon contract despite criminal probe of deaths


In this July 11, 2008 file photo, Larraine McGee of Huntsville, Texas, with a photo of her son, Staff Sgt. Christopher Everett in the foreground, listens as she prepares to testify on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

WASHINGTON – Defense contractor KBR Inc. has been awarded a $35 million Pentagon contract involving major electrical work, even as it is under criminal investigation in the electrocution deaths of at least two U.S. soldiers in Iraq.

The announcement of the new KBR contract came just months after the Pentagon, in strongly worded correspondence obtained by The Associated Press, rejected the company’s explanation of serious mistakes in Iraq and its proposed improvements. A senior Pentagon official, David J. Graff, cited the company’s “continuing quality deficiencies” and said KBR executives were “not sufficiently in touch with the urgency or realities of what was actually occurring on the ground.”

“Many within DOD (the Department of Defense) have lost or are losing all remaining confidence in KBR’s ability to successfully and repeatedly perform the required electrical support services mission in Iraq,”
wrote Graff, commander of the Defense Contract Management Agency, in a Sept. 30 letter.

Read moreKBR wins Pentagon contract despite criminal probe of deaths

Halliburton accused of supplying rotten food to U.S. forces

Dick Cheney was CEO of Halliburton. KBR is not paying taxes in the US (Top Iraq contractor skirts US taxes offshore).

Related articles and videos:
US Troops in Iraq talk about Halliburton & KBR
Whistleblower says Pentagon putting KBR over soldiers
Army Overseer Tells of Ouster Over KBR Stir
BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions
Exposing Pentagon and CIA Corruption
KBR Named In Report On Soldier Illnesses
If you do your research on KBR and Halliburton you will find a lot more evidence.

My conclusion is that the government and the corporations are considering US soldiers as cannon fodder.
___________________________________________________________________________

U.S military contractor KBR, a former subisidary of Halliburton, is facing a number of lawsuits over its activities in Iraq, and elsewhere.

KBR is the largest contractor for the United States Army and a top-ten contractor for the U.S. Department of Defense.

In one class-action suit Joshua Eller, a civilian who worked for the U.S. Air Force in 2006 at the Balad air force base northeast of Baghdad, alleges KBR ‘knowingly and intentionally supplied to U.S. forces and other individuals food that was expired, spoiled, rotten, or that may have been contaminated with shrapnel, or other materials’.

KBR ‘supplied water which was contaminated, untreated, and unsafe’, Eller charged, detailing a number of examples.

He said Halliburton and KBR ‘shipped ice served to U.S. forces in trucks that had been used to carry human remains and that still had traces of body fluids and putrefied remains.’

The lawsuit says the ‘defendants burned medical waste that contained human body parts on the open air burn pit. Wild dogs in the area raided the burn pit and carried off human remains. The wild dogs could be seen roaming the base with body parts in their mouths.’

Read moreHalliburton accused of supplying rotten food to U.S. forces

US Troops in Iraq talk about Halliburton & KBR (Flashback)

Interviews with US troops and Halliburton employees explain what is happening in Iraq.

Related articles:
Whistleblower says Pentagon putting KBR over soldiers
Army Overseer Tells of Ouster Over KBR Stir
BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions
Exposing Pentagon and CIA Corruption


Added: May 25, 2007
Source: YouTube

Whistleblower says Pentagon putting KBR over soldiers

‘Irregular’ oversight of KBR work alleged

Ex-Army official faults Pentagon on contract in Iraq and Afghanistan

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon’s oversight of Houston-based KBR’s work in Iraq and Afghanistan has been “irregular and highly out of the ordinary,” a former Army contracting official told Senate Democrats Wednesday.

Charles Smith, the former chief of the Army Field Support Command with responsibility for overseeing KBR’s massive contract with the Army, contends he was forced out of his job in 2004 for objecting to the Pentagon’s treatment of KBR.

“The interest of a corporation, KBR, not the interests of American soldiers or American taxpayers, seemed to be paramount,” Smith told the Democratic Policy Committee, a Democrats-only panel.

Read moreWhistleblower says Pentagon putting KBR over soldiers

Army Overseer Tells of Ouster Over KBR Stir


Shawn Baldwin/Reflex News, for The New York Times

An employee of KBR serving dinner to an American soldier at a base in Baghdad. In 2004, a civilian official questioned KBR’s request for about $200 million in payments for food services.

WASHINGTON – The Army official who managed the Pentagon’s largest contract in Iraq says he was ousted from his job when he refused to approve paying more than $1 billion in questionable charges to KBR, the Houston-based company that has provided food, housing and other services to American troops.

The official, Charles M. Smith, was the senior civilian overseeing the multibillion-dollar contract with KBR during the first two years of the war. Speaking out for the first time, Mr. Smith said that he was forced from his job in 2004 after informing KBR officials that the Army would impose escalating financial penalties if they failed to improve their chaotic Iraqi operations.

Army auditors had determined that KBR lacked credible data or records for more than $1 billion in spending, so Mr. Smith refused to sign off on the payments to the company. “They had a gigantic amount of costs they couldn’t justify,” he said in an interview. “Ultimately, the money that was going to KBR was money being taken away from the troops, and I wasn’t going to do that.”

Read moreArmy Overseer Tells of Ouster Over KBR Stir

BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions

Henry Waxman
Waxman: “It may well turn out to be the largest war profiteering in history.”

A BBC investigation estimates that around $23bn (£11.75bn) may have been lost, stolen or just not properly accounted for in Iraq.

For the first time, the extent to which some private contractors have profited from the conflict and rebuilding has been researched by the BBC’s Panorama using US and Iraqi government sources.

A US gagging order is preventing discussion of the allegations.

The order applies to 70 court cases against some of the top US companies.

War profiteering

While George Bush remains in the White House, it is unlikely the gagging orders will be lifted.

To date, no major US contractor faces trial for fraud or mismanagement in Iraq.

The president’s Democrat opponents are keeping up the pressure over war profiteering in Iraq.

Henry Waxman who chairs the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said: “The money that’s gone into waste, fraud and abuse under these contracts is just so outrageous, its egregious.

“It may well turn out to be the largest war profiteering in history.”

In the run-up to the invasion one of the most senior officials in charge of procurement in the Pentagon objected to a contract potentially worth seven billion that was given to Halliburton, a Texan company, which used to be run by Dick Cheney before he became vice-president.

Unusually only Halliburton got to bid – and won.

Missing billions

The search for the missing billions also led the programme to a house in Acton in West London where Hazem Shalaan lived until he was appointed to the new Iraqi government as minister of defence in 2004.

Judge Radhi Hamza al-Radhi
Judge Radhi al Radhi: “I believe these people are criminals.”

He and his associates siphoned an estimated $1.2 billion out of the ministry.

They bought old military equipment from Poland but claimed for top class weapons.

Meanwhile they diverted money into their own accounts.

Judge Radhi al-Radhi of Iraq’s Commission for Public Integrity investigated.

He said: “I believe these people are criminals.

“They failed to rebuild the Ministry of Defence , and as a result the violence and the bloodshed went on and on – the murder of Iraqis and foreigners continues and they bear responsibility.”

Mr Shalaan was sentenced to two jail terms but he fled the country.

He said he was innocent and that it was all a plot against him by pro-Iranian MPs in the government.

There is an Interpol arrest out for him but he is on the run – using a private jet to move around the globe.

He stills owns commercial properties in the Marble Arch area of London.

Read moreBBC uncovers lost Iraq billions

Rehired KBR driver in Iraq caught with child porn — again

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – A former bus driver for Iraq war contractor KBR Inc. who was fired in 2006 for possessing child pornography got rehired less than a year later, and has again been caught with a large collection of child porn, according to prosecutors.

Ira L. Waltrip of Lampasas, Texas, who had been working for KBR at Camp Liberty in Baghdad, was charged this week in U.S. District Court with possessing child pornography.

According to a court affidavit, KBR fired Waaltrip in January 2006 when he was assigned to the Al Asad Air Base in Iraq after he was discovered with a collection of child pornography.

At the time, authorities with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service elected not to prosecute Waltrip because they said they lacked sufficient evidence that the pornography in question actually depicted minors.

KBR rehired Waltrip in December 2006 as a bus driver. Again, Waltrip was caught with an extensive library of child pornography, some of which appeared to depict children as young as four to six years old.

Read moreRehired KBR driver in Iraq caught with child porn — again

Former workers accuse employees of improper activity, including the stealing of weapons, artwork and gold

WASHINGTON — KBR employees working in Iraq stole weapons, artwork and even gold to make spurs for cowboy boots, two former company workers told Senate Democrats on Monday.

Appearing before a Democrats-only panel looking into allegations of contracting abuses in Iraq, the witnesses accused their former co-workers of widespread improper activity.


Linda Warren, former employee of KBR, shows the flag she brought back from Iraq during testimony on Capitol Hill on Monday. Warren said many of her colleagues stole numerous items while doing reconstruction work in Iraq.
SUSAN WALSH
: ASSOCIATED PRESS

Read moreFormer workers accuse employees of improper activity, including the stealing of weapons, artwork and gold

DynCorp Manager Used Armored Car To Transport Hookers in Iraq

Some explosive testimony this afternoon from a panel of whistleblowers testifying before the Senate’s Democratic Policy Committee on contractor abuse in Iraq.

A contractor died when a DynCorp manager used an employee’s armored car to transport prostitutes, according to Barry Halley, a Worldwide Network Services employee working under a DynCorp subcontract.

“DynCorp’s site manager was involved in bringing prostitutes into hotels operated by DynCorp. A co-worker unrelated to the ring was killed when he was travelling in an unsecure car and shot performing a high-risk mission. I believe that my co-worker could have survived if he had been riding in an armored car. At the time, the armored car that he would otherwise have been riding in was being used by the contractor’s manager to transport prostitutes from Kuwait to Baghdad.

Other revelations:

– Kellogg Brown & Root contractors used to destroy countless quantities of still-usable equipment that was difficult to transport in “massive burn pits” that were “burning 24 hours a day.”

– KBR’s ice foreman “was cheating the troops out of ice at the same time that he was trading the ice for DVDs, CDs, food and other items at the Iraqi shops across the street.”

– When KBR whistleblower Frank Cassaday reported weapons looting, he was placed in a jail tent by KBR security.

– KBR employees looted Iraqi palaces for treasure to sell on eBay.

Monday, April 28th, 2008 at 5:04 pm

Source: Muckraked

Senator Byron Dorgan – Out of Control Fraud


Read about this here: US gave $300m arms contract to 22-year-old with criminal record

The Bush Family Business

For four generations now, the Bush family has been involved in supporting the country’s enemies (most notably the Nazi Party in Germany) and robbing the country blind.

The family was directly involved and profited from the Savings and Loan scandal of the 1980s and has participated in security fraud as well.

With this understanding as a background, the Iraq War can be viewed as their “masterpiece.”

The Bush family and its associates have stolen countless billions of dollars in the course of the war. In fact, one of their motivations for pushing the war in the first place was the opportunity for theft.

Chances are the destruction of World Trade Tower Seven, the home of crucial and now lost forever SEC and other federal law enforcement evidence and case files was carried out to cover their tracks.

Source: brasschecktv

(If you have watched this video and then you have also seen what Halliburton does.
Halliburton does not even pay taxes:
Top Iraq contractor skirts US taxes offshore

And then take a look what happens at the stock market with Halliburton:
Halliburton stocks have risen about 50% since the end of January this year, in almost no time.

If you have this stock and are happy about the gain then realize that you are paying money to a corporation to cheat the American People and steal from all taxpayers.

JP Morgan, RBC Capital Markets, Merrill Lynch etc., they all say that Halliburton will outperform and yes it does, but it is you who pay for it.

Do not support Halliburton and alike companies take them down.
Sell these stocks and investment funds that support them.

Take your power back, that you have given to them, NOW. – The Infinite Unknown PS: The stock market will crash.)

KBR Named In Report On Soldier Illnesses

Dozens of U.S. troops in Iraq fell sick at bases using “unmonitored and potentially unsafe” water supplied by the military and a contractor once owned by Vice President Dick Cheney’s former company, the Pentagon’s internal watchdog says.

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A report obtained by The Associated Press said soldiers experienced skin abscesses, cellulitis, skin infections, diarrhea and other illnesses after using discolored, smelly water for personal hygiene and laundry at five U.S. military sites in Iraq.

The Defense Department’s inspector general’s report, which could be released as early as Monday, found water quality problems between March 2004 and February 2006 at three sites run by contractor KBR Inc., and between January 2004 and December 2006 at two military-operated locations.

Read moreKBR Named In Report On Soldier Illnesses

Top Iraq contractor skirts US taxes offshore

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CAYMAN ISLANDS – Kellogg Brown & Root, the nation’s top Iraq war contractor and until last year a subsidiary of Halliburton Corp., has avoided paying hundreds of millions of dollars in federal Medicare and Social Security taxes by hiring workers through shell companies based in this tropical tax haven.More than 21,000 people working for KBR in Iraq – including about 10,500 Americans – are listed as employees of two companies that exist in a computer file on the fourth floor of a building on a palm-studded boulevard here in the Caribbean. Neither company has an office or phone number in the Cayman Islands.

The Defense Department has known since at least 2004 that KBR was avoiding taxes by declaring its American workers as employees of Cayman Islands shell companies, and officials said the move allowed KBR to perform the work more cheaply, saving Defense dollars.

Read moreTop Iraq contractor skirts US taxes offshore

10-Year U.S. Strategic Plan For Detention Camps Revives Proposals From Oliver North

Editor’s Note: A recently announced contract for a Halliburton subsidiary to build immigrant detention facilities is part of a longer-term Homeland Security plan titled ENDGAME, which sets as its goal the removal of “all removable aliens” and “potential terrorists.” Scott is author of “Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina” (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003). He is completing a book on “The Road to 9/11.” Visit his Web site at http://www.peterdalescott.net.

The Halliburton subsidiary KBR (formerly Brown and Root) announced on Jan. 24 that it had been awarded a $385 million contingency contract by the Department of Homeland Security to build detention camps. Two weeks later, on Feb. 6, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced that the Fiscal Year 2007 federal budget would allocate over $400 million to add 6,700 additional detention beds (an increase of 32 percent over 2006). This $400 million allocation is more than a four-fold increase over the FY 2006 budget, which provided only $90 million for the same purpose.

Both the contract and the budget allocation are in partial fulfillment of an ambitious 10-year Homeland Security strategic plan, code-named ENDGAME, authorized in 2003. According to a 49-page Homeland Security document on the plan, ENDGAME expands “a mission first articulated in the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798.” Its goal is the capability to “remove all removable aliens,” including “illegal economic migrants, aliens who have committed criminal acts, asylum-seekers (required to be retained by law) or potential terrorists.”

There is no question that the Bush administration is under considerable political pressure to increase the detentions of illegal immigrants, especially from across the Mexican border. Confrontations along the border are increasingly violent, often involving the drug traffic.

Read more10-Year U.S. Strategic Plan For Detention Camps Revives Proposals From Oliver North