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Exporting Dirty Money

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Posted: Wed Feb 14th, 2007 04:24 pm

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Joe Kelley
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http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=212762007

GIANT pallets loaded with cash amounting to more than $4 billion (£2 billion) and weighing a total of 363 tons were sent to Baghdad aboard military planes shortly before the United States gave control back to Iraqis, it has been revealed to Congress.

363 tons

http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m1090.htm

10,000 pound payload = 5 ton

2,000 lb per ton

363 tons of currency (cash) divided by 5 tons per truck load.

72.6 Truck loads

That is a long convoy of dump trucks driving into town.

Pallets of Cash

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Posted: Sat Feb 17th, 2007 01:51 pm

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Joe Kelley
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http://www.lewrockwell.com/margolis/margolis68.html

Chaos in US-occupied Iraq, and the collapse of its banking system and Ba’ath Party-run social programs, forced Washington to rush 363 tons of US $100 dollar bills to Baghdad. This money, which belonged to Iraq, came from the UN-run “Oil for Food” program. Bremer’s people dished out $12 billion by the truckloads and bagfuls. Another $800 million was stolen by US-appointed officials of Iraq’s Defense Ministry.

But Bremer’s missing $12.8 billion was just the tip of the corruption iceberg. US corporations in bed with the Republican Party’s rightwing, like Halliburton, and mercenary-supplier, Blackwater, made billions out of Iraq. Halliburton, whose former CEO was VP Cheney, was awarded $16 billion in questionable Iraq contracts.

Last week, House Democrats opened hearings that finally began to expose the tsunami of corruption that accompanied the occupation and plundering of Iraq. Billions more of fraud and thievery concealed by the Administration will likely be uncovered.

The whole sordid story of the 100,000 “private contractors” employed by the US in Iraq has only begun to emerge. According to the US Government Accountability Office, at least 48,000 of these – let’s use the correct term, mercenaries – are private gunmen working for hundreds of shadowy US military corporations like Blackwater and Vinnell. These heavily-armed desperados are a law unto themselves and under no supervision.

Some of these mercenaries make US $1,000 daily in Iraq and Afghanistan. While the US locks up Muslims it brands “illegal combatants” in Guantanamo, it has deployed an army of armed thugs in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even interrogation and torture of Iraqis and Afghans has been farmed out to US private enterprise.

The 2nd Most Expensive War in American History

by Eric Margolis

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Posted: Sat Feb 17th, 2007 01:53 pm

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Joe Kelley
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http://www.lewrockwell.com/chartier/chartier63.html

Come to think of it, when Uncle Sam hires foreign merce… sorry I did it again. Let me re-phrase… foaming at the mouth, rabid killers and unleashes them in Iraq, that makes the Iraqi insurgents who are alleged to be receiving help from the Iranians look like they are doing the same thing! What a cunning plan.

We Ain’t No Stinkin’ Mercenaries!

by Tom Chartier

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Posted: Sat Feb 17th, 2007 01:54 pm

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Joe Kelley
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http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17088.htm

The money goes to one thousand dollar a day mercenaries---not our two thousand dollar a month grunts.

Money Trumps Peace...Sometimes

By Cindy Sheehan

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Posted: Sat Feb 17th, 2007 01:57 pm

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Joe Kelley
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Why post this stuff in the good news section?

The sooner people dump the dollar the sooner people will regain power-independence.

It is a good idea to find a replacement currency before dumping the dollar.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul370.html

Change legal tender laws to allow constitutional legal tender (commodity money) to compete domestically with the dollar.

February 17, 2007
Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.

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Posted: Fri May 11th, 2007 06:12 pm

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Joe Kelley
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http://www.politicstv.com/blog/?p=2618
Progressive film director Robert Greenwald is scheduled to testify at a hearing on Thursday, May 10 about war profiteering. He requested to show a few minutes of one of his films, but Republicans blocked his request. Here’s what Congress won’t see:

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Posted: Mon Jul 9th, 2007 03:35 pm

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Joe Kelley
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http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2007/mayo/mier30/social-projects-latin-america-africa.html

THROUGH CUBAN COOPERATION

Social projects in Latin America and Africa receiving electricity via solar panels

This goes here because I think it belongs here.

For this reason:

http://forum.atimes.com/post.asp?method=Reply&TOPIC_ID=10544&FORUM_ID=10

I'm quoting myself again:

“The sun shines for everyone and cannot be blocked or controlled or destroyed,” said Luis Bérriz, director of CUBASOLAR (the Cuban Society for the Promotion of Renewable Energy Sources and Environmental Respect) to Granma International in 1999.

Imagine a drug dealer. The drug dealer sells his victims the refined drug at prices below cost. When I was young this was called ‘pushing’ drugs.

When the victim is hooked the supply of cheap drugs is cut off (Blocked) and the cost charged to the victim for the drugs rises dramatically. The victim will eventually do anything, literally anything, for more drugs.

Now think of the same drug dealer selling the seeds for the plants used to make the drugs and the same drug dealer sells the formula and the process for making the plant into a drug. The same drug dealer trains the customers on the dangers of drug over use and the drug dealer also hires people to help sell the seeds, make the drugs, train workers, and administer preventative counseling for drug abuse.

In the first example (drug pusher) control of the customers is taken from the customers against their knowledge and against their will and at the same time the victims become their own worst enemies in their own minds when, in fact, the true criminal is the drug pusher.

If the second example I’ve described the medical profession. Which doctor would withhold the information required for a poor person to gain health simply because of some law that makes self-production of a drug illegal?

I’ve also described Cuba and Iraq.

Reverse time back to before the Cuban Blockade and before sanctions (Blockade) against Iraq (before the war against Iraq). Take all the currency produced by the Federal Reserve Corporation (dollars) used to Blockade and make war against those countries and turn all the wealth into Solar Panels, Wind Generators, Plans to build and use them, training to build and use them, and maintain them. I’m not speaking about some pittance of wealth.

Example:

http://www.power-independence.com/view_topic.php?id=264&forum_id=4

10,000 pound payload = 5 ton
2,000 lb per ton
363 tons of currency (cash) divided by 5 tons per truck load.
72.6 Truck loads
That is a long convoy of dump trucks driving into town.

That is cash dumped (pushed) into the Iraq quagmire. Thieves stole that cash. Thieves do evil things with dirty money.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17979.htm

Some of the victims of evil manage to survive and tell the story.

Imagine turning back time and instead of pushing dirty money and evil upon people who don’t want either, people who don’t need either, and people who would rather develop at their own pace, and instead of pushing upon these people a very large (more than merely 2 billion dollar worth) amount of evil, instead of all that, imagine America using all the hard earned wealth to offer, if Cuba and Iraq wanted it, offer power independence instead.

Imagine offering independence from oil energy?

What would have happened to Castro’s and Saddam Hussein’s power over ‘his’ or ‘their’ people once the people became independently wealthy with their own ability to produce as much power as they could ever need to run hospitals, schools, farms, industry, and commerce?

Does that make sense?

Does that stop war?

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Posted: Mon Aug 13th, 2007 04:18 pm

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http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18160.htm

The suggestions of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates that this flood of armaments will be “stabilizing” in the short term while underscoring the U.S. commitment to “moderates” in the region over the longer term is a prime example of this historical amnesia.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18170.htm

In November 2006, the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction auditor reported that in 2004, KBR, a subsidiary of Dick Cheney’s old company, Halliburton, ‘had lost’ more than 14,000 weapons destined for the Iraqi government. Pentagon had lost track of them. However, the Pentagon immediately ‘found’ an old, obscure clause and shuts down the audit[iii]. On August 6, 2007, Washington Post reported that there were in fact 190,000 weapons missing – while they referred to the previously reported 14,000, they made no mention of Dick Cheney’s old KBR/Halliburton.[iv] According to Rachel Stohl, a senior analyst at the Center for Defense Information, "They really have no idea where they are," .."It likely means that the United States is unintentionally providing weapons to bad actors." [v] And Dick Cheney’s [old] company gets paid in spite of the corruption, theft, and mismanagement [vi]. Americans and Iraqis get killed – and Iran is held accountable for arming the Shiite militias; A win-win situation for Dick Cheney who is itching to go to war, and his old company.

Dismissing claims from al-Maliki that Iran is a positive force in Iraq, listening to Dick Cheney’s whispers – much like the false allegations about Afghanistan that even though Dan McNeill, the NATO commander in Afghanistan, said: "What we've found so far hasn't been militarily significant on the battlefield." McNeill also said that more likely sources for the arms are drug traffickers, black market dealers, or al-Qaida groups” (Inter Press Service, June 20, 2007), is being blamed on Iran -- Mr. Bush bows to Dick Cheney and repeats that Iran is arming the insurgents who are killing American soldiers. Dick Cheney is arguing for military action[vii]. I wonder of Dick Cheney is the God that Mr. Bush talks to, the higher authority that told him to go to war in Iraq?

But surely America does not have the soldiers for another illegal and immoral war?

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Posted: Mon Aug 13th, 2007 04:31 pm

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Joe Kelley
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http://www.flickr.com/photos/kielbryant/118020322/in/set-72057594137096110/

Last edited on Mon Aug 13th, 2007 04:32 pm by Joe Kelley

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Posted: Fri Aug 31st, 2007 03:48 pm

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http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/16076312/the_great_iraq_swindle/2

Like most contractors, Custer Battles was on a cost-plus arrangement, which means its profits were guaranteed to rise with its spending. But according to testimony by officials and former employees, the partners also charged the government millions by making out phony invoices to shell companies they controlled. In another stroke of genius, they found a bunch of abandoned Iraqi Airways forklifts on airport property, repainted them to disguise the company markings and billed them to U.S. taxpayers as new equipment. Every time they scratched their asses, they earned; there was so much money around for contractors, officials literally used $100,000 wads of cash as toys. "Yes -- $100 bills in plastic wrap," Frank Willis, a former CPA official, acknowledged in Senate testimony about Custer Battles. "We played football with the plastic-wrapped bricks for a little while."

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Posted: Mon Sep 3rd, 2007 04:44 pm

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http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/31/washington/31contract.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5090&en=379525d15e30c78d&ex=1346212800&adxnnl=0&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&adxnnlx=1188584312-oewPz7sFi4/FHTdMel0fSg

U.S. Says Company Bribed Officers for Work in Iraq

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Posted: Thu Sep 6th, 2007 10:51 pm

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Billions over Baghdad

Between April 2003 and June 2004, $12 billion in U.S. currency—much of it belonging to the Iraqi people—was shipped from the Federal Reserve to Baghdad, where it was dispensed by the Coalition Provisional Authority. Some of the cash went to pay for projects and keep ministries afloat, but, incredibly, at least $9 billion has gone missing, unaccounted for, in a frenzy of mismanagement and greed. Following a trail that leads from a safe in one of Saddam's palaces to a house near San Diego, to a P.O. box in the Bahamas, the authors discover just how little anyone cared about how the money was handled.

By Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18323.htm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_tJnj2j5kI&mode=related&search=

Over the next year, a compliant Congress gave $1.6 billion to Bremer to administer the C.P.A. This was over and above the $12 billion in cash that the C.P.A. had been given to disburse from Iraqi oil revenues and unfrozen Iraqi funds. Few in Congress actually had any idea about the true nature of the C.P.A. as an institution. Lawmakers had never discussed the establishment of the C.P.A., much less authorized it—odd, given that the agency would be receiving taxpayer dollars. Confused members of Congress believed that the C.P.A. was a U.S. government agency, which it was not, or that at the very least it had been authorized by the United Nations, which it had not. One congressional funding measure makes reference to the C.P.A. as "an entity of the United States Government"—highly inaccurate. The same congressional measure states that the C.P.A. was "established pursuant to United Nations Security Council resolutions"—just as inaccurate. The bizarre truth, as a U.S. District Court judge would point out in an opinion, is that "no formal document … plainly establishes the C.P.A. or provides for its formation."

Accountable really to no one, its finances "off the books" for U.S. government purposes, the C.P.A. provided an unprecedented opportunity for fraud, waste, and corruption involving American government officials, American contractors, renegade Iraqis, and many others. In its short life more than $23 billion would pass through its hands. And that didn't include potentially billions more in oil shipments the C.P.A. neglected to meter. At stake was an ocean of cash that would evaporate whenever the C.P.A. did. All parties understood that there was a sell-by date, and that it was everyone for himself. An Iraqi hospital administrator told The Guardian of England that, when he arrived to sign a contract, the army officer representing the C.P.A. had crossed out the original price and doubled it. "The American officer explained that the increase (more than $1 million) was his retirement package." Alan Grayson, a Washington, D.C., lawyer for whistle-blowers who have worked for American contractors in Iraq, says simply that during that first year under the C.P.A. the country was turned into "a free-fraud zone."

Bremer has expressed general satisfaction with the C.P.A.'s work while at the same time acknowledging that mistakes were made. "I believe the C.P.A. discharged its responsibilities to manage these Iraqi funds on behalf of the Iraqi people," he told a congressional committee. "With the benefit of hindsight, I would have made some decisions differently. But on the whole, I think we made great progress under some of the most difficult conditions imaginable, including putting Iraq on the path to democracy."

The Bottomless Vault
To be fair, the C.P.A. really did need money desperately, and it really did need to start spreading it among the traumatized Iraqi population. It also needed to jump-start Iraq's basic services. As the C.P.A. demanded ever greater amounts of cash, the pallets of $1, $5, and $10 bills were soon replaced by bundles of $100 bills. During the C.P.A.'s little more than a year of life, the New York Federal Reserve Bank made 21 shipments of currency to Iraq totaling $11,981,531,000. All told, the Fed would ship 281 million individual banknotes, in bricks weighing a total of 363 tons.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n7EEcv5bIw&mode=related&search=

‘Fraud" was simply another word for "business as usual." Of 8,206 "guards" drawing paychecks courtesy of the C.P.A., only 602 warm bodies could in fact be found; the other 7,604 were ghost employees. Halliburton, the government contractor once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, charged the C.P.A. for 42,000 daily meals for soldiers while in fact serving only 14,000 of them. Cash was handed out from the backs of pickup trucks. On one occasion a C.P.A. official received $6.75 million in cash with the expectation he would shell it out in one week. Another time, the C.P.A. decided to spend $500 million on "security." No specifics, just a half-billion dollars for security, with this cryptic explanation: "Composition TBD"—that is, "to be determined."

No reason to get excited
The thief he kindly spoke
There are many here among us
Who feel that life is but a joke but uh
But you and I weve been through that
And this is not our fate
So let us not talk falsely now
The hours getting late

Last edited on Thu Sep 6th, 2007 11:42 pm by Joe Kelley

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Posted: Thu Sep 20th, 2007 02:48 am

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http://thinkprogress.org/2007/09/18/iraq-weapons/

Bush Administration Flooding Iraqi Black Market With Billions Of Dollars In Weapons

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Posted: Tue Oct 2nd, 2007 03:15 pm

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http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18483.htm

Large urban societies would require enormous financial support and the funds found in Iraq’s Banks would eventually disappear in the hands of looters.

Please read:

http://www.amazon.com/Different-Kind-War-Sanctions-Regime/dp/1845452224

Try also:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Oil+for+Food+Iraq

Eample:

http://vitw.org/archives/935#more-935

It was known to all members of the Security Council that the linkage between disarmament and comprehensive economic sanctions meant that the people of Iraq were made to pay a heavy price in terms of life and destitution for acts of their government. It was known to all members of the Security Council that the inadequacy of the Council’s allocations for the oil-for-food programme and the bureaucracy with which this humanitarian exemption was implemented worsened the chances of survival of many Iraqis. It was known to all members of the Security Council that the refusal by the Council to allow the transfer of cash to Iraq’s central bank needed to run the nation, to pay for training, installation of equipment and institution building, encouraged the Government of Iraq to increase illegal means to obtain cash.

It was known to all members of the Security Council that the establishment of the two no-fly-zones within Iraq had little to do with the protection of ethnic and religious groups but a lot with destabilization. All members of the Security Council were aware that following ‘Operation Desert Fox’ in December 1998, the US and the UK governments, giving their pilots enlarged rules of engagement, used Iraqi airspace as training grounds, eventually in preparation for war. The Security Council had access to air strike reports when such reports were prepared by the UN in Baghdad and therefore all members of the Security Council knew of the destruction of civilian life and property. Yet, the Security Council did not ever debate the legality of the no-fly-zones to challenge two of its members that they maintained these zones without a UN mandate.

All this was known.

With rare exceptions, members of the Security Council allowed the Council to become a convenient tool for the pursuit of bilateral policies. There was ample experience in the Council concerning the danger of misuse of consensus resolutions as demonstrated by the handling of resolutions 687 (1991) and 1284 (1999) by the United States and the UK governments. This did not deter members of the Council from going along with yet another consensus resolution, 1441 (2002). The likelihood of misuse by individual members of the Council of provisions such as ‘material breaches’ and ’serious consequences’ to justify military invasion should have prevented the adoption of such a resolution.

In summary, Iraq remains ‘unfinished business’ for the international peace movement and responsible citizens everywhere. The challenge is to address three major issues:

1. The United Nations has failed in preventing unjust economic sanctions, an illegal war and carnage under occupation.

This means that in the short term, the peace movement must persevere in their demands that those responsible be brought to justice. It must not be forgotten that what was done in the name of ‘freedom’, ‘democracy’ and ‘human rights’ represents a travesty of the meaning of ‘freedom’, ‘democracy’ and ‘human rights’

In the medium term, the peace movement must forcefully contribute to the debate on UN reforms to create a structure which is protected against misuse. This involves much more than the enlargement of the Security Council.

2. The international peace movement, too, has failed in preventing unjust economic sanctions and an illegal war.

In the short term, the peace movement should take this as an important opportunity to carry out a self-critical review why this failure occurred and what factors contributed to this failure.

The dangers looming on the political and socio-economic horizon are horrific. The reaction of the peace movement, in the medium term, must be to leave turf battles and institutional or personal ambitions behind to facilitate significantly better organized responses to international crises. Only combined commitment and a joint strategy offer a chance to make a difference.

3. As individuals who understand and cherish the ethos of the UN Charter, who believe in peace and justice for all, who are abhorred by what has happened in Iraq before, during and after the illegal war, we must first and foremost work on ourselves to become equipped for the tasks ahead. Beyond this obligation, we have to remain, in the words of Dag Hammarskjoeld, the UN’s second secretary general, ‘conscious of the reality of evil and the tragedy of individual life, and conscious, too, of the demand that life be conducted with decency.’

Please place yourself in the shoes of a person victimized to a point of economic destitution and moral outrage. A person who has his land bombed, his neighbors tortured and slaughtered. Picture yourself in someone's shoes if you can.

Pictures?

http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/gallery/

What will you do?

Must you wait for permission to think?

Human conscience is individual. No one tells you right from wrong; that is your sole responsibility.

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Posted: Sun Aug 14th, 2011 04:24 pm

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Joe Kelley
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More power flowing to the enemies?

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