How Contractors Raked in $385 Billion to Build and Support Bases Abroad Since 2001

[unhappycamper]

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/16369-how-contractors-raked-in-385-billion-to-build-and-support-bases-abroad-since-2001

How Contractors Raked in $385 Billion to Build and Support Bases Abroad Since 2001
Tuesday, 14 May 2013 15:33
By David Vine, TomDispatch | News Analysis

Outside the United States, the Pentagon controls a collection of military bases unprecedented in history. With U.S. troops gone from Iraq and the withdrawal from Afghanistan underway, it’s easy to forget that we probably still have about 1,000 military bases in other peoples' lands. This giant collection of bases receives remarkably little media attention, costs a fortune, and even when cost cutting is the subject du jour, it still seems to get a free ride.

~snip~

Some of the money clearly pays for things like salaries, health care, and other benefits for around one million military and Defense Department personnel and their families overseas. But after an extensive examination of government spending data and contracts, I estimate that the Pentagon has dispersed around $385 billion to private companies for work done outside the U.S. since late 2001, mainly in that baseworld. That’s nearly double the entire State Department budget over the same period, and because Pentagon and government accounting practices are so poor, the true total may be significantly higher.

Not surprisingly, when it comes to such contracts and given our recent wars, the top two countries into which taxpayer dollars flowed were Afghanistan and Iraq (around $160 billion). Next comes Kuwait ($37.2 billion), where the military has had a significant presence since the first Gulf War of 1990-1991, followed by Germany ($27.8 billion), South Korea ($18.2 billion), Japan ($15.2 billion), and Britain ($14.7 billion). While some of these costs are for weapons procurement, rather than for bases and troop support, the hundreds of thousands of contracts believed to be omitted from these tallies thanks to government accounting errors make the numbers a reasonable reflection of the everyday moneys flowing to private contractors for the world of bases the United States has maintained since World War II.

Beyond the sheer volume of dollars heading overseas, an analysis of Pentagon spending reveals a troubling pattern: the majority of benefits have gone to a relatively small group of private contractors. In total, almost a third of the $385 billion has flowed into the coffers of just 10 top contractors, including scandal-prone companies like KBR, the former subsidiary of Halliburton, and oil giant BP.

[Frustratedlady]

1. I'm curious about something...

Did Halliburton have a lot of contracts before Cheney/Bush, or were they brought into the picture after they took office?

This situation is something Congress should look into rather than wasting all their time chasing Obama out the door.

[unhappycamper]

3. When dubya & darth started the Iraq adventure, Hallibuton got the big bucks.

IIRC their biggest contract was in food services.

[think]

4. Congress did and did nothing. Bechtel was the TOP DOG before Halliburton

Bechtel lost so many contracts to Halliburton that one of their former consultants had this to say before Congress:

No Competition
Former Bechtel consultant portrays Halliburton bidding process as a “sham”

by David Phinney, Special to CorpWatch
September 14th, 2004

A former Bechtel consultant who worked on a proposal for a sweeping oil reconstruction contract in Iraq in 2003 calls the government’s competition a “sham” that was “rigged” from the start in favor of Halliburton subsidiary, KBR.

Appearing before a special panel of congressional Democrats on Sept. 10, the consultant, Sheryl Elam Tappan, said that she advised Bechtel to pull out as soon as she saw an official planning document (Restoration of Iraqi Oil Infrastructure Final Work Plan) in which the U.S. committed the work to KBR even before the contract was awarded. The work plan was withheld from Halliburton competitors until 2 weeks before proposals were due.

“Officials up and down the chain of command ignored our federal laws and regulations and the procedures that normally ensure fair play,” she told the panel of the Army Corps of Engineers, which awarded the controversial contract through its Fort Worth office. She said she'd never before seen "the arrogant and egregious ways in which the Corps treated Halliburton’s competitors.”

After the competition, on Jan. 16, 2004, two contracts were awarded. Halliburton was assigned work in southern Iraq for a top value of $1.2 billion and a second, valued for as much as $800 million, went to Parsons Energy and Chemical Group and the Worley Group of Australia for similar work in northern Iraq. Both Parsons and KBR are headquartered in Houston....

Full article:
http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=11525

[pipoman]

5. I do believe, regardless the tastelessness

of the bush/cheney connection to Halliburton, that Halliburton has long been a major government contractor. Further, I believe there are few other contractors capable of executing many of the contracts put out for bids by the .gov. That said, I also believe that at least some guidelines of the contracts put out to bid were custom made to leave other possible contractors unable to fulfill the terms of the contract so they couldn't bid..

[think]

2. K&R

[Frustratedlady]

6. Thanks to all for your information.

I had forgotten about Bechtel. As for their protest on the contracting process, it probably didn't help for their complaint to come from a woman. I don't think the Bush administration took pressure from women in a good light.