The great land grab

[bemildred]

It's just a US$5,812,353 contract - chump change for the Pentagon and not even one of those notorious "no-bid" contracts either. Ninety-eight bids were solicited by the Army Corps of Engineers and 12 were received before the contract was awarded this May 28 to Wintara, Inc of Fort Washington, Maryland, for "replacement facilities for Forward Operating Base Speicher, Iraq". According to a Department of Defense press release, the work on those "facilities" to be replaced at the base near Saddam Hussein's hometown, Tikrit, is expected to be completed by January 31, 2009, a mere 11 days after a new president enters the Oval Office. It is but one modest reminder that, when the next administration hits Washington, American bases in Iraq, large and small, will still be undergoing the sort of repair and upgrading that has been ongoing for years.

In fact, in the past five-plus years, untold billions of taxpayer dollars have been spent on the construction and upgrading of those bases. When asked in the autumn of 2003, only months after Baghdad fell to US troops, Lieutenant Colonel David Holt, the army engineer then "tasked with facilities development" in Iraq, proudly indicated that "several billion dollars" had already been invested in those fast-rising bases. Even then, he was suitably amazed, commenting that "the numbers are staggering". Imagine what he might have said, barely two and a half years later, when the US reportedly had 106 bases, mega to micro, all across the country.

By now, billions have evidently gone into single massive mega-bases like the US air base at Balad, about 85 kilometers north of Baghdad. It's a "16-square-mile fortress" (41 square kilometers) housing perhaps 40,000 US troops, contractors, special-ops types and Defense Department employees. As the Washington Post's Tom Ricks, who visited Balad in 2006, pointed out - in a rare piece on one of the US's mega-bases - it's essentially "a small American town smack in the middle of the most hostile part of Iraq". Then, air traffic at the base was already being compared to Chicago's O'Hare International or London's Heathrow - and keep in mind that Balad has been steadily upgraded ever since to support an "air surge" that, unlike the President George W Bush's 2007 "surge" of 30,000 ground troops, has yet to end.

Building ziggurats

While American reporters seldom think these bases - the most essential US facts on the ground in Iraq - are important to report on, the military press regularly writes about them with pride. Such pieces offer a tiny window into just how busily the Pentagon is working to upgrade and improve what are already state-of-the-art garrisons. Here's just a taste of what's been going on recently at Balad, one of the largest bases on foreign soil on the planet, and but one of perhaps five mega-bases in that country:

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JF18Ak04.html

[slipslidingaway]

1. Another story that needs more exposure...

I used the link from tomdispatch, there is also an 8 minute video on the subject at the link below.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/p/tdvideo/engelhardt06092008


Some additional snips>>>

The Greatest Story Never Told
Finally, the U.S. Mega-Bases in Iraq Make the News

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/174944/why_we_can_t_see_america_s_ziggurats_in_iraq

"...And that, of course, is what makes their missing-in-action quality on the American landscape so striking. Yes, a couple of good American reporters have written pieces about one or two of them, but most Americans, as we know, get their news from television and -- though no one can watch all the news that flows, 24/7, into American living rooms, it's a reasonable bet that a staggering percentage of Americans have never had the opportunity to see the remarkable structures their tax dollars have paid for, and continue to pay for, in occupied Iraq...

...And let's remember one more base, though it's never called that: the massive imperial embassy, perhaps the biggest on the planet, being built, for nearly three-quarters of a billion dollars, on a nearly Vatican-sized 104-acre plot of land inside the Green Zone in Baghdad. It will be home to 1,000 "diplomats." It will cost an estimated $1.2 billion a year just to operate. With its own electricity and water systems, its anti-missile defenses, recreation, "retail and shopping" areas, and "blast-resistant" work spaces, it is essentially a fortified citadel, a base inside the fortified American heart of the Iraq capital. Like the mega-bases, it emits an aura of American, not Iraqi, "sovereignty." It, too, is being built "for the ages."


...When it came to imports, including "controlled substances," there were to be no customs fees or inspections, taxes, or much of anything else; nor was there to be the slightest charge for the use of Iraqi "headquarters, camps, and other premises" occupied, nor for the use of electricity, water, or other utilities. And all private contractors were to have total immunity from prosecution anywhere in the country. This was, of course, freedom as theft. Order 17 would have seemed familiar to any nineteenth century European colonialist. It granted what used to be termed "extraterritoriality" to Americans. Think of it as a giant get-out-of-jail-free card for an occupying nation...

...And miracle of all miracles, the mainstream media is finally writing about the bases as if they mattered. Someday, before this is over, all of us may actually see what was built in our names with our dollars. That will be a shock, especially when you consider what the Bush administration has proved incapable of building, or rebuilding, in New Orleans and elsewhere in this country..."

[slipslidingaway]

2. Another interesting comment here...

maybe a reference to a prior speech from 1964???

"The Sadrists are in the streets protesting the American presence and their leader has just called for a "new militia offensive" against U.S. forces. The pro-Iranian, but American-backed, Badrists are outraged. ("Is there sovereignty for Iraq -- or isn't there? If it is left to , they would ask for immunity even for the American dogs.")


http://www.underthesamesun.org/content/2004/06/ayatollah_khome.html

"As I just posted, Bremer's last act is expected to be bestowing of blanket immunity to U.S. troops and perhaps contractors...

So, here's a trip down memory lane with excerpts from Ayatollah Rohollah Khomeini's key speech in 1964 condemning a similarly blanket immunity deal the U.S. struck with the Shah of Iran. The very, very popular speech led to Khomeini's exile in Najaf -- marked a turning point in his rise:


...The previous government approved this measure without telling anyone, and now the present government just recently introduced a bill in the Senate and settled the whole matter in a single session without breathing a word to anyone. A few days ago, the bill was taken to the lower house of the Parliament and there were discussions, with a few deputies voicing their opposition, but the bill was passed anyhow. They passed it without any shame, and the government shamelessly defended this scandalous measure. They have reduced the Iranian people to a level lower than that of an American dog. If someone runs over a dog belonging to an American, he will be prosecuted. Even if the Shah himself were to run over a dog belonging to an American, he would be prosecuted. But if an American cook runs over the Shah, or the marja' of Iran, or the highest official, no one will have the right to object..."


From "The Eagle and the Lion: The Tragedy of American-Iranian Relations"

http://books.google.com/books?id=FNBpbh-mDcoC&pg=PA158&lpg=PA158&dq=T+Cuyler+Young+%2B+SOFA&source=web&ots=i0HaOCzY_a&sig=j3KkUPR-MXJ4SIyG1NYzanAB71E&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#PPA159,M1

"...Early in 1969, Young (T Cuyler Young) told his students at Princeton that the SOFA was a catastrophic mistake for American interests in Iran, that such a heavy-handed act was being interpreted as a mark of crass imperalism, yet that "we pushed it through."