U.S. Falters In Bid to Boost Iraqi Business

[babylonsister]

U.S. Falters In Bid to Boost Iraqi Business
Few Products Sold To American Firms

By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, August 24, 2007; Page A01

More than a year after the Pentagon launched an ambitious effort to reopen Iraqi factories and persuade U.S. firms to purchase their goods, defense officials acknowledge that the initiative has largely failed because American retailers have shown little interest in buying products made in Iraq.

The Pentagon thought U.S. firms would be willing to help revitalize the war-torn Iraqi economy and create jobs for young men who might otherwise join the insurgency. But the effort -- once considered a pillar of the U.S. strategy in Iraq, alongside security operations and political reform -- has suffered from a pervasive lack of security and an absence of reliable electricity and other basic services.

Iraqi officials have recently highlighted pending deals with retailers such as Wal-Mart and J.C. Penney, businesses that they said were considering purchasing Iraqi products from the few local factories that have restarted. But the two companies said last week that they are not in negotiations to buy Iraqi products, citing Iraq's uncertain future and the questionable viability of potential suppliers there.

Three officials who have worked with the Pentagon's Task Force to Support Business and Stability Operations in Iraq said in recent interviews that, although some factories have achieved limited success, the larger effort to link Iraqi industries with U.S. retailers has been a "failure."

In an interview last Friday, Paul A. Brinkley, the deputy undersecretary of defense in charge of the task force, acknowledged that promising opportunities with U.S. companies have slipped away as the war's popularity fell. So far, only one American company has agreed to purchase clothing from an Iraqi factory, in Mosul.

more...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/23/AR2007082302120.html?hpid=topnews

[blogslut]

1. It was a BS marketing ploy to begin with

If the Bush administration slash Pentagon gave a damn about Iraqi manufacturing they would let the Iraqis rebuild their own country with their own goods and laborers. The very fact that concrete factories in Iraq were shut out of supplying concrete for all those damned Bremer walls they put around the green zone is sickening. But no, we gave all the rebuilding contracts to Halliburton and the like.