Arms And The Man Who's Making A Killing On Killing In Iraq?
Saturday, November 08, 2003
Observer Special Report:
US BUNGLING IN BAGHDAD Oliver Morgan on the frustrations growing as Iraqis are locked out of their own reconstruction work
by Oliver Morgan
"Anwar Diab is a frustrated man. As an Iraqi who has recently returned to his homeland from America to participate in its reconstruction, his description of winning a contract from the American authorities in Baghdad is reminiscent of K's struggles with the powers-that-be in Kafka's The Castle.
"Speaking on a satellite phone from the Iraqi capital, he outlines the problems in getting any work out of the Americans - and as an English-speaker who lived in the US for 23 years, he will have had it relatively easy.
"'There is no system or procedure on how to reach the Americans,' he says. 'Every ministry has an American co-ordinator, but it is very difficult for ordinary Iraqis to reach them. The system is not transparent to Iraqis.'
"Diab, who started a technology company in Baghdad three months ago, says increasing numbers of small contracts are being handled by Iraqi authorities, where there is openness. But dealing with the US Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) or any of the other government agencies is truly Kafkaesque.
"'They have two offices, but the one where the real work is done is in the old palace of Saddam. You cannot go there unless you are invited and you have to be met at the door.'
"The contacts needed for such an invitation elude most Iraqi would-be businessmen. Diab, who secured a small contract to supply IT equipment for an internet cafe, says: 'I had to use all my personal contacts and knock on the door like a hard-nosed salesman.'
"A CPA website now lists contracts for everything from installing valves and switches on power stations to providing policing equipment. But it is criticised for having very short tender periods - sometimes less than a week - which effectively rule out those Iraqis who are aware of it in the first place.
"'Those who get the contracts are lucky,' says Diab, 'and it is large American companies that get the big ones. The awarding of contracts to [Halliburton subsidiary] Kellogg Brown and Root and Bechtel [two companies with controversial links to the Bush administration] is above and beyond what is happening in Iraq. But Iraqis are very suspicious of this. And the problem is increased because these companies are not open either, just like the CPA.'..." [more]
K STREET ON THE TIGRIS Washington insiders are lining up to help corporate clients cash in on rebuilding Iraq, whether the Iraqis like it or not.
By Michael Scherer
Additional reporting by Jaideep Singh
"The man who ran President Bush's last campaign has a new job, but he won't be checking poll numbers or arranging fundraisers. Instead, Joe Allbaugh, who left the Bush administration just weeks before the White House launched the war on Iraq, has opened up a lobbying firm with offices in Baghdad.
""It's beneficial to clients that I know who the players are and I know who the decision makers are," says Allbaugh, who was national campaign manager for Bush-Cheney 2000 and then became director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. This summer, Allbaugh joined with Ed Rogers, a former White House aide to Bush's father, to found New Bridge Strategies, a lobbying firm that connects Western businesses with the American and Iraqi power brokers overseeing the reconstruction. The firm has already attracted companies looking to sell Iraq everything from new phone lines to catering services.
"Allbaugh is not the only former official pitching his expertise to companies eager to cash in on the reconstruction of Iraq. The total cost of rebuilding the country is estimated at between $100 billion and $500 billion, with potential business opportunities reaching far beyond the much-publicized contracts held by Bechtel and Halliburton. "What you see on the surface is not really what is going on," says Timothy Mills, a partner at Patton Boggs, one of several K Street firms that have launched a practice dedicated to Iraq. Mills advises clients to look beyond the continuing violence in Iraq and toward the long-term payoff for multinational corporations. "Western companies, if they make the right connections early enough," he says, "have the potential of being swept into the mainstream of Iraqi commerce."
"At least for now, those connections begin stateside. "The way to Baghdad is through Washington," says Bart Fisher, a lawyer at the firm Dorsey & Whitney and co-founder of the U.S. Iraq Business Council...." [more]
"(Albuquerque-AP) -- A Canadian man accused of illegally possessing 2,400 warheads at his Roswell counter-terrorist training center says they were legally sold to him.
"David Hudak testified Thursday that a United States subsidiary of Halliburton Company sold him the warheads as demolition charges.
"And he says the warheads didn't have detonators.
"Hudak says a company called Jet Research Center sold the devices to his commercial demolition company for one dollar and 35 cents each.
"Hudak says the warheads had failed inspection for use in military weapons.
"Hudak is on trial in U.S. District Court in Albuquerque.
"He's accused of using U.S. defense information to train foreign soldiers.
"Prosecutors allege Hudak provided soldiers from the United Arab Emirates with training that had been denied them by the U.S. government."
By Paul Richter and Edmund Sanders
Times Staff Writers
"BAGHDAD — Businessmen with close ties to a leading — and controversial — member of Iraq's Governing Council have won large contracts for the country's reconstruction, leading to charges by some council members and other Iraqis that the actions are fueling a cronyism that threatens to sabotage the nation-building effort.
"The men are associates of Ahmad Chalabi, an American-trained financier who has close ties to senior Pentagon officials and is a prominent member of the council, the U.S.-appointed interim government in Iraq.
"Although it is perfectly legal for entrepreneurs with ties to top government officials to land reconstruction contracts, the perception of favoritism is setting back the rebuilding effort in Iraq by discouraging some foreign companies from seeking contracts, Iraqi and U.S. businessmen and officials said in interviews in Washington and Iraq.
"It is further damaging the image of a reconstruction effort already hurt by the granting of huge no-bid awards to the politically connected U.S. firms Halliburton Co. and the Bechtel Group, Iraqis said.
""We have to show people that we are fair and aboveboard," said Sam Kubba, an Iraqi American architect who is also president of the American Iraqi Chamber of Commerce in Washington. Perceptions of insider influence, Kubba cautioned, "are hurting us.... They're driving people away."..." [more]
"Carlyle Group, a Washington-based private equities firm, has put off plans to start a Russian buyout fund after Mikhail Khodorkovsky became the company's second adviser in the country to be jailed, its potential partner said.
"Carlyle planned to start a fund with the Moscow-based Alfa Group. "Talks are on hold," Mark Bond, a managing director of Alfa Group's private equity unit, said by telephone. "The events of the last two weeks haven't helped." A Carlyle partner, Christopher Finn, declined to comment.
"Carlyle has a close business relationship with Khodorkovsky, the 40-year-old chief of the oil giant Yukos who was arrested on Oct. 25 on suspicion of fraud and tax evasion. Platon Lebedev, a Carlyle advisor and the chairman of Group Menatep, a Yukos holding company, was arrested in July on similar accusations. Both deny the allegations.
"Carlyle, which manages $16.4 billion, appoints senior political and business figures to help raise funds and identify takeover targets. Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush retired as a Carlyle adviser last month.
"Renaissance Capital, a Moscow-based investment bank, said Lebedev's arrest in July was a "key factor" prompting Russians to send $7.7 billion abroad in the third quarter, more than triple the amount expatriated a year earlier.
"Carlyle, which also counts a former U.S. secretary of state, James Baker 3rd, as an adviser, is chaired by Louis Gerstner Jr., former chief executive and chairman of International Business Machines. He succeeded a former U.S. defense secretary, Frank Carlucci, as chairman in November 2002.
""The risk that Carlyle takes by having high-profile advisers is that they can be held hostage to fortune," said Chris Davison, an analyst at AltAssets, which tracks private equity firms. "Advisers can be very beneficial, but the risks are higher in volatile places like Russia."
"Bond at Alfa said talks with Carlyle had also stalled because the American firm was less about entering into a joint venture. Carlyle operates its own buyout and real estate funds in America, Europe and Asia, though it has a joint venture with Riverstone Holdings to operate a $222 million energy and power fund. Khodorkovsky is an adviser to the energy and power fund, according to Carlyle's 2002 annual report. Lebedev is an adviser to Carlyle's European operations, which are headed by former Prime Minister John Major of Britain....
"Carlyle Group, a Washington-based private equities firm, has put off plans to start a Russian buyout fund after Mikhail Khodorkovsky became the company's second adviser in the country to be jailed, its potential partner said....
"Carlyle has a close business relationship with Khodorkovsky, the 40-year-old chief of the oil giant Yukos who was arrested on Oct. 25 on suspicion of fraud and tax evasion. Platon Lebedev, a Carlyle advisor and the chairman of Group Menatep, a Yukos holding company, was arrested in July on similar accusations. Both deny the allegations.
"Carlyle, which manages $16.4 billion, appoints senior political and business figures to help raise funds and identify takeover targets. Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush retired as a Carlyle adviser last month...." [more]
"With Iraq as the centrepiece, George Bush has stepped up his campaign for a less permissive attitude towards authoritarian rule in the Arab world. "For too long, many people in that region have been victims and subjects," he told the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington early yesterday.
"Given the role of cynical realpolitik of American policy in the region for much of the past 60 years, it should be heartening that a US president is seeking to draw a principled line in the sand.
"But Bush's aspirational rhetoric must be measured against the inevitable trade-offs. One to be watched closely is the extent to which the Bush Administration is prepared to moderate its commitment to the "global wave of democracy" to cement an emerging strategic partnership with Vladimir Putin's Russia. Here, as in the Middle East, the politics of oil will be crucial.
"Although Bush's speech ranged far and wide on the need for "outposts of oppression" to be exposed to democratic freedoms - Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian leadership, Cuba, Burma, North Korea, Zimbabwe and China all got a mention - there was not a word from the President about recent intrigues in Russia surrounding the arrest at gunpoint of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, reputedly Russia's richest man...." [emphasis added] [more]
"Dibis, Iraq -- On the road south from this town, the men in a pickup truck had it easy. A nearby villager said they had stopped Oct. 11 for a few minutes at the roadside where an adjacent crude oil pipeline crossed a wadi -- a dry streambed.
"When their bomb exploded, blasting a jet of flaming crude into the air, the liquid inferno flowed down the wadi, destroying sections of a second pipeline and an electrical high-voltage line. Hours afterward, a black acrid crust covered the ground, and pools of crude smoldered red-hot in the ditch, raising plumes of gray smoke.
"A campaign of attacks against Iraq's oil pipelines has escalated since mid-August -- sabotage that, along with continued looting, has helped scuttle a basic idea with which U.S. policy-makers began the war: that Iraq could pay for its own reconstruction with oil profits.
"As America toppled Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, Vice President Dick Cheney and Pentagon officials offered this good news to U.S. taxpayers: The lucrative Iraqi oil industry would quickly recover from war, generating $20 billion to $30 billion a year for rebuilding. Six months later, occupation officials have told reporters that oil revenue this year could be as low as $4 billion, and the Bush administration is seeking $20 billion in new U.S. funds to pay for reconstruction of Iraq.
"Oil analysts and administration critics in Congress say a central reason for the disappointment is that the administration presented the rosiest estimates available about Iraq's oil industry, ignoring more cautious reports by independent scholars, the United Nations and even a secret task force operating within the Pentagon. The independent reports warned that Iraq's oil industry was slowly choking from more than 20 years of poor maintenance and damaging practices...." [more]
Click here for more info on why Paul Bremer's "reforms" in Iraq have been illegal to begin with. Compiled by Aaron Maté.
"Cancel the contracts. Ditch the deals. Rip up the rules.
"Those are a few suggestions for slogans that could help unify the growing movement against the occupation of Iraq. So far, activist debates have focused on whether the demand should be for a complete withdrawal of troops, or for the United States to cede power to the United Nations.
"But the "Troops Out" debate overlooks an important fact. If every last soldier pulled out of the Gulf tomorrow and a sovereign government came to power, Iraq would still be occupied: by laws written in the interest of another country, by foreign corporations controlling its essential services, by 70 percent unemployment sparked by public sector layoffs.
"Any movement serious about Iraqi self-determination must call not only for an end to Iraq's military occupation, but to its economic colonization as well. That means reversing the shock therapy reforms that US occupation chief Paul Bremer has fraudulently passed off as "reconstruction" and canceling all privatization contracts flowing from these reforms...." [more]
"As the United Nations launches a high-level review to address how it can better keep the peace in the 21st century, a new initiative has emerged that proposes fielding forces of private soldiers to prevent conflicts in Africa and elsewhere from spiralling out of control.
"The initiative is aimed at addressing the widely acknowledged failings of current UN peacekeeping efforts while avoiding the drawbacks of deploying private mercenary forces.
"Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general, announced the creation of a 16-member review panel this week that is expected to include a new look at the possibility of hiring private security forces in UN-led peacekeeping missions.
"The proposal for dealing with low-intensity conflicts in Africa and elsewhere comes from a group called the Global Security Partnership Project. Its principals are two Britons, Edwyn Martin and Tobias Masterton, and a Canadian, Michael Hepburn.
"UN officials privately concede there are severe flaws in UN-led peacekeeping efforts, agreeing that it takes too long before forces deploy and that the quality of the peacekeepers, most now drawn from poor countries, is often questionable.
"But many governments are opposed to using private soldiers, some fearing what they call the "Frankenstein Problem" - that mercenary groups, once in a conflict area, are difficult to control and barely accountable. According to Mr Martin, the private soldiers now offering peacekeeping services are "there for either money or adventure, not for the benefit of the international community"...." [more]
"WASHINGTON (AP) - The Army said Wednesday it is negotiating to replace Vice President Dick Cheney's former company as an importer of oil products into Iraq, but denied that the talks were related to Democratic allegations of price gouging by Halliburton.
"Robert Faletti, a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers, said the Army needs to find a long-term importer to serve the Iraqi population and is talking with the U.S. military's fuel delivery agency.
"Faletti confirmed the negotiations after they were disclosed by Reps. Henry Waxman of California and John Dingell of Michigan, two Democratic critics of the company that Cheney led before he ran for the vice presidency. The corps spokesman said the imports will be needed through the winter because of pipeline sabotage in Iraq.
"The lawmakers said the Pentagon's Defense Energy Support Center imports military fuel from Kuwait to Iraq for $1.08 to $1.19 per gallon, compared with the $2.65 per gallon that Halliburton charges the U.S. government under a no-bid Army contract...." [more]
"Nov. 4 — The cost of training a new police force for the new Iraq is higher than you might expect and much higher than the same kind of work here at home.
"IRAQI POLICE recruits are now being trained by the U.S. military on the streets of Baghdad. But soon, 1,500 private trainers hired by the State Department will take over training 32,000 Iraqi recruits, over the next 18 to 24 months, at a military base to be rebuilt in neighboring Jordan.
"The contractor: DynCorp International, a company in charge of screening and training foreign police in Haiti, Bosnia and now Iraq. But, at what cost?
"According to the help-wanted notice on DynCorp’s Web site, the company will pay as much as $153,600 for senior people in Iraq for one year. On top of that, they get all their living expenses, and most of their salary is tax-free — a package that will cost taxpayers as much as $400,000 to put each trainer in Iraq.
'"Private contractors make the kind of salaries military police only dream of earning. “I can tell you this — none of our ordinary troops are making that kind of money. Many of them are having families at home that are suffering because they don’t have enough money even to make it through the month,” says U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D.-Ill.
"And most police back home don’t make out nearly as well as DynCorp’s police trainers. Veteran Philadelphia police earn $53,000 a year — $100,000 less. A U.S. official acknowledged that $153,000 is the top pay bracket, adding that most trainers will make about $100,000.
"So far, the cost for DynCorp’s police training program: $50 million. The initial contract was approved quietly and quickly, with only one other company invited to bid. The administration tells Congress the final cost will be $800 million more over the next two years...." [more]
"A decision by the House Republicans to strip the Iraq supplemental bill of an anti-profiteering provision has outraged the Democrats.
"Some Democrats have accused the White House of pulling the strings on the effort to nix the language.
"“The White House and House GOP leadership didn’t want [the provision] in there,” charged Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), an author of the language.
"The provision — included during the Senate Appropriations Committee markup with unanimous support but removed in conference — would have subjected those who deliberately defrauded the United States or Iraq to jail terms of up to 20 years and costly fines.
"Leahy said that, privately, some Republicans told him they though it was a good provision.
"Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), another author of the profiteering provision, called it “shocking” that it was taken out. “Why?” Feinstein asked. “It was a good amendment.”
"A Senate Democratic aide said, “Several House Republican conferees were clearly empathetic, but they had to look to a higher authority. That higher authority was the White House, which had sent the marching order to strip this from the bill.”
"Another Democratic aide said that “the White House got to House Republicans.” The aide pointed to Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner’s (R-Wis.) support for the provision — the lawmaker chairs the authorizing committee but was not a member of the conference — and the unwillingness of House Republicans to compromise on the language as evidence that the top White House staff may have given the marching orders.
"Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), at a Monday hearing of the Democratic Policy Committee, claimed that it does not look as if the White House wanted any oversight on reconstruction efforts in Iraq...." [more]
"Sometimes I miss the old days. Remember back when "war profiteering" actually was thought to be a bad thing? Indeed, Harry Truman considered it treason.
"But, hey, that's so old school. In these modern times of corporate coziness with Washington, war profiteering is business as usual – just another of the entitlements that flow from corporate campaign contributions. And far from denouncing it, top officials applaud it, ably assist it, and even become profiteers themselves. Dick "Halliburton" Cheney, for example, is the poster boy of the ever-revolving door between the Pentagon and war profiteers.
"But now, multi-billion-dollar profiteering by such names as Halliburton, Bechtel, and Boeing has become such a booming business that a new kind of corporate consultant has sprung up: Profiteering facilitator. These are political insiders who use their Washington connections to help paying clients get fat government contracts from us taxpayers to do this or that in Iraq. Many of these boondoggles are awarded out of the political offices of the White House and Pentagon with no competitive bids and little or no congressional oversight...." [more]
Quote of the day : "Contractors' deaths aren't counted among the tally of more than 350 U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq. No one is sure how many private workers have been killed, or, indeed, even how many are toiling in Iraq for the U.S. government. Estimates range from under 10,000 to more than 20,000 - which could make private contractors the largest U.S. coalition partner ahead of Britain's 11,000 troops." (Jim Krane, A Private Army Grows, Associated Press)..." [more]
By Dan Murphy | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
"KIRKUK, IRAQ – Mannaa al-Ubaidi's explanation of the obstacles to resuming exports from Iraq's Northern Oil Company is interrupted by a knock at the door.
An American soldier pokes his head into the executive's freshly painted office, which was badly damaged by postwar looting. "Excuse me, sir, I've come for the production reports. No bad news, I hope?"
"Mr. Ubaidi, a 33-year veteran of Northern Oil and its current chief executive, assures the soldier all is well, hands over a summary of crude-oil output from the rich Kirkuk fields, and ushers him out. He says he knows full well why the US is anxious to track his progress.
""The work we do here is vital to the future of Iraq,'' says Ubaidi. "We help fuel the domestic economy, and oil exports are going to determine how much we can spend on our own reconstruction."
"How much, remains Iraq's $50 billion question. That's the amount the US-led coalition predicts oil exports will contribute to Iraq's government in the next three years.
"The good news is that the oil is flowing again. Oil-well fires have been extinguished, looted spare parts replaced, and some pipelines reopened. In October, Iraq exported a daily average of 1.14 million barrels of crude, worth about $24 million. It's a promising amount when compared with the coalition's goal for the end of 2004, 1.6 million barrels per day (b.p.d.). But it falls far short of the goal of 2.4 million b.p.d. by the end of 2005.
"But just 10 miles from Ubaidi's office in the center of Kirkuk city is the bad news. All looks well at the sprawling depot that marks the start of the 300-mile pipeline to Turkey's Mediterranean port of Ceyhan. Huge cylindrical oil tanks squat on the landscape, and the four-foot wide pipeline gleams.
"But it's strangely silent. Slap the pipeline hard with your palm and you're rewarded with a hollow, resonant thunk. That's evidence that the pipeline which accounted for about 40 percent of Iraq's exports of 2 million barrels a day before the war remains dry...." [more]
"Since it first set its sights on Iraq, the Bush administration has defended flawed policies by arguing that what the rest of the world thinks does not matter. The Bush administration is wrong. By monopolizing the reconstruction, the administration has led the world to think that it favors control over cooperation. In Iraq, what the world think does matter: the rest of the international community is opting to work around us, and too many Iraqis are choosing to work against us. Last month's donor’s conference in Madrid was an opportunity not only to rebuild Iraq, but also to restore America’s credibility. The administration could have seized that opportunity—and still might—but only if it finally concedes that sharing the burden of rebuilding Iraq means sharing responsibility for managing the process.
"In fact, as it now stands, the Bush administration’s management of the reconstruction effort is a recipe for failure. The president’s proposed reconstruction budget for Iraq will be managed by the Coalition Provisional Authority under the auspices of the Pentagon. Thus far, the Coalition Authority’s management of aid to Iraq has, as the administration claims, led to the construction or repair of schools and clinics. But the Authority has also marginalized Iraqis and other donors while vesting huge power in the administration and carefully selected corporate contractors. Far from setting an example for a new Iraq, the management of the reconstruction effort has been tightly-controlled, secretive and unaccountable to anyone outside the Pentagon, including the taxpayers and their representatives on Capitol Hill.
"No surprise, then, that other donor nations have reacted by creating an independently controlled authority: the new Reconstruction and Development Fund Facility for Iraq. Although National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice describes it as merely “another vehicle by which we can reconstruct the Iraqi economy,” what this Fund actually represents is the refusal of other nations to allow their funds to be controlled by the United States.
"What is most telling is the assertion by Rice and other administration officials that none of the $20 billion in new U.S. reconstruction assistance will be channeled through what will thus be a much smaller international Fund. Instead, the United States will continue doing business under the Coalition Authority, and again bypass international coordination in favor of control. In so doing, the administration is establishing a new precedent for the management of post-conflict transitions that assumes less rather than more international coordination. The ultimate burden will fall upon a fragile Iraqi bureaucracy forced to reckon with two international aid bureaucracies instead of one...." [emphasis added] [more]
"November 3— It is unlikely the oil pipeline running from Northern Iraq to Turkey’s Mediterranean coast will resume operations for at least three weeks.
"According to a report carried by the Reuters news Agency, a resumption of fuel exports from Iraq through the Kirkuk-Yumutalik pipeline will not take place on schedule.
"Citing an official in the Iraqi oil ministry, the report said that repairs to the pipeline necessitated by the latest act of sabotage and other work will not be completed for up to three weeks.
"“I seriously doubt that the pipeline will restart this week,” Reuters quoted the official as saying. “It could take two to three weeks....” [more]
"Jakarta - Indonesia`s state oil company Pertamina has so far invested US$20 million in a crude oil exploration project in Iraq`s Western desert, the oil company`s managing director said Monday.
"The project would have been started in 2004, but all would depend on the improvement of security situation there, Ariffi Nawawi told reporters here.
"The oil company expected that next year`s security situation would be better so that the exploration could have been started, he said."
"The United States and Britain, as well as their private contractors engaged in rebuilding Iraq, could face an onslaught of lawsuits—perhaps claiming hundreds of millions of dollars in damages and taking up years of court time. The grounds? That the coalition broke international law in the way it invaded and occupied Iraq, and in the way it is using Iraq's wealth and resources. This warning comes from an international lawyer who has just finished a detailed study of the possible legal consequences of America's first pre-emptive war.
"David J. Scheffer, a visiting professor at Georgetown University Law Center who was President Clinton's ambassador-at-large for war-crimes issues, argues that the United States and Britain have ignored the "short leash" granted by the internationally accepted rules governing the behavior of occupying powers. He contends that they have gone far beyond just patching up Iraq, which he said is allowed under international law, and are now moving onto the forbidden ground of exploiting the oil wealth of the country...." [more]
"In May, President Bush issued Executive Order 13303 ("EO 13303"). Previously little noticed, EO 13303 is now receiving scrutiny from watchdog groups. They fear that it may be used to limit the accountability of corporations doing business in Iraq.
"Their fears are reasonable, as we will explain. In particular, it is possible the Executive Order will be used to cut off tort victims' ability to sue corporations working in Iraq.
"And that's not the only problem with the Executive Order; there are two others. First, EO 13303 sets a terrible precedent for the abuse of the executive's power over private litigation in the context of national security. Second, it is yet another example of what Professor Sebok has described on this site as the Republican penchant for "sneaky tort reform."..." [more]
"Dibis, Iraq -- On the road south from this town, the men in a pickup truck had it easy Oct. 11. A nearby villager said they stopped for a few minutes at the roadside where an adjacent crude oil pipeline crossed a wadi -- a dry streambed.
"When their bomb exploded, blasting a jet of flaming crude into the air, the liquid inferno flowed down the wadi, destroying sections of a second pipeline and an electrical high-voltage line. Hours afterward, a black acrid crust covered the ground and pools of crude smoldered red-hot in the ditch, raising plumes of gray smoke.
"A campaign of attacks against Iraq's oil pipelines has escalated since mid-August -- sabotage that, along with continued looting, has helped scuttle a basic idea with which U.S. policy-makers began the war: that Iraq could pay for its own reconstruction with oil profits...." [more]
