Published on Thursday, November 17, 2005 by
CommonDreams.org
Dick Cheney: War Profiteer
by Tom Turnipseed
Questions persist about Vice-President Cheney's role in the ongoing
investigation and scandal swirling about the White House. His chief of staff
and confidante Lewis "Scooter" Libby has been indicted for perjury and
obstruction of justice. Let's take a look at some personal incentives for
Cheney's selling war to our country.
Cheney has pursued a political and corporate career to make himself very
rich and powerful. He is the personification of a war profiteer who slid
through the revolving door connecting the public and private sectors of the
defense establishment on two occasions in a career that has served his
relentless quest for power and profits.
As Defense Secretary, Mr. Cheney commissioned a study for the U.S.
Department of Defense by Brown and Root Services (now Kellogg, Brown and
Root), a wholly owned subsidiary of Halliburton. The study recommended that
private firms like Halliburton should take over logistical support programs
for U.S. military operations around the world. Just two years after he was
Secretary of Defense, Cheney stepped through the revolving door linking the
Department of Defense with defense contractors and became CEO of
Halliburton. Halliburton was the principal beneficiary of Cheney's
privatization efforts for our military's logistical support and Cheney was
paid $44 million for five year's work with them before he slipped back
through the revolving door of war profiteering to become Vice-President of
the United States. When asked about the money he received from Halliburton,
Cheney said. "I tell you that the government had absolutely nothing to do
with it."
The Bush administration has dished out lucrative reconstruction contracts in
Iraq to favored U.S. based corporations including Halliburton and denied
contracts to many Iraqi and foreign based companies. To the conquerors go
the spoils was the message on December 11, 2003 when Bush said, "The
taxpayers understand why it makes sense for countries that risk lives to
participate in the contracts in Iraq, It's very simple. Our people risk
their lives, friendly coalition folks risk their lives, and therefore the
contracting is going to reflect that."
Bush's statement is a stunning admission of how much corrupt corporations
control our foreign policy. Under Cheney's leadership Halliburton out did
Enron in using offshore subsidiaries as tax shelters to hide profits to bilk
U.S. taxpayers. Halliburton also utilized off-shore subsidiaries to contract
for services and sell banned equipment to rogue states like Iran, Iraq and
Libya. This would be illegal if done directly by Halliburton.
At last count Halliburton had 58 offshore subsidiaries in Caribbean tax
havens. With Cheney at the helm Halliburton's tax payments to the U.S. went
from $302 million in 1998 to zero in 1999, when they also received a refund
of $85 million from the Internal Revenue Service.
During Cheney's tenure as CEO from 1995 to 2000, Halliburton Products and
Services set up shop in Iran. The Halliburton subsidiary does approximately
$40 million a year worth of oil field service work for the Iranian
government. 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl visited the subsidiary in
the Cayman Islands and found that it had no office and no employees. The
mailing address was a local bank with which the subsidiary is registered.
Stahl was met there by the bank's manager who informed her that all mail to
the subsidiary is forwarded to Halliburton headquarters in Houston.
Halliburton had created the subsidiary to allow itself to do illegal
business with a rogue state and to skip out on its taxes in the process.
With Iran's president vowing to destroy Israel and being accused by the Bush
administration of harboring and aiding al-Qaeda operatives, Cheney's company
is doing business with Iran through a subsidiary and dodging its tax
obligations to the U.S.
Halliburton has been more closely associated with the invasion of Iraq than
any other corporation. Before the Iraq War began, it was 19th on the U.S.
Army's list of top contractors and zoomed to number 1 in 2003. In 2003
Halliburton made $4.2 billion from the U.S. government. Cheney stated he had
, "severed all my ties with the company, gotten rid of all my financial
interest."
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) recently asserted that Cheney's stock options
which were worth $241,498 a year ago, are now valued at more than $8
million-- for an increase of 3,281%% . Cheney has pledged to give the
proceeds to charity. Cheney continues to received a deferred salary from the
company. He was paid $205,298 in 2001; $162,392 in 2002; $178,437 in 2003;
and $194,852 in 2004.
The Congressional Research Service has concluded that holding stock options
while in elective office does constitute a "financial interest" whether or
not the holder of the options donates the proceeds to charities, and
deferred compensation is also a financial interest.
Calling on Cheney to sever his financial ties to Halliburton, Lautenberg
points out that the company has already raked in more than $10 billion for
work in Iraq, and was handed some of the first Katrina contracts. The
company has been criticized by auditors for its handling of no-bid contacts
in Iraq, and there have been numerous allegations of over charging for
services. Auditors found the firm marked up meal prices for troops and
inflated gas prices in a deal with a Kuwaiti supplier. The company also
built the American prison at Guantanamo Bay. Lautenberg said, "It is
unseemly for the Vice President to continue to benefit from this company at
the same time his Administration funnels billions of dollars to it."
Cheney's war profiteering requires redress and justice.
