Sunanda K Datta Ray: Bombing for bucks

WHERE MONEY TALKS

I like the cerebral Paul Wolfowitz's candour. The United States deputy defence secretary who can quote Rabindranath Tagore even more pertinently, perhaps, than the forgotten Stephen Solarz did, is not squeamish about acknowledging that his country is making more money out of Iraq than it has spent there.

That's a significant political admission in the closing lap of the American presidential election, though less pragmatic Asians might find it morally indefensible.

Not for Wolfowitz the lofty verbiage with which the US has from the very beginning misled the world. Addressing the United Nations recently, George W Bush spoke of his "great purpose" to "build a better world" but nary a word about the shrewd calculation of his neo-con cronies that gains will more than offset the financial burden of the reckless military adventurism that is inflicting such cruel suffering on Iraqis.

It was left to Wolfowitz to proclaim that America's pecuniary interest underlies the bombings and beheadings that compound not only Iraq's agony but also of foreigners who are trapped there.

The occasion was a report, "Paying the Price", by the Institute for Policy Studies and Foreign Policy estimating America's war expenditure at $126.1 billion. In addition, the US Congress has sanctioned substantial sums for Iraq's reconstruction.

Calculating that this outlay would saddle each American household with a burden of $3,415, "Paying the Price" predicted that the total amount would suffice to provide health care for more than half the 43 million American citizens who lack medical insurance.

Robbing public health to pay for a foreign war, especially one that the United Nations secretary-general, Kofi Annan, says was "illegal" because the UN Security Council did not sanction force, could be dynamite in John Kerry's hands.

"Paying the Price" also quotes a Texas university economist as warning that although war spending would initially boost the economy, long-term problems were bound to arise. He fears a growing trade deficit and rising inflation, with the spike in oil prices adding to the economic downturn.

Not so, retorted Wolfowitz, readily admitting that the US expects a faster flow of Iraqi oil to compensate for whatever it spends. "There's been $20 billion of Iraqi money that's almost never mentioned," he retorted with admirable forthrightness.

"Ten billions of it was leftover oil-for-food revenues. There's another $8 billion that's projected, if the killers don't destroy the pipelines, by the end of the year. That will be $28 billion of Iraqi money"

We are reminded that for men like Wolfowitz, his boss, Donald Rumsfeld, and the vice-president, Dick Cheney, the compulsion to conquer Iraq had no connection with global events. It was not a part of Bush's war on terrorism. The attacks of September 11, 2001, and the Afghan campaign were of tangential interest.

So were Saddam Hussein's mythical weapons of mass destruction. They were not interested in the testimony of Hans Blix, the chief UN inspector, that Baghdad was cooperating with his team.

Britain's Tony Blair may actually have believed the crusading zeal of these architects of invasion which he articulated with passion, but the authors themselves were out not just to seize Iraq's huge oil reserves but to gain a base from which West Asian politics can be effectively reshaped.

That would explain their choice of personnel. Ahmed Chalabi, the Pentagon's initial nominee as ruler, was convicted of fraud in Jordan. Since then, Iraq's chief investigating judge has accused him of counterfeiting.

His nephew, Salem Chalabi, whom the US put in charge of organising Saddam Hussein's trial, is charged with murder and dare not set foot in Iraq. Iyad Allawi, the prime minister, owes his job and life to the presence of 138,000 American troops.

He has obligingly invented a West Asian variant of the old and discredited domino theory, making common cause with Spain (Madrid metro bombing) and Russia (Chechen violence) in a civilisational struggle against terrorists seeking a foothold. "This (Iraq) could be their flagship in the Middle East, spreading out into other countries" Chalabi says.

But recent claims and counter-claims about the release of three Iraqi prisoners, including two women scientists, Rihab Taha and Huda Salih Mahdi Amash, exposed the fiction of his authority. Iraq's national security adviser, Kassim Daoud, announced the release, which the justice ministry confirmed.

But the US refused which Britain promptly echoed. Allawi's regime may not even be aware of the numbers, categories and other details of prisoners. The shame of Abu Ghraib showed that the Americans do exactly as they please.

Unlike some colonial rulers, they can't even plead they are investing in Iraq's future. By the time of the so-called handover of power at the end of June, the US had spent only 2 per cent of the $18.4 billion that Congress voted for urgent reconstruction. Even that was on the police, military and administration.

Not a cent was wasted on health care, water or sanitation. The Americans were not so parsimonious with Iraqi money, spending $19 billion out of the $20 billion from oil sales. But again, it was on elections and such like.

Identified needs like an electricity grid, sewage treatment, schools, hospitals, telecommunications and roads "" many outstanding since the 1991 war "" received scant attention. With 30 per cent unemployment and a target of 250,000 new jobs, only 15,000 were created.

By all accounts, conditions are worse than under Saddam Hussein's dictatorship. And yet the resistance to the occupying forces and their local puppets is put down to Islamic terrorists from abroad!