Iraq Cellular Project Leads to U.S. Inquiry (Bush Pentagon corruption)

[papau]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-na-iraqphones29apr29.story

Iraq Cellular Project Leads to U.S. Inquiry
A Pentagon official acted to award a contract to a group that included his friends.

By T. Christian Miller, Times Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — A senior Defense Department official(a former Nixon/Reagan/Bush Admin person whose office does not normally do government contracting and who has no experience with cellular phone technology) is under investigation by the Pentagon inspector general for allegations that he attempted to alter a contract proposal in Iraq to benefit a mobile phone consortium that includes friends and colleagues, according to documents obtained by The Times and sources with direct knowledge of the process.

John A. Shaw, 64, the deputy undersecretary for international technology security, sought to transform a relatively minor police and fire communications proposal into a contract allowing the creation of an Iraq-wide commercial cellular network that could generate hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue per year, the sources said.

Shaw brought pressure on officials at the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad to change the contract language and grant the consortium a noncompetitive bid, according to the sources.

The consortium, under the guidance of a firm owned by Alaskan natives, consisted of an Irish telecommunications entrepreneur, former officials in the first Bush administration and such leading telecommunications companies as Lucent and Qualcomm, according to sources and consortium members.

Shaw's efforts resulted in a dispute at the Coalition Provisional Authority that has delayed the contract, depriving U.S. military officials and Iraqi police officers, firefighters, ambulance drivers and border guards of a joint communications system.

That has angered top U.S. officials and members of the U.S.-led authority governing Iraq, who say the deaths of many Americans and Iraqis might have been prevented with better communications.<snip>

[UpInArms]

1. and did anyone expect

that this mal-administration would ever put lives ahead of dollars?

That has angered top U.S. officials and members of the U.S.-led authority governing Iraq, who say the deaths of many Americans and Iraqis might have been prevented with better communications.

[htuttle]

2. Remember when they Bush administration removed a working cell network?

Jump in the Wayback machine with me, Sherman:

Very shortly after Baghdad fell, a Bahraini cellular company moved into Iraq and had a working cellular network going within a week. It used the cellular standard common in the region, and would work with most Iraqi's existing cell phones.

The US Proconsul forced them to dismantle this working network, since they didn't have permission to set it up. They'd already awarded the cellular contract to a US company -- unfortunately for Iraqis, this US company was planning on using the US cellular standard, so that pretty much only US cell phones worked -- the ones normally used in the Middle East and Europe were incompatible by design.


on edit:

Found a link to this:
Bailing Out WorldCom
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0332/mondo2.php

Soon after Bush announced the liberation of Iraq and the end of the war, private entrepreneurs sprang into action by setting up cell phone service in Baghdad. (Saddam had banned cell phones.) Prime among them was Batelco, partly owned by the government of Bahrain. It invested $5 million to get a system up and running and promised to put in a total of $50 million. MTC Vodaphone, 25 percent owned by the Kuwait government and a franchisee of Britain's big Vodaphone company, rushed into the Baghdad market to set up its roaming service there.

But this notable example of spontaneous free-market capitalism was shut down by the U.S.'s Coalition Provisional Authority.

Who stands to gain from the authority's ban? Currently, the U.S. military and others use a Baghdad network built by WorldCom, the corrupt and bankrupt American telecommunications firm that is trying to revive itself by returning to the name MCI after defrauding the U.S. government. Of course, the Iraqi public isn't allowed to use that system.

(more)

[papau]

3. No armour/no phones - and it is Kerry's fault folks died - since our media

does not tell anyone - and indeed the LATimes headline on campaign ad's truth telling is headlined as

Kerry's TV Ad Claims Questioned

even though the article questions Bush ads more!

[Just Me]

4. Another (expletive) inquiry!!!!

When the &$%!@ are investigations, real investigations, the criminal kind, going to be initiated. God, I am so freakin' sick of crony capitalism. It is KILLING this country and countries around the world.

[damnraddem]

5. Now the Bushista Iraqi program has

cellulitis.