Saturday, October 28, 2006

Fortress US in Baghdad


It's the OIL, Stupid.

What is Fortress US? The code name for the mega embassy structure apparently being built in Baghdad by First Kuwaiti (a Lebanese-run company) to give the US diplomats a bird's eye view of the billion dollar oil flow will eventlually go online. (Don't worry, GWB, Cheney, Rice, et al are very patient). Say what?

As we debate mundane things like the pesky civil war underway, which the US is probablly delighted about, because it assures that NO ONE will be looking at things like the US Embassy and it's future...the building forges ahead. Add this to the permanent mega military bases being constructed and you can see why Bush needs to stay the course, of course.

AT: Now, with a highly secretive contract awarded by the US State Department, First Kuwaiti is in the midst of building the most expensive and heavily fortified embassy in the world. Scheduled to open next year, the sprawling complex near the Tigris River will equal Vatican City in size....But scratching the surface is the only view yet available of what may be the most lasting monument to the US invasion and occupation of Iraq. As of now, only a handful of authorized State Department managers and contractors, along with First Kuwaiti workers and contractors, are officially allowed inside the project's walls. No journalist has ever been allowed access to the sprawling 42-hectare site with towering construction cranes raising their necks along the skyline.

Altogether, now: We went into Iraq for the oil. Ask Ken Mehlman, the former RNC chair, who said on Meet the Press (May 2006), "...Imagine a failed state on the second largest oil reserves in the world." Transcript here