Corporate US to rebuild Iraq - theage.com.au

Private US companies will do much of the rebuilding work in Iraq after a US-led war to oust Baghdad's government, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The plan, detailed in more than 100 pages of confidential contract documents, would sideline United Nations development agencies and other multilateral organisations that traditionally have directed reconstruction efforts in places such as Afghanistan and Kosovo, the newspaper reported.
The plan also would leave big non-governmental organisations largely in the lurch: $US1.5 billion ($A2.5 billion) in work to reconstruct Iraq is being offered to private US companies, while just $US50 million ($A83.8 million) is so far earmarked for a small number of non-profit groups such as CARE and Save the Children, the paper said....
All of the companies in question have done government work for years and have deep political ties to Washington.
Vice President Dick Cheney once served as head of Halliburton Company, whose subsidiary Kellogg Brown and Root is part of one bidding consortium.
Other big bidders are Bechtel Group Inc, Parsons Corporation and Louis Berger Group and Fluor Corporation - companies which made political contributions of a combined $US2.8 million ($A4.7 million) between 1999 and 2002.