Halliburton Is Helping Iran

Published on September 9, 2004 By kingbee In Politics

go to http://www.whitehouse.gov/vicepresident/ and you'll find a photo of dick cheney speaking to a group of marines at camp pendleton, calif. according to the caption, cheney told them:. "And the terrorists will fail because men and women like you stand in their way."

scroll down the page and you'll find a cheney bio full of praise for his government service. what you wont see there (or in his bio at http://www.georgewbush.com --the official bush-cheney re-election site) is any reference to the five years cheney ran halliburton corporation.

you may or may not be know there are at least two ongoing investigations seeking to determine the nature and scope of services provided to the iranian national oil company by halliburton corporation through a subsidiary chartered in the cayman islands. the cayman islands office is always empty because the 'real' working offices are in dubai and tehran. it is illegal for an american company to contract with the islamic government of iran. halliburton claims the cayman islands subsidiary--halliburton products and services ltd--is independent of american control. sooner--or more likely later, if bush-cheney are re-elected; so far its taken 3 years without any indication of resolution--the investigations will reach a conclusion. until those investigations have run their course, both the company and cheney are presumed to have conducted their business in compliance with us law.

there are other issues worth considering however. issues that go beyond the artifice of legality and the technicality of compliance. among them are these: why would halliburton agree to provide services of any type to iran in the first place? why does the us government give preference on huge contracts to a company that is working to the benefit of our enemies in iran. how does the head of a company that assists iran wind up vice-president of the usa?

nearly 24 years ago, the us embassy in tehran was overrun by students acting in the name of the new islamic republic of iran. 66 people were taken hostage, 14 of whom were released shortly thereafter. the rest were finally freed after 444 days of captivity in january, 1981 following a year and a half of negotiations and the transfer of money and weapons to iran. over the next 11 years, the islamic government of iran funded/supported/assisted in the kidnapping and murder of americans in lebanon as well as suicide bomb attacks on both the american embassy and a marine barracks in beirut resulting in the deaths of 258 americans including 244 us marines.

in 1993, then president clinton proclaimed a new policy of 'dual containment' which would punish iran for its support of islamic terrorists, discourage iranian efforts to more substantially destabilize the middle east and impede iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons capability. in april, 1995 clinton signed an executive order banning trade with iran. the next year, congress passed the libya-iran sanctions act.

cheney, former deputy chief of staff for gerald ford, congressman from wyoming from 1977-1987 and secretary of defense from march 1989 to january 1993--who was, presumably, privy to intelligence about those iranian activities that prompted clinton's containment of iran--was appointed chairman, president and ceo of halliburton in august 1995. how halliburton chose cheney...or why the company would even consider a person with virtually no experience running a business (or for that matter virtually no experience doing anything in the private sector) for that position...are matters for another article.

as head of halliburton, cheney publicly advocated having the government drop sanctions against american businesses helping iran and libya to enrich themselves. while conceding his company was already engaged in contracts with those two countries, but only through subsidiaries, cheney emphaticaly stated halliburton would not do any business with iraq. dresser industries had no such scruples. halliburton's purchase of dresser industries is considered one of the highpoints of cheneys tenure there. as a consequence of that purchase, halliburton assumed dresser's contracts with iraq. as a result, while cheney was head of halliburton, the organization was working on behalf of libya, iran and iraq

as i've already noted, there are ongoing investigations into allegations that halliburton under cheney violated the spirit if not the letter of those sanctions prohibiting american entities from doing business with iran. until those investigations are concluded, halliburton and cheney deserve the benefit of the doubt as far as legalities go.

yet it seems pertinent to wonder why a patriotic american such as cheney would--for any reason--consider providing services that could only help our enemies in iran. cheney's not a foolish man, so it couldn't be out of stupidity. nor is it likely he was merely not paying attention. corporations don't bestow $30 million dollar stock option packages on the inept.

was it all about money?

cheney was less than candid when he announced in 2000, "Since I've left Halliburton to become George Bush's vice-president, I've severed all my ties with the company, gotten rid of all my financial interests. I have no financial interest in Halliburton of any kind and haven't now for over three years."

according to the congressional research service, patriot cheney received $205.,298 in deferred salary from halliburton during 2001 and $162,392 in 2002. similar payments are scheduled through 2005 with an insurance policy in place to guarantee them even if halliburton were to go belly up. halliburton's iranian profits may only represent a few dollars of those payments (it may be more, rather than less disturbing that cheney didn't make a lot of money for permitting his former company to assist our enemies in iran).

if terrorists fail--as we all hope they will--it apparently wont be because men like dick cheney as head of halliburton stood in their way. unlike the marines in that photo, he had 'other interests'.

Comments (Page 2)

Texas Wahine

on Sep 10, 2004

For you, kingbee:

kingbee

on Sep 10, 2004

soooooo youre saying that after 15 years of taking american hostages, supporting hezbollah and suicide bombers that blew up the marine barracks in lebanon and doing their best to develop nuclear weapons--which led up to a presidential order banning commerce with them and congressional sanctions to the same effect--cheney (who was secretary of defense during part of that period) was so easily confused by some smiling ayatollahs that he was conned? or he suddenly hadda revelation that they really are our friends? so he was acting on our behalf by helping them make more money?

wonder why i didnt see that before? (if you shared whatever it is youre smoking...)

kingbee

on Sep 10, 2004

For you, kingbee

ahahahaha they musta caught him on a day when he wasnt really at his best tho. thanks mz w!

ShoZan

on Sep 10, 2004

(if you shared whatever it is youre smoking...)

It's a Domincan Cigar, but I think you already have the stronger 'grass' type article.

The question was how do you know on some people when they are nice one day and before that (i.e. no attacks against your country), but than after you help them out they do a 180 and attack you, so parts with human nature you can't predict, granted if the country has attacked us prior we should be wary of making deals with them, but alas there is no progress without forgiveness some times, but they should earn the forgiveness. You can't just not help an Arabic country because you think they are going to become terrorist, that would be religious persecution or for companies Monetary Persecution, don't think companies would ever do the latter, if you want Oil Companies to stop making those deals, we need to replace everything we use OIL for with an alternative, and not just Cars (only half the problem there).

kingbee

on Sep 10, 2004

a Domincan Cigar

that explains it.

ShoZan

on Sep 10, 2004

Got something wrong with the Dominican Republic eh, well let me switch to Honduran, or Connecticut, hehehe there's also Nicaraguan, mmm all good.

kingbee

on Sep 12, 2004

Got something wrong with the Dominican Republic eh, well let me switch to Honduran, or Connecticut, hehehe there's also Nicaraguan, mmm all good.

id hope you were smoking something stronger while trying to explain how iran is just another oil producer...and that it's no big deal that halliburton is helping the iranians to exploit their oil resources to fund their nuclear program.

i just found this translation of a speech first reported by al-sharq al-awsat--a london-based arabic paper--in an article about a speech at a secret conference attended by student members of the ansar hizbullah movement at al-hussein university. ansar hizbullah is associated with the iranian revolutionary guards. the paper had a tape of the speech in which hassan abbasi--a teacher at the university and revolutionary guards theoritician--said:

‘The West sees us as terrorists, and depicts our strategy as terrorism and repression. Had our youth agreed to Khatami’s teachings and interpretations, it would never have fought the arrogance, and would never have defended the holy places — because Khatami speaks always of being conciliatory, of patience, and of rejecting terrorism, while we defend [the line of] toughness and war against the enemies of revolutionary Islam. I take pride in my actions that cause anxiety and fear to the Americans.

“’Haven’t the Jews and the Christians achieved their progress by means of toughness and repression? We have a strategy drawn up for the destruction of Anglo-Saxon civilizationand for the uprooting of the Americans and the English.

”’Our missiles are now ready to strike at their civilization, and as soon as the instructions arrive from Ali Khamenei, we will launch our missiles at their cities and installations"

an american corporation that doesnt have a problem helping our enemies arm themselves is outta line. but a good cigar is a smoke.

ShoZan

on Sep 12, 2004

This is not just American Business as usual but Business as usual for every Westernized Country. You want to attack Iran or not, if not than sanctions should be enough, maybe we can reinstitute another Oil For Food Program for Iran, and watch the people in UN abuse it again for their profit.

Unless you are ready to take down Iran completely, all the US can do with Iran is put UN Sanctions on it, though if we took out Iran you could watch the number of so-called Iraqi Insurgents drop down from 100 to 20 even less. This right now is a no-win situation with Iran, if American oil companies don't help them, France or Russia will, so they still get their oil plants in Iran. If we do help them, we are helping them to build up there terrorist network, but the American Economy benefits from having helped them.

kingbee

on Sep 14, 2004

This is not just American Business as usual but Business as usual

no...this is an american business playing both sides of the street.

ShoZan

on Sep 14, 2004

What about France, Russia, and China selling weapons, and other junk to these nations, oh that is considered American Business as well, but anyways Iran has it's sanctions on it, and they have until November to comply fully, than from there who knows exactly.

kingbee

on Sep 14, 2004

France, Russia, and China selling weapons, and other junk to these nations, oh that is considered American Business as well, but anyways Iran has it's sanctions on it, and they have until November to comply fully, than from there who knows exactly.

ya know i read a lotta your comments so i know youre too smart to be missing the point here any other way but intentionally.

former secretary of defense with NO civilian business experience is hired by huge oilfield/logisitical contractor to be not just chairman of the board of directors, president and ceo --all at the same time--whereupon he suddenly realizes sanctions against the iranians and libyans (both being globaly recognized rogue states that need money to develop nuclear weapons) are unfair to american businesses. on his watch, halliburton establishes a front company to help those nice ayatollahs whove provided comfort, shelter and funding to terrorists whove killed at least 300 us marines and diplomats--even as the company benefits from a huge very favorable contract with the us military.

ShoZan

on Sep 14, 2004

I see the point and understand the point, but ultimately what can WE do about it, American Businesses are just plain dumb when it comes to dealing with Foreign nations. Hell, I am sure one of them would deal with Kim Jong IL if there was enough money in it, other than a law being passed about it, there is little to be done, especially when it comes to Oil. So far I don't see a replacement for Oil in the near future and unless that happens Oil Companies will always deal with Terrorists, not to mention, both sides simply could not face the fact of how serious a terror threat Iran and the rest were until the World Trade Centers and the Pentagon were hit, they simply thought themselves safe from those terrorists that they supported.

Read up on Operation Bojinka or Project Bojinka that took place in 1998, it should have sent a blatant warning signal to the United States, but they seemed to ignore it with the thought it could never happen here.

kingbee

on Sep 15, 2004

Read up on Operation Bojinka or Project Bojinka that took place in 1998, it should have sent a blatant warning signal to the United States, but they seemed to ignore it with the thought it could never happen here

although i wasnt aware of the name, i do recall when the stuff happened in manila and i managed to keep sorta current as the investigations continued; enough so that i was aware of the multiplane hijacking plan as well as the proposed attack on langley. within a few moments of seeing the 2nd plane slam into the tower on 911, i remembered all of that and was really surprised there wasnt any bioweapons on board those planes.

i also recall several weird terrorist missions in the summer of 2001--like three of them--in europe that seemed sorta pointless (about as stupid as that idiot with the c-5 on the soles of his shoes) that were stopped because the perpetrators were caught before they could be launched. i didnt pay a lotta attention to them at the time because they seemed so amatuerish. when i remembered them a short while after 911, it seemed to me they may have been decoys that were purposely flawed in order to draw attention away from the bigger plot.

nevertheless, theres really not much of a connection between what im trying to point out and the al-quaida plots. if youll go back up to my reply after you described your cigar collection, and read the transcript of that tape, you should see that the iranians have their own agenda--one thats easily as apocalyptic as al-quaidas if not more so, but not being worked in association with them.

what can americans do about halliburton workin for the iranians? the obvious answers are a. make sure cheney isnt re-elected (you will likely not be receptive to this, but i think a reasonable case can be made that cheney is the real shotcaller in the bush administration) and b. start pushing the justice department and the irs to speed up their investigation of halliburtons activities and, if it turns out they are violating the sanctions and laws regarding trade with iran, push even harder for substantial penalties to discourage other companies from doin the same thing. i personally feel its an outrage that theyre were selected as the master contractor (no other bids were solicited) enabling them to profit while collaborating with those who are supporting the insurgents who are killing our troops in iraq.

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