Rewards for a few, losses for millions

The Iraqi people are set to suffer more in the coming years. They got rid of a tyrant, and are being freed of crippling slogans like Arabism, Islamism, may be even Nationalism. They've been promised their destiny in their own hands, so that they can choose their way of living, elect their rulers, and look forward to achieving their aspirations.

All these promised fruits of western-style democracy are still yet to bear. In a transitional period of two years, occupying forces are going to set every single aspect of new Iraq: American-built infrastructure, American revised school curricula, American sponsored choice of local administrations to run cities and regions, and first and foremost total American handling of the Iraqi oil sector. Iraqis are illusively promised that their children will not be subjected to fundamental Islamic teachings, or by the hollow doctrines of struggle that made them no-good and left the Baath party suppressing them for decades.

The "liberators" understand that Iraqi people are not yet mature enough to practice democracy, so they're going to do it for them until they can pick it up themselves. An American ex-general and businessman, Jay Garner, will lead an occupation administration in Iraq for about two years.

Multinational consultants

He's being assisted by multinational consultants from Denmark to Japan, and any country permitted by the Anglo-American occupiers to have a share in the rebuilding contracts bonanza in that "free country".The Garner administration will be assisted by locals: for example, the ministry of oil will be run by an Iraqi technocrat but supervised by an American, most probably the ex-chief of Royal Dutch Shell in North America, Phillip Carol.

Those local assistants are already being singled out by the man chosen by the American occupiers to lead their way of dominance in Iraq, the head of opposition group Iraqi National Congress (INC) Ahmad Chalabi. Local people assigned to main cities for now are either relatives or affiliates of Chalabi, who insist that he's not after any official post in Iraq's transitional administration.

He's more interested in business, as his background tells, almost like that of Jay Garner. Chalabi was sentenced to 22 years of prison in Jordan in the late eighties, after the collapse of his Petra bank and evaporation of deposits of ordinary Jordanians and Iraqis.

The same happened with his investment company, Socofi, and Mebco bank in Switzerland.
Chalabi's Associat-ed Software Co. and Middle East and Trading Investment Co. are under accounting scrutiny. He's also accused by other INC members of embezzlement concerning $100 million authorised by Clinton administration to help the opposition topple Saddam's regime.

This is the man preferred by the Pentagon to distribute the reward of "liberation" among the Iraqis, with the help of a regiment of mercenaries he selected from Iraqis abroad, trained by the Americans in Hungary and now dispersed in Iraq to support his cronies in local administration working under American supervision.

As for the cost, it's too huge to be calculated. Everybody, proponent or opponent to the war, will pay a share but the Iraqi people will take the biggest chunk.

A few days after the fall of Baghdad, British foreign minister, Jack Straw, toured the Gulf, explicitly discussing the future of Iraq and implicitly asking the Gulf States to write off Iraqi debts worth billions.

The new occupation authority in Iraq would like to free the country's resources of all obligations. The Washington-based Centre for Strategic and Inter-national Studies (CSIS) estimates the liabilities on Iraq as follows:

- $199 billion in Gulf war compensation claims, most of it to Kuwait.

- $ 127 billion in debt, of which $ 47 billion is accrued interest. Main debtors are: Gulf States
($ 30 billion), Kuwait ($ 17 billion), and Russia ($ 12 billion).

- $ 57 billion owed for pending contracts, most of which is to Russia.

With a total economic output of $ 25 billion, these massive liabilities can never be met. So the occupiers will seek scraping of this debt, and creditors will pay the cost.

In addition to this, the costs of the war will be reclaimed. Yet it's more than $20 billion and the Pentagon will likely spend another $10 billion before traditional combat operations are over.

According to the American Defence Department military operations will probably cost more than $2 billion a month thereafter. Add to this the costs of sustaining the administration, and rebuilding which amount to another $10 billion a year in the first two years.

Before the war Iraq pumped 1.7 million barrels of oil per day, earning revenues of less than $10 billion annually. Even if American oil companies' investments raised Iraqi output to more than double in two years, still the revenue (between $20 and $25 billion) won't be enough to cover expenses.

Maximum production

Unless Iraq reaches the maximum production limit of more than six million bpd, with estimated revenue of around $ 35 billion, its balance sheets will be heavily in the red. Raising oil production would need investments of between $20 and $40 billion, which oil companies working in Iraq would need to get back with profits.

So, Iraqi oil revenues won't even cover current expenses leaving the country in massive debt. All these costs are going to be paid by the ordinary Iraqi public, while the occupiers, and the Iraqi elite working with them, will benefit from the plight of the country. Again, loss for millions and reward for a few hundred: this is the simple equation of the end result of the Anglo-American occupation of Iraq.


Ahmed Mustafa, is a well-known Egyptian journalist based in Qatar.