posted December 03, 2004 04:25 PM            

The Oil-for-Food program was supposedly designed for Saddam Hussein to trade oil for humanitarian aid, food and emergency supplies for the Iraqi people. But that didn’t happen. The Iraqi people continued to suffer as Saddam and his cronies feathered their own nests. And based on the incredible intricacy and orchestration of Oil-for-Food, one has to wonder if this $111 billion program wasn’t set up specifically for criminal manipulation.

Payoffs, blackmail, hit men, money laundering, fraud, graft and even sex scandals – this story has it all. Just substitute tough-guy jargon like mafia, wise-guy, being a “made” man, whacked, etc., for fancy terms like the Secretariat, diplomacy and protocol, and the end result is the same: organized crime.

Now Senate investigations are shining a light on this international underworld.
In true mafia style, Kofi Annan’s son Kojo received payments totaling, at minimum, $150,000 from one of OFF’s prime contractors, creating a glaring conflict of interest.

Meanwhile, another crime family, Saddam Hussein and his sons, manipulated the world with bribes, kickbacks, front companies, smuggling, etc., all under the auspices of Mr. Annan’s personal appointee to run Oil-for-Food, Executive Director Benon Sevan – who, in one alleged transaction, was given 7.3 million barrels of Iraqi oil, upon which he could expect to personally pocket $3.5 million in profit.

Also, Annan’s U.N. was paid on commission by Saddam Hussein to “monitor” Saddam’s own OFF activities. This totaled at least $1.4 billion, which the U.N. pocketed. And everything about the program, such as the identities of the companies, oil buyers, food contractors, quantities and pricing, has been a closely guarded secret.

As journalist Claudia Rosett pointed out in her testimony on April 21 to the House Subcommittee on National Security, “ ... once Saddam had done a tainted deal, delivered a bribe, received a kickback, given a gift of those now infamous oil vouchers, he had the goods on the other party to the deal. Along with graft came ample opportunity for blackmail. ...”

Saddam skimmed over $21.3 billion from OFF by receiving kickbacks from discounted oil deals and lucrative humanitarian aid contracts. Three of the five permanent members to the U.N. Security Counsel benefited the most from the Saddam-U.N. business venture. So, it’s no surprise that these countries – France (150.8 million barrels of Iraqi crude and $2.9 billion in aid contracts), Russia (over 1 billion barrels of Iraqi crude and $3.3 billion in contracts for vendors) and China (which was given billions in contracts) – voted against the Iraq War. With Saddam in power, they were cashing in.

Imagine Saddam’s shock when the U.S., Great Britain and the coalition took military action without the U.N. Certainly he must have thought that the bribes he allegedly tendered and the business deals he set up had bought him protection, not war.

Puzo’s Don Corleone couldn’t have done better himself. And had the feds (read U.S. military) not raided the joint (Iraq) and apprehended one of the Godfather’s key henchmen (Saddam), then this incredibly corrupt international crime syndicate would still be operating while the Iraqi people continued to suffer – maybe for generations to come.

posted December 03, 2004 07:20 PM            

But they had the WRONG players..It was Saddam shedding the blood for his oil for food scandel.