Cheap Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers (DVD) (Robert Greenwald) Price

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"Why do they have Cadillac Escalades in Iraq?"
While American and Iraqi families continue to bury their dead and comfort their wounded, the HUGE companies who continue to profit from the extended fiasco in Iraq are laughing all the way to the bank. Yes, those bank deposits in the billions keep rolling in, and shares in companies such as Halliburton and KBR keep skyrocketing. It's odd, isn't it, that one slice of the American population (i.e. those in the military) are told to continue to sacrifice, while the CEOs take home fat multi million dollars salaries. Robert Greenwald's documentary, "Iraq For Sale: The War Profiteers" makes it clear exactly who is cashing in on the slaughter, maiming, and destruction, and it isn't pretty. <
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>A large portion of the film takes a look at the relatively lowly civilian contractors employed by various companies in Iraq, and then interviews the families of those killed over there. The survivors of those killed--and injured--in Iraq--are understandably bitter as they argue that their loved ones were knowingly placed in dangerous situations by Halliburton, for example. Too large a portion of the film focuses on this aspect of things, and that was unfortunate. <
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>Another section of the film focuses on the civilian contractors employed to interrogate--which is a euphemism for torture--prisoners at Abu Ghraib. While several low-ranking soldiers have been court-martialed for the treatment of Iraqi prisoners, the film reveals that there's NO accountability for contractors who "interrogate" and kill in the process. They simply walk away from the situation. Various interrogators are interviewed--as well a translator who argues that the translators employed are often not proficient in the language, but that there's no evaluation of language skills. <
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>The very best--and strongest part of the film focuses on the nitty-gritty details of some of the financial abuse taking place in Iraq. One civilian who was employed by Halliburton breaks down when he explains that contaminated water (tested for malaria, typhus, and giardia) is knowingly given to the troops. Another soldier explains how Halliburton charges $99 for washing a bag full of dirty clothes. And details are given of the burning and destruction of $80,000 vehicles that lack a spare tyre or an oil filter, for example. No oil filter--no problem--just destroy the old vehicle and bill the taxpayers for a new one! Apparently, the system of "cost plus" encourages these companies to run amok with expenses. And that's underscored by the luxuries the executives of these companies reward themselves with every chance they get. <
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>The documentary also traces the crony system that thrives between the politicians and the companies who are reaping billions off the blood of others. Dollar amounts running into the billions flash on the screen as company after company rake in the profits. This is beyond scandalous--it's downright criminal. When is someone going to pull the plug on this thievery? And I'll add my own experience of bills from the war--a friend's unit stationed in Iraq was given a satellite phone and guess who going to get the 4 million dollar phone bill? Taxpayers like you and me--displacedhuman

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Average Production Quality but Good Source Material
I just saw "Iraq for Sale" in the theater. It's the only movie I've heard of that focuses on the reconstruction in Iraq and the obscene corruption associated with it. Many people have heard of Halliburton and its subsidiary, KBR, but few people know the extent of the corruption and negligence of these and other companies. <
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>The strength of the film is that it examines several companies (Blackwater, Titan, CACI, etc.) and not just KBR, and it provides numerous points of evidence linking their management policies with the disasters on the ground (the results of which are torture at Abu Ghraib, polluted water for soldiers, gross corporate waste, greed, negligent homicide, and so on). It makes an attempt to connect these results with the polluted political process in Washington. Finally, it does a good job of expressing the human toll of this ruinous corruption through interviews with participants and victims. <
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>The facts in this film should be known by all Americans. The film sometimes intersperses its sections with brief clips from network and cable news. It makes one wonder... it does seem like the mainstream media reports on instances of corruption, but sadly it never seems to give them the prominence they deserve, to dig deeper than surface level, or to connect the dots in a way that exposes the "system" itself. Hopefully this film will help do some of that. <
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>My only complaint is that the production quality and cinematography is not of the highest grade. The film sometimes feels disjointed, and the lack of rhythm prevents it from fully achieving the emotional impact that the source material deserves. <
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>For other good documentaries on the occupation of Iraq, I recommend "The War Tapes" (an excellent documentary filmed by actual soldiers in Iraq) and "About Baghdad" (a solid documentary providing the neglected Iraqi viewpoint, filmed in 2003 just as discontent began to boil over).

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Shockingly Americentric
I just reviewed this DVD on my blog, Robert's Virtual Soapbox. Here is the review, copied and pasted (and slighted edited) from my blog: <
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>Last night I saw Robert Greenwald's latest documentary, Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers, at a community showing of the DVD. <
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>Iraq for Sale is worth watching, but the documentary gave me two strong messages, one intended and the other, I am fairly certain, quite unintended. <
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>The first message is what I already knew: that the Vietraq War always was about war profiteering, especially the war profiteering of Dick Cheney's Halliburton. <
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>The second message I also already knew, but not to the degree that Iraq for Sale makes painfully clear, and that message is that Americans, even those on the left, are starkly Americentric. <
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>Iraq for Sale, by not offering an opposing viewpoints on the matter, supports the myth that American contractors flooded into post-"shock and awe" Iraq out of noble intentions, such as to help the Iraqi people (especially through reconstruction), to spread "freedom" and "democracy," and to (somehow) strengthen the United States. <
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>These noble American contractors surely weren't attracted to Iraq out of greed! That they could make several times the amount of money that they could make for the same work in the United States surely was not their primary motive for going to Iraq! <
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>So in Iraq for Sale we listen to interviewee after interviewee -- including survivors of American contractors killed in Iraq and American contractors who were injured in Iraq and/or who witnessed the deaths and/or injuries of other American contractors in Iraq -- talk about the noble intentions of the contractors. <
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>The fact is that the majority of the American contractors who flooded into Iraq were/are just as greedy as are the executives at Halliburton and the other war-profiteering subsidiaries of BushCheneyCorp. All of them, from the CEO of Halliburton to the individual American contractor, wanted a piece of the Iraqi pie. None of them seems to have or to have had a problem personally profiting from the Iraqi people's grave misfortune. <
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>That's called greed. And there is nothing noble about it. <
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>What would Jesus do? War profiteer? That one is war profiteering him- or herself, under the auspices of a war-profiteering corporation, as a contractor -- is that supposed to free the individual from any personal guilt? Is it the case that the corporation is guilty but that those individuals who work for the corporation -- who make the corporation's very existence possible -- are innocent? Is it the case that the Empire in the Star Wars movies is evil, but that the stormtroopers and others who do the Empire's work are innocent because, hey, they have families to feed? (Well, OK, the stormtroopers are clones and they don't have families, but you get the point.) <
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>At least those American contractors interviewed in Iraq for Sale who state that they went to Iraq so that they could have more money for their families are more honest about their motivation than those who talk about helping to rebuild Iraq, help the United States, blah blah blah. But helping your own family at the expense of the Iraqi people -- isn't that a bit hollow? Do you really want to send your kids to college on blood money, on money that a war-profiteering corporation stole from the American people via the bogus Vietraq War? Are you really OK with the fact that Iraqis had to suffer and die so that you could send your offspring to college? <
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>And why is it that Americans don't call evil things evil until and unless they are touched by those evil things themselves? <
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>For instance, would Lila Lipscomb, the mother of the young American soldier who was killed in Iraq who is depicted in the documentary Fahrenheit 9/11, be against the Vietraq War had her son returned safely home? Or would she still be the pro-military mom that she depicts herself to be in Fahrenheit 9/11 before her son is killed? Is the Vietraq War wrong only because her son died in it? <
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>The American contractors and the survivors of American contractors in Iraq for Sale: Would they be bashing the war-profiteering corporations had they or their loved ones just gotten their money without incident? Are the war-profiteering corporations evil only because the corporations screwed them over? <
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>Iraq for Sale doesn't touch on these profound moral issues, and throughout Iraq for Sale are boo-hoo-hoo stories of the bad things that happened to American contractors, most of whom were/are just greedy opportunists, while the plight of the Iraqi people comes into the picture only when Abu Ghraib prison is discussed, and Abu Ghraib prison is discussed only within the context of war profiteering, such as the war profiteering by the corporation that provided torturers and the corporation that provided "translators" who weren't given so much as a simple test of their language and translation skills before they were given jobs in Iraq. <
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>Iraq for Sale makes it clear that the primary purpose of the Vietraq War was to make it possible for the subsidiaries of BushCheneyCorp to steal billions of the American taxpayers' dollars through fraud, corruption and waste in Iraq via the bogus war that the Bush regime delivered to them. They couldn't just storm the U.S. treasury and steal billions of American taxpayers' dollars outright, so they decided to do their stealing via the Vietraq War. <
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>Iraq for Sale is worth watching because every American needs to realize this fact. <
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>But I find the myth of American innocence that pervades Iraq for Sale to be unsettling -- and, ultimately, dangerous, because until Americans wake up from their delusions of moral superiority and complete and total innocence, they imperil themselves. <
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>In Iraq for Sale American interviewees express their belief that the Vietraq War really was for the benefit of Iraqis and they express their shock -- shock! -- that the war-profiteering corporations in Iraq actually care more about their profits than they care about the safety and the lives of the American contractors who make their obscene profits possible. News flash: Corporations care more about money than they care about people! Who knew? <
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>Do the American interviewees in Iraq for Sale really believe the bullcrap that comes out of their mouths, such as that the American contractors went to Iraq primarily for noble, selfless reasons? Or is it the case that it is necessary for them to believe that they and/or their loved ones who are/were contractors in Iraq aren't/weren't greedy, selfish and soulless, just like those of BushCheneyCorp, and that they think that if they repeat what they want to believe just enough, it will make it true? <
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>So watch Iraq for Sale. You need to know what the Vietraq War is really all about. <
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>But as you watch Iraq for Sale, note how pathetically Americentric it is, and ask yourself what the average Iraqi citizen would think about the United States and Americans if he or she watched an American documentary about the hardships of those poor, poor American contractors and their survivors when thousands upon thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed and maimed in the American war profiteering in Iraq and when it will take years and years for Iraq to return to anything like normalcy. <
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>My grade: B- <
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