(MintPress) – On the 10th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, new financial reports show that Halliburton-affiliated construction firm KBR received $39.5 billion in U.S. government contracts over the course of the Iraq War between 2003-2011, potentially implicating former Vice President Dick Cheney in corrupt dealings and kickbacks to his former employer.
This follows a 2010 investigation by the U.S. Justice Department after the Bush administration gave KBR a $568 million contract without hearing bids from other competing firms.
Overall, the U.S. government spent roughly $138 billion contracting private companies for a range of services, including private security, infrastructure reconstruction and food services.
Just 10 contractors received 52 percent of the funds, according to an analysis published by the Financial Times this week. During the war, private security firms sparked outrage among Iraqis for alleged misconduct, including the killing of innocent civilians.
On Sept. 16, 2007, guards working for the private security firm, Blackwater, killed 17 Iraqi civilians and injured 20 others. The guards maintain that they opened fire in self-defense after being shot at by insurgents. Charges against the mercenary soldiers were later thrown out by a federal judge in 2009, who cited constitutional violations against the accused in previous court proceedings.
In a separate agreement, Blackwater agreed to pay victims’ families roughly $100,000 each.
Much of the $60 billion specifically allocated for reconstruction in Iraq has been squandered or fraudulently distributed to police and military. The Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction found massive fraud, waste and abuse of reconstruction funds, according to the Brown University Cost of War project.
The infrastructure of Iraq remains in a state of disrepair, with large swaths of the country cut off from electricity, especially in more rural areas. According to official Iraqi government statistics, some provinces receive an average of just 12 hours of electricity per day.
The squandered money pales in comparison to the human losses incurred over the course of the war. According to the Brown University Costs of War project, the Iraq War resulted in the deaths of roughly 190,000 people, 70 percent of whom were civilians. Among those killed were 4,488 U.S. service members over the course of the eight-year occupation that toppled Saddam Hussein and ended Baathist party rule.