Cruelbreed
07-05-2009, 06:45 PM
Iraqi Seizes the Chance to Make War Profitable
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/07/05/world/middleeast/04iraqi_600.jpg Christoph Bangert for The New York Times
Araz M. Mohsin, a struggling baker before the war, has become rich by working with Americans in Iraq on construction projects.
By MARC SANTORA (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/marc_santora/index.html?inline=nyt-per)
Published: July 4, 2009
BAGHDAD — For most Iraqis, life after the American invasion has been a tale of loss: loss of loved ones, loss of property, loss of dignity, loss of security.
Skip to next paragraph (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/05/world/middleeast/05baghdad.html?ref=world#secondParagraph)
But not for Araz M. Mohsin.
A baker scraping by when American tanks rolled into Baghdad, Mr. Mohsin recently spent $50,000 to throw a one-night bacchanal at the exclusive Hunting Club here. When guests visit his second home, in Baghdad, he proudly shows off the two peacocks he imported from Dubai, to join a menagerie of exotic birds that he sometimes gives away to friends.
“I have four cars,” he said proudly. “The Land Cruiser cost $80,000.”
The car is parked on a street still littered with debris and lined with blast walls from the sectarian war that was fiercely fought in his neighborhood, Mansour. Fingering his gold watch — the one he is wearing costs $2,000; he reserves a $20,000 timepiece “for big parties” — Mr. Mohsin said that only in America, or an American occupation, was his story possible.
Every war has its spoils, and while much has been written about the multinational corporations whose profits soared as the battle raged, there are also hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people like Mr. Mohsin.
There is no suggestion that he did anything illegal, but in his description of the rise of his business, the Future Company, it is possible to see writ small how such vast sums of money from American taxpayers and the treasuries of other countries could have been poured into Iraq (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/iraq/index.html?inline=nyt-geo) with so little to show for it.
Even an American contract for something as simple as hauling gravel has brought Mr. Moshin tens of thousands of dollars.
The basic infrastructure of the country is still a shambles, and with security remaining relatively stable, Iraq’s political leaders have turned their rhetoric to the evils of corruption.
In May, the trade minister was ousted and later arrested on charges that he used his position to enrich himself. At least a half-dozen ministers may find themselves being called before Parliament to answer questions about their own conduct. Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/nuri_kamal_al-maliki/index.html?inline=nyt-per) has said there is a list of more than 1,000 public officials who could face corruption charges.
But other officials point to Mr. Maliki’s inner circle as part of the problem.
A recent survey by Baghdad University of 500 people found that 452 of them believed that the office of passports and identity cards, run by the Interior Ministry, was thoroughly corrupted.
In this environment, Mr. Mohsin makes no apology for making the most of the situation, offering a variation on the 19th-century New York political boss George Washington Plunkitt’s observation: “I seen my opportunities (http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5731/) and I took ’em.”
Mr. Mohsin spent the first three years of the war in hiding in the Kurdistan region, but by 2006, he decided to take a risk and work with the United States Army (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/a/us_army/index.html?inline=nyt-org) as an interpreter.
“Everyone I saw who worked with Americans, they made good money,” he said.
Once on the job, he wore a mask and, on one occasion, was beaten for his association with Americans.
Although Mr. Mohsin is Kurdish, he grew up in Baghdad and knew people on both the Shiite and Sunni sides of the sectarian fault line.
Eventually, he was stationed at an American base outside Baghdad and began to help the Americans track down extremists, he said. “My guys would come in and they would tell me who was bad and who was not,” he said. “They knew everyone.”
Mr. Mohsin still proudly keeps the documents that prove that he worked for the Americans, but it is impossible to verify the payments he claims to have received.
When his information proved accurate — or at least actionable —the trust of the Americans grew, he said.
After nearly two years working as an interpreter, he saw his chance to capitalize on his connections. Mr. Mohsin was acquainted with some men from Ramadi, then a hotbed of the insurgency, who knew how to navigate among the extremists. Those men, who could operate in an area that no Western contractor would tread, would become his business partners.
After ending his work as an interpreter, he went back to the Americans, knowing they were offering work, and he secured an $80,000 contract to supply gravel to the American base, Al Asad.
“We made $40,000 profit,” he said. His cut was $15,000.
Seeing how lucrative the contracts with the Americans could be, he formed his own company, bringing in friends from Ramadi.
Over Pepsi and chocolate cake at his house in Mansour, the décor of which could be charitably described as frat-house chic, several of his partners sat and listened. The men did not speak English and made it clear that even if they did, they would not be talking much. Only Mr. Mohsin allowed his name to be used.
After working on the construction of a school — a $75,000 contract paid by the Americans, of which he claims $20,000 was profit — he decided to push the envelope.
“I love adventure,” he said, smiling as he fed one of his parrots.
The Americans wanted someone to build a police station in Abu Ghraib, another no-go zone for Western contractors. They were willing to pay $700,000 for the construction of the station, which they named Victory and Peace.
“We made a deal with the local leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/a/al_qaeda_in_mesopotamia/index.html?inline=nyt-org),” Mr. Mohsin said. “They agreed not to destroy the station, and we promised to cut them in on the profit.”
When the project was completed, however, he gave the Qaeda leader’s name to the Americans, and the man was arrested, Mr. Mohsin said, adding that he kept the entire $350,000 profit.
He does not know what became of the Qaeda leader, but Mr. Mohsin portrays the episode as a good deal — for Iraq and for himself. While he boasted of not being afraid to walk the streets of Baghdad, his entourage, including his burly business partners, is almost always at his side.
The money from the Americans only got better. A contract to remove “trash” from a base outside Falluja netted him $1 million, he said. It turned out what the Americans considered trash — generators, cables, air-conditioners, furniture — was actually perfectly usable and could be resold.
“The Americans gave us a contract to deliver stone to a town near the Syrian border,” he said. The contract was worth $1.5 million, and Mr. Mohsin said $1 million of that was pure profit.
But as the Americans prepare to leave, he is unsure of the fate of the Future Company. He said he was likely to leave Baghdad and return to his opulent home in Kurdistan.
Working with the Iraqi government was proving difficult.
He did one job for the government and has yet to be paid. “They are very corrupt,” Mr. Mohsin said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/05/world/middleeast/05baghdad.html?ref=world
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/07/05/world/middleeast/04iraqi_600.jpg Christoph Bangert for The New York Times
Araz M. Mohsin, a struggling baker before the war, has become rich by working with Americans in Iraq on construction projects.
By MARC SANTORA (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/marc_santora/index.html?inline=nyt-per)
Published: July 4, 2009
BAGHDAD — For most Iraqis, life after the American invasion has been a tale of loss: loss of loved ones, loss of property, loss of dignity, loss of security.
Skip to next paragraph (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/05/world/middleeast/05baghdad.html?ref=world#secondParagraph)
But not for Araz M. Mohsin.
A baker scraping by when American tanks rolled into Baghdad, Mr. Mohsin recently spent $50,000 to throw a one-night bacchanal at the exclusive Hunting Club here. When guests visit his second home, in Baghdad, he proudly shows off the two peacocks he imported from Dubai, to join a menagerie of exotic birds that he sometimes gives away to friends.
“I have four cars,” he said proudly. “The Land Cruiser cost $80,000.”
The car is parked on a street still littered with debris and lined with blast walls from the sectarian war that was fiercely fought in his neighborhood, Mansour. Fingering his gold watch — the one he is wearing costs $2,000; he reserves a $20,000 timepiece “for big parties” — Mr. Mohsin said that only in America, or an American occupation, was his story possible.
Every war has its spoils, and while much has been written about the multinational corporations whose profits soared as the battle raged, there are also hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people like Mr. Mohsin.
There is no suggestion that he did anything illegal, but in his description of the rise of his business, the Future Company, it is possible to see writ small how such vast sums of money from American taxpayers and the treasuries of other countries could have been poured into Iraq (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/iraq/index.html?inline=nyt-geo) with so little to show for it.
Even an American contract for something as simple as hauling gravel has brought Mr. Moshin tens of thousands of dollars.
The basic infrastructure of the country is still a shambles, and with security remaining relatively stable, Iraq’s political leaders have turned their rhetoric to the evils of corruption.
In May, the trade minister was ousted and later arrested on charges that he used his position to enrich himself. At least a half-dozen ministers may find themselves being called before Parliament to answer questions about their own conduct. Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/nuri_kamal_al-maliki/index.html?inline=nyt-per) has said there is a list of more than 1,000 public officials who could face corruption charges.
But other officials point to Mr. Maliki’s inner circle as part of the problem.
A recent survey by Baghdad University of 500 people found that 452 of them believed that the office of passports and identity cards, run by the Interior Ministry, was thoroughly corrupted.
In this environment, Mr. Mohsin makes no apology for making the most of the situation, offering a variation on the 19th-century New York political boss George Washington Plunkitt’s observation: “I seen my opportunities (http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5731/) and I took ’em.”
Mr. Mohsin spent the first three years of the war in hiding in the Kurdistan region, but by 2006, he decided to take a risk and work with the United States Army (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/a/us_army/index.html?inline=nyt-org) as an interpreter.
“Everyone I saw who worked with Americans, they made good money,” he said.
Once on the job, he wore a mask and, on one occasion, was beaten for his association with Americans.
Although Mr. Mohsin is Kurdish, he grew up in Baghdad and knew people on both the Shiite and Sunni sides of the sectarian fault line.
Eventually, he was stationed at an American base outside Baghdad and began to help the Americans track down extremists, he said. “My guys would come in and they would tell me who was bad and who was not,” he said. “They knew everyone.”
Mr. Mohsin still proudly keeps the documents that prove that he worked for the Americans, but it is impossible to verify the payments he claims to have received.
When his information proved accurate — or at least actionable —the trust of the Americans grew, he said.
After nearly two years working as an interpreter, he saw his chance to capitalize on his connections. Mr. Mohsin was acquainted with some men from Ramadi, then a hotbed of the insurgency, who knew how to navigate among the extremists. Those men, who could operate in an area that no Western contractor would tread, would become his business partners.
After ending his work as an interpreter, he went back to the Americans, knowing they were offering work, and he secured an $80,000 contract to supply gravel to the American base, Al Asad.
“We made $40,000 profit,” he said. His cut was $15,000.
Seeing how lucrative the contracts with the Americans could be, he formed his own company, bringing in friends from Ramadi.
Over Pepsi and chocolate cake at his house in Mansour, the décor of which could be charitably described as frat-house chic, several of his partners sat and listened. The men did not speak English and made it clear that even if they did, they would not be talking much. Only Mr. Mohsin allowed his name to be used.
After working on the construction of a school — a $75,000 contract paid by the Americans, of which he claims $20,000 was profit — he decided to push the envelope.
“I love adventure,” he said, smiling as he fed one of his parrots.
The Americans wanted someone to build a police station in Abu Ghraib, another no-go zone for Western contractors. They were willing to pay $700,000 for the construction of the station, which they named Victory and Peace.
“We made a deal with the local leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/a/al_qaeda_in_mesopotamia/index.html?inline=nyt-org),” Mr. Mohsin said. “They agreed not to destroy the station, and we promised to cut them in on the profit.”
When the project was completed, however, he gave the Qaeda leader’s name to the Americans, and the man was arrested, Mr. Mohsin said, adding that he kept the entire $350,000 profit.
He does not know what became of the Qaeda leader, but Mr. Mohsin portrays the episode as a good deal — for Iraq and for himself. While he boasted of not being afraid to walk the streets of Baghdad, his entourage, including his burly business partners, is almost always at his side.
The money from the Americans only got better. A contract to remove “trash” from a base outside Falluja netted him $1 million, he said. It turned out what the Americans considered trash — generators, cables, air-conditioners, furniture — was actually perfectly usable and could be resold.
“The Americans gave us a contract to deliver stone to a town near the Syrian border,” he said. The contract was worth $1.5 million, and Mr. Mohsin said $1 million of that was pure profit.
But as the Americans prepare to leave, he is unsure of the fate of the Future Company. He said he was likely to leave Baghdad and return to his opulent home in Kurdistan.
Working with the Iraqi government was proving difficult.
He did one job for the government and has yet to be paid. “They are very corrupt,” Mr. Mohsin said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/05/world/middleeast/05baghdad.html?ref=world