Halliburton Makes Billions Off of Iraq

Katherine Griffiths reports from New York on the American company with friends in the highest places, the contracts that all seemed to flow in one direction and the high-ranking army employee who blew the whistle

27 March 2005

Halliburton, the world's largest military private contractor, has made at least $8bn (£4.3bn) in war-torn Iraq - doing everything from washing American troops' laundry to setting up vital oil supplies. Now, a critically well-placed army employee says contracts were unfairly awarded to Halliburton, whose chief executive used to be US Vice-President Dick Cheney.

Bunnatine Greenhouse, the highest-ranking civilian in the US Army Corps of Engineers, saw the contracts handed to Halliburton pass over her desk. She objected to all of them on the grounds that the government was being too generous to the Texas-based company. Now she might lose her job.

The army tried to demote her last autumn after her performance ratings swung from excellent to sub-standard. An alternative offered to the 60-year-old, who followed her husband into the army, is a swift retirement.

According to Ms Greenhouse, who is hanging on to her job under American laws that protect whistleblowers, her superiors want her out because she is "a stickler for the rules". She hopes to stay on at the corps until she is ready to retire, even though many of her colleagues "treat me like I have the plague".