For those of you who are blissfully ignorant of this, click here. If you could, please explain your reasons for your vote.

I say that there shouldn't be any restrictions like this on construction companies. It wasn't the choice of these excluded companies whether their nation went to war or not. And Dubya's idea of reconstruction contracts being an "incentive" is just plain wrong. The decision to go to war should not be tainted by the promise of corporate feeding grounds.

in theory it should be a combination of best people compared to price, though due to the politics surrounding the issue i'm not sure how it'll go, i'd like to see a fair few english companies in there as, as a country we put our necks on the line (with or without the backing of the general public) so it'd be nice ot get thanks in that medium at least

Any company should be free to put in a bid...

It should then be up to the Iraqi people who they choose.

Lets not forget that Iraq has a highly skilled work force which includes some of the regions finest engineers, architects and construction workers. I think that they should be heavily involved in what ever work is done.

This is dangerously close to becoming a US military controlled exercise in paying off all of Gee Dubbya's campaign funders in the US construction industry. They paid (and continue to pay) the Republican party huge sums of money, and they get exclusive rights to bid - without fear of competition from abroad - so they don't have to lower their prices too much... not that that's a problem - because much of their fees have already been guaranteed as having been set aside from Iraqi oil and the US tax payers anyway.

Couldn't agree more. The only reason I didn't vote for the Iraqi choice one is because Iraq is currently represented by some US beaurocrat anyway. The true voice of the Iraqis is not heard.

it's more that dangerously close. haliburton was given a $16 billion contract before the war even ended!

Halliburton was also a favourite contracted company of the Clinton administration, so I find it hard to say that Halliburton's some GW crony. Halliburton has a longstanding tradition with the American government. Why this is, I have no idea. I wouldn't keep hiring a company that charges more money all the time unless I was getting some seriously superior work, but... not my call.

But anyway, back to the direct topic... there's a reason that Bush is disallowing France/Germany/Russia in on all this. The popular argument for this is "They wouldn't help us start the Iraq war, but now they want the spoils? Uh-uh, don't think so!"

But frankly, I think that's just a surface examination. France and Russia are owed a lot of money that they loaned to the Iraqi government in the past. Since the Iraqi goverment is now gone, so is their money, unless they can get back into that country, rebuild the Iraqi infrastructure, and repay their money to themselves. So Bush isn't going to let them do anything there until they agree to follow his agendas. Which, I imagine, they will, as money tends to talk that way, and then Bush will back down, and the world will be happy as untold millions gets traded behind everyone's back.

And untold millions of innocents get stamped on by the neo-crusaders. Oh! What a wonderful war!

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