THIS IS TOO MUCH: FAT-CAT DEVELOPERS FROM THE US WANT TO TURN GREEN ZONE INTO LUXURY CONDOS AND SHOPPING MALL

Who says you can't make money off of the war? Look at Bush and Cheney's friends at Haliburton and KBR. They are getting so rich over the war it is unbelievable.

But now there are a group of fat-cat Republican developers from the United States who want to buy land inside the Green Zone in Baghdad and turn it into luxury condos and a state-of-the art shopping mall with more and more fat cat Republican firms leasing property inside the Green Zone.

The whole idea that Republican fat cats are going to make a financial KILLING on land inside the Green Zone while American troops are getting KILLED outside of the Green Zone is enough to turn a person's stomach.

But it is about to happen and there is nothing anyone in the United States can do about it.

Editorial comment by BILL CORCORAN, editor of CORKSPHERE

US-backed plan sees shiny future for embattled Green Zone

By BRADLEY BROOKS and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, Associated Press Writers 43 minutes ago
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080505/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_growing_the_green_zone

BAGHDAD - Forget the rocket attacks, concrete blast walls and lack of a sewer system. Now try to imagine luxury hotels, a shopping center and even condos in the heart of Baghdad.

That's all part of a five-year development "dream list" — or what some dub an improbable fantasy — to transform the U.S.-protected Green Zone from a walled fortress into a centerpiece for Baghdad's future.

But the $5 billion plan has the backing of the Pentagon and apparently the interest of some deep pockets in the world of international hotels and development, the lead military liaison for the project told The Associated Press.

For Washington, the driving motivation is to create a "zone of influence" around the new $700 million U.S. Embassy to serve as a kind of high-end buffer for the compound, whose total price tag will reach about $1 billion after all the workers and offices are relocated over the next year.

"When you have $1 billion hanging out there and 1,000 employees lying around, you kind of want to know who your neighbors are. You want to influence what happens in your neighborhood over time," said Navy Capt. Thomas Karnowski, who led the team that created the development plan.

Karnowski said a deal already has been completed for Marriott International Inc. to build a hotel in the Green Zone. He also said a possible $1 billion investment could come from MBI International, a conglomerate that focuses on hotels and resorts and is led by Saudi Sheikh Mohamed Bin Issa Al Jaber.

Elizabeth Caminiti, a Marriott spokeswoman, declined to comment. Phone calls and e-mails sent to London-based MBI were not returned.

For the moment, however, it's mortars and rockets — not investment money — pouring into the Green Zone, which includes the U.S. and British embassies, key Iraqi government offices and other international compounds. Militants have escalated their shelling of the enclave since Iraqi forces began a crackdown on Shiite militias in late March.

But developers are clearly looking many years ahead and gambling that Baghdad could one day join the list of former war zones such as Sarajevo and Beirut that have rebounded and earned big paydays for early investors.

Even now — with violence in Baghdad again creeping up — the faint hints of the development plan have driven up the Green Zone's already sky-high real estate prices.

Land that a few years ago was going for $60 a square meter on 50-year leases in the zone is now going for up to $1,000 a square meter, American officials say.

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