Barbara Slavin / USA Today & Associated Press & US Embassy – 2007-06-04 23:04:20
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2006-04-19-us-embassy_x.htm
The $592 Million US Embassy In Iraq
(June 3, 2007) — Construction of the US embassy in Iraq, set to open in September, is projected to cost $592 million, with a staff of 1,000 people and operating costs totaling $1.2 billion a year. It will be a 104-acre complex, which is the size of approximately 80 football fields. On May 10, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) criticized the ballooning size and cost of the embassy in a hearing with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice:
Now, having said over and over again that we don’t want to be seen as an occupying force in Iraq, we’re building the largest embassy that we have — probably the largest in the world — in Baghdad. And it just seems to grow and grow and grow. … We agree that we should focus our aid locally not in Baghdad, but we have 1,000 Americans at the embassy in Baghdad. You add the contractors and the local staff it comes to 4,000.
The architectural firm designing the embassy, Berger Define Yaeger, has posted the designs for the colossus on its website. Some previews of the compound’s planned swimming pool and tennis courts:
The complex “will include two office buildings, one of them designed for future use as a school, six apartment buildings, a gym, a pool, a food court and its own power generation and water-treatment plants.”
The US embassy is likely to create even greater Iraqi resentment toward the US occupation. While Americans will be living in posh quarters, the citizens of Baghdad are forced to survive with just 5.6 hours of electricity a day. Baghdad was also recently rated the world’s worst city in which to live.
UPDATE: The residence of the US ambassador to Iraq will be 16,000 square feet. The deputy chief of mission in Iraq will have a “cozy cottage” measuring 9,500 square feet.
Giant US Embassy Rising in Baghdad
Barbara Slavin / USA Today
BAGHDAD (April 19, 2006) — Three years after a US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein, only one major US building project in Iraq is on schedule and within budget: the massive new American embassy compound.
The $592 million facility is being built inside the heavily fortified Green Zone by 900 non-Iraqi foreign workers who are housed nearby and under the supervision of a Kuwaiti contractor, according to a Senate Foreign Relations Committee report. Construction materials have been stockpiled to avoid the dangers and delays on Iraq’s roads.
“We are confident the embassy will be completed according to schedule (by June 2007) and on budget,” said Justin Higgins, a State Department spokesman.
The same cannot be said for major projects serving Iraqis outside the Green Zone, the Senate report said. Many — including health clinics, water-treatment facilities and electrical plants — have had to be scaled back or in some cases eliminated because of the rising costs of securing worksites and workers.
“No large-scale, US-funded construction program in Iraq has yet met its schedule or budget,” the committee report said.
Security is the “No. 1 factor that impedes progress,” said Stuart Bowen, the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction.
Contractors and Army Corps of Engineers officials “are being shot at or threatened every day,” he said. At least 467 contractors in Iraq have been killed, said Christine Belisle, a spokeswoman for the special inspector general.
According to the special inspector general’s office, which Congress created to oversee US projects in Iraq, 25% of nearly $21 billion for Iraq reconstruction has been diverted to pay for security.
The massive new embassy, being built on the banks of the Tigris River, is designed to be entirely self-sufficient and won’t be dependent on Iraq’s unreliable public utilities.
The 104-acre complex — the size of about 80 football fields — will include two office buildings, one of them designed for future use as a school, six apartment buildings, a gym, a pool, a food court and its own power generation and water-treatment plants. The average Baghdad home has electricity only four hours a day, according to Bowen’s office.
The current US Embassy in Iraq has nearly 1,000 Americans working there, more than at any other US embassy.
Most embassy functions are now housed in Saddam Hussein’s former Republican Palace, also within the Green Zone. The US government and military, which occupied many of Saddam’s palaces after the 2003 US-led invasion, are turning the facilities back to the Iraqi government.
The lead contractor on the embassy project is a Kuwaiti firm, First Kuwaiti Trading & Contracting, Higgins said. There are also five US subcontractors, but he would not name them for security reasons.
The Senate report recommended that First Kuwaiti consider hiring more Iraqis, if they can be properly screened.
THE SITE HAS 21 STRUCTURES
# New office building: Includes classified activities
# New office annex: For public diplomacy staff, consular affairs and the US Agency for International Development
# Interim office building: Designed for future use as a school
# General services annex: Facilities management, break areas, staff locker rooms
# Recreation building: Gym, exercise room, swimming pool, locker rooms, the American Club, commissary, food court, barber and beauty shop
# Six staff apartment buildings: Each has one bedroom apartments
# Residences for the chief and deputy chief of mission
# Marine security guard quarters
# Remaining buildings are dedicated to security, vehicle maintenance and facilities management, storage, utilities, and water and wastewater treatment
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,276933,00.html
Detailed Plans of US
Embassy in Baghdad Appear Online
Associated Press
WASHINGTON (June 1, 2007) — Detailed plans for the new US Embassy under construction in Baghdad appeared online Thursday in a breach of the tight security surrounding the sensitive project.
Computer-generated projections of the soon-to-be completed, heavily fortified compound were posted on the Web site of the Kansas City, Mo.-based architectural firm that was contracted to design the massive facility in the Iraqi capital.
The images were removed by Berger Devine Yaeger Inc. shortly after the company was contacted by the State Department.
“We work very hard to ensure the safety and security of our employees overseas,” said Gonzalo Gallegos, a department spokesman. “This kind of information out in the public domain detracts from that effort.”
The 10 images included a scheme of the overall layout of the compound, plus depictions of individual buildings including the embassy itself, office annexes, the Marine Corps security post, swimming pool, recreation center and the ambassador’s and deputy ambassador’s residences.
US officials said the posted plans conformed at least roughly to conceptual drawings for the new embassy, which is being built on the banks of the Tigris River behind huge fences due to concerns about insurgents’ attacks.
Dan Sreebny, a spokesman for the embassy in Baghdad, declined to discuss the accuracy of the posted images.
“In terms of commenting whether they’re accurate, obviously we wouldn’t be commenting on that because we don’t want people to know whether they’re accurate or not for security reasons,” he said.
Berger Devine Yaeger’s parent company, the giant contractor Louis Berger Group, said the plans had been very preliminary and would not be of help to potential US enemies.
“The actual information that was up there was purely conjectural and conceptual in nature,” said company spokesman Jeffrey Willis. “Google Earth could give you a better snapshot of what the site looks like on the ground.”
Some US officials acknowledged that damage may have been done by the postings and used expletives to describe their personal reactions. Still, they downplayed the overall risk.
“People are eventually going to figure out where all these places are, but you don’t have to draw them a map,” said one senior official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about the embassy project.
Few are, and in Baghdad, the construction is under heavy guard and treated with extreme secrecy. It is off-limits to all but those with special passes, surrounded by tall, concrete blast walls and impossible to see except from the air.
The images posted on the Web site show that the $592 million embassy, expected to be completed in September on prime real estate two-thirds the size of Washington’s National Mall, will be a spacious and comfortable facility, albeit dangerous.
Identified as the “Baghdad US Embassy Compound Master Plan,” the images show palm-lined paths, green grass gardens and volleyball and basketball courts outside the Marine post, as well as the swimming pool.
“In total, the 104-acre compound will include over twenty buildings, including one classified secure structure and housing for over 380 families,” the Web site says.
It says the compound will include the embassy building, housing, a PX, commissary, cinema, retail and shopping areas, restaurants, schools, a fire station, power and water treatment plants as well as telecommunications and wastewater treatment facilities.
A US Senate Foreign Relations Committee report last year said embassy security will be extraordinary: Setbacks and perimeter no-go areas will be especially deep, structures reinforced to 2.5 times the standard and five high-security entrances, plus an emergency entrance-exit.
About the Embassy
US Embassy Web Page
Public Affairs Section
The Embassy’s Public Affairs Section explains and supports American foreign policy and promotes U.S. national interests through a wide range of information programs. It promotes mutual understanding between the United States and Iraq by conducting educational and cultural activities. More specifically, the Public Affairs Section aims to:
* Explain and advocate U.S. policies in terms that are credible and meaningful in the Iraqi context.
* Provide information about the official policies of the United States and about the people, values, and institutions that shape those policies.
* Bring the benefits of mutual understanding to Iraqi and American citizens and institutions by helping them build strong long-term relationships.
* Work through colleagues in Washington, to provide the President and other policymakers with information about how foreign attitudes will have a direct bearing on the effectiveness of U.S. policies.
In one-on-one meetings, in conferences, and through media materials, we address themes with our Iraqi counterparts that include:
* Economic security — pursuing American trade interests, globalization of the economy, and free-market ideals;
* Democracy and human rights;
* U.S. society and its values;
* Global issues such as environmental protection, curbing international narcotics trafficking, and anti-terrorism;
* Political security — working toward a peaceful world and interrelationships;
* Information and communication — how technology is affecting the global dialogue through the Information Superhighway, and how ethical journalism plays a role in societies’ democratic maturation.
Public Affairs staffers have direct, substantive, and sustained contact with Iraqi leaders. They serve as spokespersons for all agencies represented in the U.S. diplomatic mission, articulate U.S. foreign policy concerns to journalists, and conduct press conferences for resident and visiting experts on a wide variety of subjects.
Press Office
The Embassy’s Press Office explains and supports American foreign policy and promotes U.S. national interests through a wide range of information programs directed at Iraqi media. More specifically, the Press Office aims to:
* Explain and advocate U.S. policies in terms that are credible and meaningful in the Iraqi context.
* Bring the benefits of mutual understanding to Iraqi and American citizens and institutions by helping explain U.S. actions and policy in Iraq to Iraqi and other audiences through national media.
In one-on-one meetings, in conferences, background briefings, and through media materials, we address themes with our Iraqi counterparts that include:
* Economic security — pursuing American trade interests, globalization of the economy, and free-market ideals;
* Democracy and human rights;
* U.S. society and its values;
* Global issues such as environmental protection, curbing international narcotics trafficking, and anti-terrorism;
* Political security — working toward a peaceful world and interrelationships;
* Information and communication — how technology is affecting the global dialogue through the Information Superhighway, and how ethical journalism plays a role in societies’ democratic maturation.
Political-Military Affairs Section
The Embassy’s Political-Military Affairs Section observes and analyses political and military developments of relevance to U.S. national security interests occurring within Iraq and between Iraq and other countries. The Political-Military Affairs Section works in conjunction with U.S. military counterparts, interagency representatives, and foreign governments to handle all issues concerned with the Multinational Force Iraq and its relationship to the Iraqi Interim Government and MOD.
The Political-Military Affairs Section staff maintains official contact with Iraqi government departments, including the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Prime Minister’s Office and the Ministerial Committee for National Security. These contacts are used to advocate policy consistent with U.S. interests, assess the degree of support for U.S. policies, and maximize cooperation with the Iraqi government in areas of mutual concern.
The Political-Military Affairs Section’s analytical reporting of Iraqi issues to the U.S. Department of State, along with its process of advocating U.S. positions to the Iraqi government, are integral elements in the formation and implementation of American foreign policy in and towards Iraq.
The activities of the Political-Military Affairs Section will support the Iraqi Government’s transition to democracy, to include the first nationwide, democratic elections to be held by January 30, 2005, and the subsequent writing of a permanent constitution.
Economic Section
The Embassy’s Economic Section is responsible for monitoring and managing the full range of economic relations between the U.S. and Iraq. The section works with the Iraqi government on bilateral and international economic policy issues, reports on developments in the Iraqi economy and trade and investment policies, promotes the adoption of economic policies favorable to free trade and open markets, and provides advocacy on behalf of Iraqi businesses in Iraq. Specific issues handled by the Economic Section include:
* Macroeconomic situation
* Finance and banking
* Economic reform
* Bilateral and multilateral trade
* Regional economic integration
* Intellectual property rights protection
* Regulatory framework
