Blatantly Boasting War Profiteers

By Sarah Anderson, AlterNet. Posted August 30, 2006.

Profiteering execs don't usually brag about their windfalls from the 'war on terror' -- unless they're talking to potential investors.

Like Sen. George "macaca" Allen in a crowd of white Virginia Republicans and Rep. Katherine "God chooses our rulers" Harris with a reporter for a Baptist newspaper, defense executives tend to let their hair down in conversations with investment analysts.

In their glossy annual reports, military contractors are typically modest about how much loot they've gotten from a bloody and increasingly unpopular "War on Terror." But read the transcript of virtually any Q&A session with Wall Street and the truth comes out. While millions are suffering from the human and economic costs of the Iraq war, the violence has been very good for the bottom lines of military contractors and their top executives.