In research I have conducted about federal entities such as the U.S. Trade & Development Agency, it appears that third-world countries aren't the only victims of looting and pillaging; add the U.S. taxpayer to that mix. While I agree that not all aid is bad or worthless, the USTDA consistently funds projects that serve only to rob the Treasury and transfer it to US businesses, even if only a few hundred-thousand dollars at a clip.

To cite one recent example, the USTDA is about to fund a feasibilty study to explore how to clean up the Sebou River in Morocco, where olive-oil manufacturers produce many tons of waste daily. True, the project will help an African nation, but it is a ruse that simply benefits US-based makers of pollution-remediation technology (see: http://tpr.typepad.com/thepeacockreport/2006/02/feds_react_to_p.html#more). It is thievery draped in the name of environmentalism, humanitarianism, and economic expansion (i.e.: corporate welfare).

Separately, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is increasingly becoming an adjunct of the Pentagon. The Bush Administration, I discovered, is reversing policies going back to the Kennedy Administration that once had purposefully established a wall between third-world aid and U.S. military affairs; now, rather than providing aid simply out of compassion, Defense agencies such as the U.S. Special Operations Command are partnering with USAID with the goal of concentrating more aid to regions where the U.S. military is engaged in conflict (see the Jan.-Feb. '06 edition of NACLA Report on the Americas http://www.nacla.org/art_display.php?art=2626).

I've always understood that fostering foreign debt was a way for the "Establishment" to wrongly influence the economies, ect. of the involved countries.

On Aug. 12, '82, Mexico's minister of finance explained how the Mexican treasury was dry, such the gov. was unable to repay its foreign creditors. According to the Washington Post the problem was that much of the money ended up in the accounts of corrupt Mexican politicians...

In the DRC (the Congo, formerly Zaire) DICTATOR Mobutu Sese-Seko received more US aid than the rest of Sub-Sahara combined, and this money went directly into his Swiss account...

Furthermore, African countries' debts swelled enormously over time as a result of skyrocketing interest rates and harmful economic policies FORCED on these countries by creditors. Nigeria originally borrowed $5 billion, and while it paid back $16 billion, its debt was still $32 billion.

And how about the way US policy on debt forgiveness took a 180 degree turnabout in the aftermath of the invasion of Iraq, when the Bush administration appealed to creditor nations to forgive IRAQ'S estimated $120 billion debt. In Dec., '03, George W. argued that such debt endangered the countries' long-term prospects for political health and economic prosperity... What...? You loan an oil rich country a nice hunk of change...

Real funny, huh, how foreign debt forgiveness costs American taxpayers gigabucks...

Yeah, laugh till it hurts: since the Earth summit in '92 the World Bank has funded fossil fuel projects that will wind up adding carbon emissions to the atmosphere equivalent to ten times all current annual global emissions. Oh yeah baby, you got that right--nine out of ten World Bank fossil fuel projects enrich multinational corps...

On the other hand, India managed a thirty fold increase in wind generation between ninety-two and ninety-nine, with plans for another fifty percent increase over twenty years!