Pentagon, Ex-Workers Hit Halliburton on Oversight, Costs

The Pentagon's Defense Contract Audit Agency found that Halliburton's system of billing the government for billions of dollars in contracts was "inadequate in part," failing to follow the company's internal procedures or even to determine whether subcontractors had performed work.

At the same time, four former Halliburton employees issued signed statements charging that the company had routinely wasted money. Among other things, they said the company had paid $45 apiece for cases of soda and $100 per bag of laundry, and had abandoned nearly new, $85,000 trucks in the desert for lack of spare parts.

"There was this whole thought process that we can spend whatever we want to because the government won't crack down in the first year of a war," said Marie deYoung, a former logistics officer with the company.

Halliburton officials declined to address specifics of the allegations by former employees but said they would investigate. The officials said they were working to correct many of the deficiencies cited in the audit, and they denied that they had failed to control subcontractor costs.

"Rebuilding Iraq is one of the largest and most complex reconstruction undertakings of the past half-century, and our employees do not let danger stand in the way of efforts to make life a little easier for long-suffering people," said Wendy Hall, a corporate spokeswoman.

The latest revelations came from Democrats. They are trying to focus attention during the presidential race on the links between Halliburton and Vice President Dick Cheney, who ran the company from 1995 to 2000, and it has become increasingly difficult to separate politics from unbiased criticism of Halliburton's working relationship with the government.

Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles), one of Halliburton's biggest critics in Congress, had planned to introduce the whistle-blower testimony at a hearing today by the House Government Reform Committee, but was blocked by Rep. Thomas M. Davis (R-Va.), the panel's chairman, who was seeking more time to investigate the complaints.

Instead, Waxman released a copy of the audit, the whistle-blower statements and an angry letter to Davis, demanding that the committee increase its oversight of Halliburton contracts.