Prometheus 6   

So, cut 14 Billion off that budget request, buddy

Iraq Aid Figure Gives Donors New Confidence
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN

WASHINGTON, Oct. 8 -- A team of World Bank economists has concluded that, as a practical matter, Iraq can absorb only about $6 billion in aid next year for its infrastructure needs. That conclusion sets a target that Bush administration officials said Wednesday could be met from American and international assistance.

The $6 billion figure for Iraq has been circulating among policy makers at the World Bank, the United Nations and the Bush administration as they struggle to plan for an international donors' conference this month that they fear could be judged a failure for lack of pledges.

Underscoring those fears, an administration official said Spain, the conference host, had suddenly become worried about the growing possibility that the United States might delay plans to obtain a United Nations Security Council resolution on Iraq's future government until after the conference takes place Oct. 23 and 24 -- or even abandon the resolution altogether.

A concern in the administration was that without a resolution, Spain might wish to postpone the conference, as other European countries had suggested earlier in the year.

But other American officials said there was new confidence that the conference could be portrayed as a success, or at least not a failure, in part because the figure for what Iraq could actually spend had been lowered to a more realistic level that reflects the time it takes to solicit bids, award contracts and get the work under way.

…In developers' jargon, the $6 billion figure rests on calculations of Iraq's "absorptive capacity," meaning that it takes months or years to plan for projects.

"The aid figures that have been published for Iraq are reasonable as a measure of what Iraq needs," said an official involved in planning the Madrid conference. "Where the numbers are not so reasonable is the time frame for how much can be spent. This money cannot be spent overnight." [P6: HAH! You obviously have never seen a Halliburton contract]