The head of the GAO told a House watchdog committee that it had looked into no-bid contracts in Iraq, including Halliburton's, and concluded that the Pentagon and other agencies "generally complied with applicable laws and regulations governing competition" when awarding them. Comptroller General David Walker faulted the Pentagon for some add-ons to those contracts, called "task orders," that he said were not properly justified in writing prior to the award. But he also said the agencies probably would have been able to formally justify the awards given urgent wartime needs (emphasis added):
Comptroller General David Walker: Importantly, given the war in Iraq, the urgent need for reconstruction efforts, and the latitude allowed by the competition law, these task orders reasonably could have been supported by justifications for other than full and open competition.
Preceding Walker's testimony was a formal GAO report to Congress stating, among other things, that the Army Corps of Engineers "properly" awarded a sole-source contract for rebuilding Iraq's oilfields (emphasis added):
GAO Report: For example, the Army Corps of Engineers properly awarded a sole-source contract for rebuilding Iraq's oil infrastructure to the only contractor that was determined to be in a position to provide the services within the required time frame.