Blackwater Mercenaries on Patrol in Streets of New Orleans

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Blackwater Mercenaries on Patrol in Streets of New Orleans

Postby GDN01 » Sun Sep 11, 2005 1:00 am

<!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/091005A.shtml">Truthout is reporting</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--> that the same security firm hired as private security in Iraq has now been contracted by the Fed. and State govts. to patrol the streets of New Orleans. Not only have they been hired to protect hotels and private businesses, they some have been "deputized" and are wearing law enforcement badges. <br><br>Why is Blackwater working for Homeland Security in New Orleans?<br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em><br> Blackwater Mercenaries Deploy in New Orleans<br> By Jeremy Scahill and Daniela Crespo<br> t r u t h o u t | Report<br><br> Saturday 10 September 2005<br><br> New Orleans - Heavily armed paramilitary mercenaries from the Blackwater private security firm, infamous for their work in Iraq, are openly patrolling the streets of New Orleans. Some of the mercenaries say they have been "deputized" by the Louisiana governor; indeed some are wearing gold Louisiana state law enforcement badges on their chests and Blackwater photo identification cards on their arms. They say they are on contract with the Department of Homeland Security and have been given the authority to use lethal force. Several mercenaries we spoke with said they had served in Iraq on the personal security details of the former head of the US occupation, L. Paul Bremer and the former US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte.<br><br> "This is a totally new thing to have guys like us working CONUS (Continental United States)," a heavily armed Blackwater mercenary told us as we stood on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter. "We're much better equipped to deal with the situation in Iraq."<br><br> Blackwater mercenaries are some of the most feared professional killers in the world and they are accustomed to operating without worry of legal consequences. Their presence on the streets of New Orleans should be a cause for serious concern for the remaining residents of the city and raises alarming questions about why the government would allow men trained to kill with impunity in places like Iraq and Afghanistan to operate here. Some of the men now patrolling the streets of New Orleans returned from Iraq as recently as 2 weeks ago.<br><br> What is most disturbing is the claim of several Blackwater mercenaries we spoke with that they are here under contract from the federal and Louisiana state governments.<br><br> Blackwater is one of the leading private "security" firms servicing the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. It has several US government contracts and has provided security for many senior US diplomats, foreign dignitaries and corporations. The company rose to international prominence after 4 of its men were killed in Fallujah and two of their charred bodies were hung from a bridge in March 2004. Those killings sparked the massive US retaliation against the civilian population of Fallujah that resulted in scores of deaths and tens of thousands of refugees.<br><br> As the threat of forced evictions now looms in New Orleans and the city confiscates even legally registered weapons from civilians, the private mercenaries of Blackwater patrol the streets openly wielding M-16s and other assault weapons. This despite Police Commissioner Eddie Compass' claim that "Only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons."<br><br> Officially, Blackwater says it forces are in New Orleans to "join the Hurricane Relief Effort." A statement on the company's website, dated September 1, advertises airlift services, security services and crowd control. The company, according to news reports, has since begun taking private contracts to guard hotels, businesses and other properties. But what has not been publicly acknowledged is the claim, made to us by 2 Blackwater mercenaries, that they are actually engaged in general law enforcement activities including "securing neighborhoods" and "confronting criminals."<br><br> That raises a key question: under what authority are Blackwater's men operating? A spokesperson for the Homeland Security Department, Russ Knocke, told the Washington Post he knows of no federal plans to hire Blackwater or other private security. "We believe we've got the right mix of personnel in law enforcement for the federal government to meet the demands of public safety." he said.<br><br> But in an hour-long conversation with several Blackwater mercenaries, we heard a different story. The men we spoke with said they are indeed on contract with the Department of Homeland Security and the Louisiana governor's office and that some of them are sleeping in camps organized by Homeland Security in New Orleans and Baton Rouge. One of them wore a gold Louisiana state law enforcement badge and said he had been "deputized" by the governor. They told us they not only had authority to make arrests but also to use lethal force. We encountered the Blackwater forces as we walked through the streets of the largely deserted French Quarter. We were talking with 2 New York Police officers when an unmarked car without license plates sped up next to us and stopped. Inside were 3 men, dressed in khaki uniforms, flak jackets and wielding automatic weapons. "Y'all know where the Blackwater guys are?" they asked. One of the police officers responded, "There are a bunch of them around here," and pointed down the road.<br><br> "Blackwater?" we asked. "The guys who are in Iraq?"<br><br> "Yeah," said the officer. "They're all over the place."<br><br> A short while later, as we continued down Bourbon Street, we ran into the men from the car. They wore Blackwater ID badges on their arms.<br><br> "When they told me New Orleans, I said, 'What country is that in?,'" said one of the Blackwater men. He was wearing his company ID around his neck in a carrying case with the phrase "Operation Iraqi Freedom" printed on it. After bragging about how he drives around Iraq in a "State Department issued level 5, explosion proof BMW," he said he was "just trying to get back to Kirkuk (in the north of Iraq) where the real action is." Later we overheard him on his cell phone complaining that Blackwater was only paying $350 a day plus per diem. That is much less than the men make serving in more dangerous conditions in Iraq. Two men we spoke with said they plan on returning to Iraq in October. But, as one mercenary said, they've been told they could be in New Orleans for up to 6 months. "This is a trend," he told us. "You're going to see a lot more guys like us in these situations."<br><br> If Blackwater's reputation and record in Iraq are any indication of the kind of "services" the company offers, the people of New Orleans have much to fear.</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> <p></p><i></i>
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New Orleans Eyewitness

Postby greencrow0 » Sun Sep 11, 2005 2:09 am

<br><br>New Orleans Eyewitness <br>Describes People <br>Helping People<br>By Lyn H. Lofland<br>Research Professor<br>Department of Sociology<br>University of California, Davis<br>9-9-5<br> <br>Two days after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, the Walgreen's store at the corner of Royal and Iberville streets remained locked. The dairy display case was clearly visible through the widows. It was now 48 hours without electricity, running water, plumbing. The milk, yogurt, and cheeses were beginning to spoil in the 90-degree heat. The owners and managers had locked up the food, water, pampers, and prescriptions and fled the City. Outside Walgreen's windows, residents and tourists grew increasingly thirsty and hungry. <br> <br>The much-promised federal, state and local aid never materialized and the windows at Walgreen's gave way to the looters. There was an alternative. The cops could have broken one small window and distributed the nuts, fruit juices, and bottle water in an organized and systematic manner. But they did not. Instead they spent hours playing cat and mouse, temporarily chasing away the looters. <br> <br>We were finally airlifted out of New Orleans two days ago and arrived home yesterday (Saturday). We have yet to see any of the TV coverage or look at a newspaper. We are willing to guess that there were no video images or front-page pictures of European or affluent white tourists looting the Walgreen's in the French Quarter. <br> <br>We also suspect the media will have been inundated with "hero" images of the National Guard, the troops and the police struggling to help the "victims" of the Hurricane. What you will not see, but what we witnessed, were the real heroes and sheroes of the hurricane relief effort: the working class of New Orleans. The maintenance workers who used a fork lift to carry the sick and disabled. The engineers, who rigged, nurtured and kept the generators running. The electricians who improvised thick extension cords stretching over blocks to share the little electricity we had in order to free cars stuck on rooftop parking lots. Nurses who took over for mechanical ventilators and spent many hours on end manually forcing air into the lungs of unconscious patients to keep them alive. Doormen who rescued folks stuck in elevators. Refinery workers who broke into boat yards, "stealing" boats to rescue their neighbors clinging to their roofs in flood waters. Mechanics who helped hot-wire any car that could be found to ferry people out of the City. And the food service workers who scoured the commercial kitchens improvising communal meals for hundreds of those stranded. Most of these workers had lost their homes, and had not heard from members of their families, yet they stayed and provided the only infrastructure for the 20% of New Orleans that was not under water. <br> <br>On Day 2, there were approximately 500 of us left in the hotels in the French Quarter. We were a mix of foreign tourists, conference attendees like ourselves, and locals who had checked into hotels for safety and shelter from Katrina. Some of us had cell phone contact with family and friends outside of New Orleans. We were repeatedly told that all sorts of resources including the National Guard and scores of buses were pouring in to the City. The buses and the other resources must have been invisible because none of us had seen them. <br> <br>We decided we had to save ourselves. So we pooled our money and came up with $25,000 to have ten buses come and take us out of the City. Those who did not have the requisite $45.00 for a ticket were subsidized by those who did have extra money. We waited for 48 hours for the buses, spending the last 12 hours standing outside, sharing the limited water, food, and clothes we had. We created a priority boarding area for the sick, elderly and new born babies. We waited late into the night for the "imminent" arrival of the buses. The buses never arrived. We later learned that the minute the arrived at the City limits, they were commandeered by the military. <br> <br>By day 4 our hotels had run out of fuel and water. Sanitation was dangerously abysmal. As the desperation and despair increased, street crime as well as water levels began to rise. The hotels turned us out and locked their doors, telling us that the "officials" told us to report to the convention center to wait for more buses. As we entered the center of the City, we finally encountered the National Guard. The Guards told us we would not be allowed into the Superdome as the City's primary shelter had descended into a humanitarian and health hellhole. The guards further told us that the City's only other shelter, the Convention Center, was also descending into chaos and squalor and that the police were not allowing anyone else in. Quite naturally, we asked, "If we can't go to the only 2 shelters in the City, what was our alternative?" The guards told us that that was our problem, and no they did not have extra water to give to us. This would be the start of our numerous encounters with callous and hostile "law enforcement". <br> <br>We walked to the police command center at Harrah's on Canal Street and were told the same thing, that we were on our own, and no they did not have water to give us. We now numbered several hundred. We held a mass meeting to decide a course of action. We agreed to camp outside the police command post. We would be plainly visible to the media and would constitute a highly visible embarrassment to the City officials. The police told us that we could not stay. <br> <br>Regardless, we began to settle in and set up camp. In short order, the police commander came across the street to address our group. He told us he had a solution: we should walk to the Pontchartrain Expressway and cross the greater New Orleans Bridge where the police had buses lined up to take us out of the City. The crowd cheered and began to move. We called everyone back and explained to the commander that there had been lots of misinformation and wrong information and was he sure that there were buses waiting for us. The commander turned to the crowd and stated emphatically, "I swear to you that the buses are there." <br> <br>We organized ourselves and the 200 of us set off for the bridge with great excitement and hope. As we marched past the convention center, many locals saw our determined and optimistic group and asked where we were headed. We told them about the great news. Families immediately grabbed their few belongings and quickly our numbers doubled and then doubled again. Babies in strollers now joined us, people using crutches, elderly clasping walkers and others people in wheelchairs. We marched the 2-3 miles to the freeway and up the steep incline to the Bridge. It now began to pour down rain, but it did not dampen our enthusiasm. <br> <br>As we approached the bridge, armed Gretna sheriffs formed a line across the foot of the bridge. Before we were close enough to speak, they began firing their weapons over our heads. This sent the crowd fleeing in various directions. As the crowd scattered and dissipated, a few of us inched forward and managed to engage some of the sheriffs in conversation. We told them of our conversation with the police commander and of the commander's assurances. The sheriffs informed us there were no buses waiting. The commander had lied to us to get us to move. <br> <br>We questioned why we couldn't cross the bridge anyway, especially as there was little traffic on the 6-lane highway. They responded that the West Bank was not going to become New Orleans and there would be no Superdomes in their City. These were code words for if you are poor and black, you are not crossing the Mississippi River and you were not getting out of New Orleans. <br> <br>Our small group retreated back down Highway 90 to seek shelter from the rain under an overpass. We debated our options and in the end decided to build an encampment in the middle of the Ponchartrain Expressway on the center divide, between the O'Keefe and Tchoupitoulas exits. We reasoned we would be visible to everyone, we would have some security being on an elevated freeway and we could wait and watch for the arrival of the yet to be seen buses. <br> <br>All day long, we saw other families, individuals and groups make the same trip up the incline in an attempt to cross the bridge, only to be turned away. Some chased away with gunfire, others simply told no, others to be verbally berated and humiliated. Thousands of New Orleaners were prevented and prohibited from self-evacuating the City on foot. <br> <br>Meanwhile, the only two City shelters sank further into squalor and disrepair. The only way across the bridge was by vehicle. We saw workers stealing trucks, buses, moving vans, semi-trucks and any car that could be hotwired. All were packed with people trying to escape the misery New Orleans had become. <br> <br>Our little encampment began to blossom. Someone stole a water delivery truck and brought it up to us. Let's hear it for looting! A mile or so down the freeway, an army truck lost a couple of pallets of C-rations on a tight turn. We ferried the food back to our camp in shopping carts. <br> <br>Now secure with the two necessities, food and water; cooperation, community, and creativity flowered. We organized a clean up and hung garbage bags from the rebar poles. We made beds from wood pallets and cardboard. We designated a storm drain as the bathroom and the kids built an elaborate enclosure for privacy out of plastic, broken umbrellas, and other scraps. We even organized a food recycling system where individuals could swap out parts of C-rations (applesauce for babies and candies for kids!). <br> <br>This was a process we saw repeatedly in the aftermath of Katrina. When individuals had to fight to find food or water, it meant looking out for yourself only. You had to do whatever it took to find water for your kids or food for your parents. When these basic needs were met, people began to look out for each other, working together and constructing a community. <br> <br>If the relief organizations had saturated the City with food and water in the first 2 or 3 days, the desperation, the frustration and the ugliness would not have set in. Flush with the necessities, we offered food and water to passing families and individuals. Many decided to stay and join us. Our encampment grew to 80 or 90 people. <br> <br>From a woman with a battery powered radio we learned that the media was talking about us. Up in full view on the freeway, every relief and news organizations saw us on their way into the City. Officials were being asked what they were going to do about all those families living up on the freeway? The officials responded they were going to take care of us. Some of us got a sinking feeling. "Taking care of us" had an ominous tone to it. <br> <br>Unfortunately, our sinking feeling (along with the sinking City) was correct. Just as dusk set in, a Gretna Sheriff showed up, jumped out of his patrol vehicle, aimed his gun at our faces, screaming, "Get off the fucking freeway". A helicopter arrived and used the wind from its blades to blow away our flimsy structures. As we retreated, the sheriff loaded up his truck with our food and water. Once again, at gunpoint, we were forced off the freeway. All the law enforcement agencies appeared threatened when we congregated or congealed into groups of 20 or more. In every congregation of "victims" they saw "mob" or "riot". We felt safety in numbers. Our "we must stay together" was impossible because the agencies would force us into small atomized groups. <br> <br>In the pandemonium of having our camp raided and destroyed, we scattered once again. Reduced to a small group of 8 people, in the dark, we sought refuge in an abandoned school bus, under the freeway on Cilo Street. We were hiding from possible criminal elements but equally and definitely, we were hiding from the police and sheriffs with their martial law, curfew and shoot-to-kill policies. The next days, our group of 8 walked most of the day, made contact with New Orleans Fire Department and were eventually airlifted out by an urban search and rescue team. We were dropped off near the airport and managed to catch a ride with the National Guard. The two young guardsmen apologized for the limited response of the Louisiana guards. They explained that a large section of their unit was in Iraq and that meant they were shorthanded and were unable to complete all the tasks they were assigned. <br> <br>We arrived at the airport on the day a massive airlift had begun. The airport had become another Superdome. We 8 were caught in a press of humanity as flights were delayed for several hours while George Bush landed briefly at the airport for a photo op. After being evacuated on a coast guard cargo plane, we arrived in San Antonio, Texas. <br> <br>There the humiliation and dehumanization of the official relief effort continued. We were placed on buses and driven to a large field where we were forced to sit for hours and hours. Some of the buses did not have air-conditioners. In the dark, hundreds if us were forced to share two filthy overflowing porta-potties. Those who managed to make it out with any possessions (often a few belongings in tattered plastic bags) we were subjected to two different dog-sniffing searches. <br> <br>Most of us had not eaten all day because our C-rations had been confiscated at the airport because the rations set off the metal detectors. Yet, no food had been provided to the men, women, children, elderly, disabled as they sat for hours waiting to be "medically screened" to make sure we were not carrying any communicable diseases. <br> <br>This official treatment was in sharp contrast to the warm, heart-felt reception given to us by the ordinary Texans. We saw one airline worker give her shoes to someone who was barefoot. Strangers on the street offered us money and toiletries with words of welcome. Throughout, the official relief effort was callous, inept, and racist. There was more suffering than need be. Lives were lost that did not need to be lost. <br> <br>Lyn H. Lofland <br>Research Professor <br>Department of Sociology University of California, Davis <br>One Shields Avenue <br>Davis, California 95616 USA <br>Telephone: 530-756-8699/752-1585 <br>FAX: 530-752-0783 <br>email: lhlofland <br>ucdavis.edu <br> <p></p><i></i>
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link

Postby somebody » Sun Sep 11, 2005 2:12 am

greencrow....do you have a link? <p></p><i></i>
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More on Blackwater Police State

Postby Starman » Sun Sep 11, 2005 4:26 am

Read a few freeper web-forums for some aded perspective -- The Blowback from this is being spun as a major Democratic assault on 2nd Amendment, and the predicted death of the Democrats in La. as gun-owners see the hiring of Blackwater goons is being linked with the forced disarming of N.O. resident holdouts in preparation for their forced evacuation.<br><br>This is just SO fuckin' nuts -- aren't there ENOUGH troops in N.O. already? And of course, Blackwater are now doing, for 10X the cost, what the GD purpose of the Lousianna National Guard is!!!!!<br><br>PLUS using Blackwater helicopters. Apparently, Blackhawk provided a Puma Helicopter for Search and Rescue on Sept. 1 -- Note the helicopter that crashed a coupla days ago was a 'civilian' Puma -- it COULD have been a Blackwater craft. Again, duplicating what National Guard and Navy. army, air force units are/should be capable of doing non-profit. Katrina's becoming a major gravy-train.<br><br>Also, check out this blog-link for an on-site report of a contracted aid-delivery run -- showing the acute fear and alarm being promoted by greatly-exaggerated and fixated 'news' reports really did a number on rescue and resupply personnel. It also mentions the police barricade on I-10 that prevented all 'unauthorized' people from trying to drive in to rescue N.O. victims, and that prevented anyone from walking out. This is the measure of extreme class-prejudice being practiced which is a symptom of an enormous social schism, news-hype that <br>provoked dangerous 'us vs them' thinking. About 6-stories down from the top.<br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://s95150067.onlinehome.us/zs/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=6210&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=576">s95150067.onlinehome.us/z...&start=576</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>So, major contract bonuses are being paid to bigtime GOP-linked businesses, esp. the whole Private Police 'security' scam.<br><br>Too Much -- It keeps getting worse and worse, more outrageous and in-your-face crazy-nuts-absurd-ominous every day. Unbelievable -- Twilight Zone Meets Blackhawk Down meets Outer Limits meets The Day After Tomorrow meets Patriot Games meets The Day of the Jackal.<br><br>My only solace now is to reflect that the more extreme the High and Proud and Mighty act, the greater they will Crash and Burn when they finally tumble. Unfortunately, they'll probably inflict a lot of destruction and pain on their way down. Has anyone heard any nation offering Americans political asylum?<br><br>The following story by Larry Chin offers another take on the Blackwater hiring for N.O. Police State.<br>Starman<br>***<br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=CHI20050908&articleId=905">www.globalresearch.ca/ind...icleId=905</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>Private Security and Mercenary Companies Patrol New Orleans<br>Reaping the Profits of a Humanitarian Disaster<br><br><br>by Larry Chin<br> <br>September 8, 2005 <br>GlobalResearch.ca <br><br><br>Email this article to a friend<br>Print this article <br><br><br>The Wednesday, September 7, 2005 broadcast of KPFA's "Flashpoints" featured a telephone interview with Malik Rahim, who gave a gut-wrenching and shocking firsthand account of the staggering horror of still-neglected New Orleans that he and other survivors are facing. In stark contrast to increasingly optimistic mainstream media coverage (cover-up) about "improving relief efforts" and "rebuilding", Rahim exposed the fact that there is no relief. No Red Cross, no food, no emergency medical care under a FEMA lockdown that has kept any relief from getting into New Orleans. <br><br>Meanwhile, as the Bush administration’s combat operations ramp up, and troops prowl the streets, no help whatsoever has been offered to residents, according to Rahim. Rotting corpses litter the streets, still not moved. People, heroically fending for themselves and their own, are being left in shocking conditions to suffer and die. "Between these disturbing [independent firsthand] reports, and accounts such as "The People of the Dome", New Orleans is being reduced to another Fallujah." (see L Chin at <!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/090505Chin/090505chin.html)">onlinejournal.com/Special...chin.html)</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>Rahim’s account confirms this---literally. According to Rahim, mercenaries from Blackwater USA are rumbling through the New Orleans streets, armed to the teeth and in full battle gear. <br><br>Blackwater USA is a private mercenary firm, one of many "war outsourcing" outfits working for the Pentagon. In the spring 2004 Fallujah assault, Blackwater was involved with combat as well as logistics (food shipments, etc.). Four Blackwater USA mercenaries were killed in Fallujah, raising worldwide attention. In February 2005, the former Director of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center, and the Bush State Department’s former Coordinator for Counterterrorism, Cofer Black, became Blackwater USA's Vice Chairman. <br><br>In "The Mercenary Variable: Outsourced combat in Iraq", US Army Special Forces Master Sergeant Stan Goff describes Blackwater as follows:<br><br>"Blackwater USA is a guns-for-hire training-and-recruitment outfit on a 6,000 acre military training compound on the northern coastal plain of Moyock, North Carolina, a stone's throw from the Virginia border."<br><br>"What differentiates them from the crazed, ex-military flotsam that rampaged through Congo in the 1960's is that they are (1) incorporated, (2) they use legally recognized financial/contract instruments, and (3), they work for recognized governments. The latter is a very finely drawn point, because governments frequently hire these legalized mercenaries at the insistence, and with the support, of multinational corporations who just happen – as it turns out – to be in the same place these outfits are doing their security.<br><br>"On the combat end, Blackwater USA is mostly ex-SEALs with a few former SWAT cops thrown in, run by a blustering hyper-macho ex-SEAL named Gary Jackson. One of the victims of the Fallujah ambush – a WWF-looking body-builder-type – had boasted to a reporter staying in his hotel in Baghdad that he preferred hand-to-hand combat so he could see his quarry eye to eye. When I was running a Special Forces A-Detachment, this kind of talk would have sent me seeking a way to reassign you out of my team." <br><br>The infamous Halliburton-KBR (Kellogg Brown & Root), the "classic" private military firm connected to Dick Cheney, is already in the area as well. Where there is oil, war, destruction and "rebuilding", there is KBR.<br><br>What are they doing in New Orleans? What is the Bush administration and FEMA up to, that the world is being kept from seeing? How many more Americans in New Orleans will die? <br> <br>******<br>From Blackhawks website:<br><br>morning (September 1, 2005), Blackwater USA joined the ongoing relief effort in the Gulf Region devastated by Hurricane Katrina by dispatching a SA-330J Puma helicopter to help assist in evacuating citizens from flooded areas.<br><br>Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Erik Prince stated, "At this time, all Americans should band together and assist our countrymen who have been struck by this natural disaster."<br><br>The following services are available:<br><br># Airlift Services<br><br># Security Services<br><br># Humanitarian Support Services<br><br># Logistics and Transportation Services<br><br>Anyone having a security or evacuation request may call<br>(252) 435-2052/2488. All requests shall be prioritized and acted upon as quickly as possible. <br><br><br> <p></p><i></i>
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the rise of 'private militias'

Postby rain » Sun Sep 11, 2005 6:08 am

has been the subject of much discussion in the last few years. just a few months back some of these outfits were actively recruiting.<br>it should come as no surprise to anyone the direction this will take. 'howl with the lupus boys, that pays'.<br>quick google. one example. -<br> <br>WORLD: Explosive Growth for Private Armies<br><br>Big money is involved in the private military business. Equitable Services, a security industry analyst. In 1997, Equitable Services, a security industry analyst, predicted that the international security market will mushroom from $56 billion in 1990 to $220 in 2010. This was long before the boost given to the sector by the September 11 attacks.<br> <br>In July 2002, Christopher Deliso recounted in antiwar.com that Dutch Radio, based on reports leaked by a Dutch military analysis firm, accused the US government of aiding and abetting terrorists in Macedonia. Not for the first time, the Americans were rumored to have hired the services of MPRI (Military Professional Resources, Inc.) to train and assist the rebels of the NLA, the Albanian National Liberation Army, which skirmished for months with the Macedonian police and military throughout last year.<br><br>MPRI is a leading Private Military Company (PMC) whose presence was espied in other Balkan trouble spots, such as Croatia, Kosovo, and Bosnia. The absurd is that MPRI has been training the Macedonia army - to little avail it would seem - since 1998 under a "Stability and Deterrence Program".<br><br>Croatian former Foreign Minister Tonino Picula described MPRI's role thus:<br><br>"We started at the beginning of the 1990's lacking all kind of assistance. We faced a war of aggression. We needed all kinds of friends to enhance our capability to keep a schedule. I know that it (MPRI) did a significant job in Croatia as a part of US assistance to Croatia during the 1990s."<br><br>Other governments - notably Colombia's and Nigeria's - were less sanguine about the utility of MPRI's services. Colombian officials complained "the MPRI's contributions were of little practical use", while according to the Center for Democracy and Development, the vociferous objections of the Nigerian military led to the dismissal by the president of senior army officers, among them General Malu, the Nigerian chief of staff.<br><br>The end of the Cold War spelled the termination of many an illustrious career in the military and the secret services - as well as the destabilization and disintegration of many states. The Big Powers are either much reduced (Russia), militarily over-stretched (Europe), their armies ill-prepared for rapid deployment and low intensity warfare (everyone), or lost interest in many erstwhile "hot spots" (USA). Besieged by overwhelming civil strife, rebellions, and invasions - many countries, political parties, politicians, corporations, and businessmen seek refuge and protection.<br><br>More than 5 million soldiers were let go all over the world between 1987-1994, according to Henry Sanchez of Rutgers University. Professional soldiers, suddenly unemployed in a hostile civilian environment, resorted to mercenariness. A few became rogue freelancers. The role of the Frenchman Bob Denard in the takeover of the Comoros Islands is now mythical. So is the failed coup in Seychelles in 1981, perpetrated by Colonel "Mad" Mike Hoare, a British ex-paratrooper.<br><br>Private armies for hire proliferated. Executive Outcomes acted in Sierra Leone, Congo, and Angola, Sandline International in Sierra Leone and Papua New Guinea, DynCorp in Colombia, Haiti, Kosovo, and Bosnia and, of course, MPRI in Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, and, lately, Macedonia. Aviation Development Corporation flies surveillance planes for the CIA. Its involvement was revealed when, in Peru, it misidentified a civilian light plane as carrying narcotics. It was shot down by the Peruvian air force.<br><br>But these are only the tip of a growing iceberg. Vinnell Corporation was established in the US during the Great Depression and is currently owned by TRW. It has coached militaries, operated facilities, and provided logistical support in more than 50 countries, starting in Saudi Arabia in 1975, where it won a controversial $77 million contract to train oilfield guards.<br><br>BDM International, Betac, Logicon, and SAIC are competitors, but Kroll of New York and Saladin Security of London do mainly intelligence gathering. Brown and Root of Houston, Texas, provide logistical support to peacekeeping operations, for example in Kosovo.<br><br>Pacific Architects and Engineering (PAE) furnishes logistical support and private security to armies the world over, mainly to the ECOMOG West African multilateral force. Control Risks Group offers corporate security, research, and intelligence solutions. It specializes in hostage situations. It boasts having advised in more than 1200 kidnappings and extortion cases in 80 countries.<br><br>Armor Holdings was founded in 1969 as "American Body Armor and Equipment" and incorporated in 1996. It is a Private Security Company (PSC). Its London-based subsidiary, Defense Systems Limited, guards industrial and other sensitive sites, such as embassies and HQ's of international organizations, mainly the UN's.<br><br>Armor itself manufactures police and other "non-lethal" equipment. It is a leading maker of armored passenger vehicles and the prime contractor to the U.S. Military for the supply of armoring and blast protection for High Mobility Multi-purpose Wheeled Vehicles (HMMWVs).<br><br>Gray Security is another PSC with clients in both Africa and among Latin American immigrants in Florida. Some PMC's are ethnically pure. Succumbing to market realities, the legendary Gurkhas now offer their services through Gurkha International. The oil-rich region of Cabinda is air-patrolled by AirScan - Airborne Surveillance and Security Services.<br><br>Big money is involved. The Los Angeles Times quoted, in its April 14th, 2002 issue, Equitable Services, a security industry analyst. In 1997, it predicted that the international security market will mushroom from $56 billion in 1990 to $220 in 2010. This was long before the boost given to the sector by the September 11 attacks.<br><br>"The top five executives at Science Applications International Corp. of San Diego made between $825,000 and $1.8 million in salaries in 2001, and each held more than $1.5 million worth of stock options." - continued the LA Times.<br><br>Control Risks Group's turnover exceeded $50 million in 2001. Armor Holding's 1999 revenues exceeded $150 million. Prior to its controversial demise, Executive Outcomes of South Africa was said to have earned c. $55 million in its last 4 years - excluding the $1.8 million per month contract it has signed with Sierra Leone, most of which went unpaid. There were unsubstantiated allegations of securing a share of the diamond trade in the ravaged country as well.<br><br>Sandline's contract with Papua New Guinea amounted to $36 million for the first 3 months with just under $1 million for any consecutive month - or a total of c. $45 million per the first year. The country's new government at first refused to honor the commitments of its predecessor - hurling at it vague corruption charges - but then compromised with Sandline and agreed to dole out $13 million.<br><br>Nor are these small ensembles. MPRI - now in its 17th year - employs over 800 people, most of them former high level US military personnel. It draws on a database of 12,500 freelancers "former defense, law enforcement, and other professionals, from which the company can identify every skill produced in the armed forces and public safety sectors". Many of its clients work under the US government's Foreign Military Sales program and abide by the GSA (General Services Administration) tariffs.<br><br>Control Risks Group - founded in 1975 as a subsidiary of the Hogg Robinson insurance group - claims to have had "more than 5,300 clients (including 86 of the Fortune 100 companies) in over 130 countries". Eighty three percent Of the firms comprising the FTSE 100 use one or more of CRG's services. It has 400 employees in 16 offices around the world. It has recently acquired Network Holdings Limited, the UK's largest private forensic laboratory.<br><br>The Armor Holdings Products Division is made up of nine operating companies in eight geographic locations. It offers its branded security products through a network of more than 500 distributors and agents internationally. ArmorGroup employs 5,500 people in 38 countries.<br><br>Modern PMC's, such as Sandline, are veritable - though miniature - armies, replete with staff military ranks, uniforms, doctrine, training syllabi, cohesion, unit spirit, and discipline.<br><br>Smaller, ad hoc, outfits from Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, France, the United Kingdom, Israel, Croatia, South Africa, the United States and other nationalities scour the Earth for emerging conflicts. Such units are often infiltrated by criminals on the run, terrorists in disguise, sadistic psychopaths, and intelligence officers.<br><br>These "dogs of war" are known for their disloyalty and lack of discipline. Many have committed acts of banditry, rapes, and an array of atrocities in the mutilated host countries. Still, these are marginal groups and in the minority of PMC's - the last resort, often hired by undesirables and failed states.<br><br>On February 12, 2002 the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office released a long-awaited briefing ("green") paper in support of regulating the private military sector. Quoted in "Defense News", the paper stated:<br><br>"The demand for private military services is likely to increase ... A strong and reputable private military sector might have a role in enabling the (United Nations) to respond more rapidly and more effectively in crises. The cost of employing private military companies for certain functions in U.N. operations could be much lower than that of national armed forces."<br><br>Regulation, though, has a poor record. All PMC's in the USA are subject to the porous and ill-enforced Arms Export Control Act overseen by the State Department. The Los Angeles Times is not impressed with the record:<br><br>"Congress is notified only of contracts worth more than $50 million. Sometimes there are conflicting views of what is in the U. S. interest. And once a license is granted, there are no reporting requirements or oversight of work that typically lasts years and takes the firms' employees to remote, lawless areas." Decisions often appear to be arbitrary and are mysteriously reversed. All major PMC's maintain lobbyists in Washington and function, partly, as rent seekers.<br><br>Still, PMC's are the most cost-effective alternative. According to the UN Special Representative to Sierra Leone, The UN peacekeeping mission there costs more than $500 million per year - compared to Executive Outcomes' $33 million spread over 21 months.<br><br>Regulation may amount to a belated acceptance of reality. MPRI boasts that it already operates in foreign countries with the full knowledge and "licence" of the American administration. It is a way to circumvent both the oft-withheld Congressional approval needed for US military involvement abroad - and unwelcome media scrutiny.<br><br>The US Army, in the framework of LOGCAP (Logistics Civil Augmentation Program), "preplans during peacetime for the use of civilian contractors to perform selected services in wartime and other contingencies. Utilization of contractors, in a theater of operation, will release military units for other missions or fill shortfalls." The ubiquitous MPRI is LOGCAP's main contractor.<br><br>Bahamas-incorporated Sandline also claimed British Foreign Office tacit approval of its mission in Sierra Leone. Most PMC's are self-regulating and selective. They won't render their services to organized crime, drug cartels, rogue states, terrorists, illegal arms traders, and regimes known for flagrant violations of human rights.<br><br>The privatization of hitherto exorbitantly costly peacekeeping and humanitarian operations would bestow legitimacy upon these outfits and entice them to adhere to strict regulatory codes. Still, the exercise of violence is a prerogative of states and a hallmark of often hard-gained sovereignty. Many do not take kindly to the encroachment of morally-neutral private sector replacements upon these hallowed grounds.<br><br>David Isenberg wrote in the March 11, 2002 issue of "Defense News":<br><br>"The only question is how best to address concerns about accountability, threats to a nation's sovereignty (i.e., usurping the state's prerogative of having a monopoly on violence), having a vested interest in perpetuating a conflict, violating human rights or acting as government proxies. The consensus opinion is that this is best accomplished through regulation."<br><br>The imperceptible line between "military advisors" and combatants is often crossed. According to the Los Angeles Times, Vinnell employees may have joined Saudi National Guard units in battle against the invading army of Saddam Hussein in 1991.<br><br>MPRI personnel are alleged by Ken Silverman in his book "Private warriors" and by numerous media - from the British journalist Paul Harris on Australia's Radio National's "Background Briefing" to The Scotsman - to have helped plan the Croatian occupation and ethnic cleansing of Serb-populated Krajina in 1995. Even the Foreign Military Training Report published by both the State Department and Department of Defence in May refers to these allegations against MPRI not entirely disparagingly.<br><br>Sanchez describes what happened in Papua New Guinea:<br><br>"When citizens of Papua New Guinea learned that their government signed a $27 million contract with EO (should be Sandline - SV) to train the Army to fight a secessionist rebel uprising it set off five days of rioting and protests. Even the Army commander (later convicted on unrelated corruption charges - SV) refused to work with the South African firm.<br><br>States that hire private firms for security are usually financially poor but mineral rich. They often pay for services by offering concessions earned through diamond mining, oil drilling or other natural resources. An enterprising military firm may end up exploiting a poor nation of its modest resources. As a result there may be a new 'Scramble for Africa' over resources where no government exists or is desperate for help..."<br><br>Few PMC's if any consent to any form of payment, except cash. Mineral concessions require heavy investments and existing mines require a logistical infrastructure often way beyond the expertise and financial wherewithal of the average PMC. PMC's may be involved in influence peddling on behalf of mineral extractors or receive introduction fees and commissions from multinationals, though. PMC's also make a lot of money on arms sales to their client states.<br><br>Consider Sandline International. It was never a shareholder in Branch Energy, DiamondWorks, or any other real or imaginary mining firm it was associated with by sloppy researchers and journalists. Nor was it the successor to Executive Outcomes. Yet, the same people acted as directors, or advisors in all these firms.<br><br>This incestuous setup led to the false assertions that Sandline - and EO before it - looted the mineral wealth of countries such as Sierra Leone and Angola. That many PMC's render security services to mining firms - both statal and private - adds to the confusion.<br><br>"The Financial Times" mentioned the positive role "Southern Cross Security" played in keeping Sierra Leone's titanium-dioxide mines intact throughout the war. Others wrongly accused it of being an EO offshoot out to pillage the minerals it sought to protect.<br><br>Even Sanchez acknowledges that "(others think that) a private company can deploy forces rapidly, avoid the difficulties of ad-hoc multinational forces (command is streamlined and cohesive), they usually have standing logistics for transport, appear to be cost-effective, and are willing to sustain loss of life".<br><br>Isenberg concurs:<br><br>"It is time to recognize that today's PMCs are far different from the ad hoc organizations of the past. As experts such as professor Herb Howe of Georgetown University have noted, many of today's companies exhibit a distinct corporate nature and a desire for good public relations. The companies' goal of obtaining contracts encourages them to control their employees' actions. Private firms have a large pool of qualified applicants, due to worldwide political realignments and defense cutbacks since 1989 ... One thing is clear: The need for security from the private sector is going to increase dramatically. And PMCs are going to fulfill that need."<br><br>PMC's have embarked on a concerted effort to alter their penumbral image. MPRI - its Web site replete with literary quotes lifted from the works of Marcel Proust and other renowned soldiers of fortune - has contracted with Enterprise Strategies and Solutions under the Department of Defence's Mentor-Protégé program. MPRI explains:<br><br>"ESSI's emphasis on economic well-being, technology transfer, corporate social investing, business incubation, and knowledge management complement the vital safety and security roles performed by MPRI. MPRI has the added advantage of being able to utilize the skill sets of a small, woman-owned, veteran-owned business. MPRI and ESSI form a comprehensive team that enables them to perform on a wide range of projects that would otherwise be inaccessible for one or the other."<br><br>MPRI branched out to offer corporate leadership programs that include the re-enactment of historical battles. It is a major provider of training, support, and "other services" - such as strategic planning and leader development - to the US armed forces, Department of Defense, the corporate sector, and "non-DoD government agencies." Its Web site - a sincere stab at transparency - lists dozens of military and semi-military contracts.<br><br>Its military contracts notwithstanding, it emphasizes the humanitarian side of its operations. It "shipped more than $900,000,000 worth of donated food and medical supplies to the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union over a five year period ... has provided peace keeping monitors for both the Department of Defense and the Department of State" and engaged in other charitable deeds, like demining.<br><br>In the Winter 2002 issue of "Harvard International Review", Sean Creehan summed up this shift in public perceptions:<br><br>"Today's mercenaries still fight for money, but in the context of global capitalism, some groups are becoming less morally objectionable. The organization of mercenaries into corporations that function like consulting firms has put distance between them and their activities. Mercenary corporations' increasing efficiency and self-regulation is influencing the way legitimate governments view mercenaries as instruments of state policy."<br><br>In a BBC poll conducted in the wake of the British government's Green Paper about regulating "soldiers of fortune", a reader named Katie raised important points regarding the corporate structure and liabilities of PMC's:<br><br>"The UK has a rather poor record of holding corporate officers responsible in any way for their actions ... Maybe military 'companies' should actually be restricted to being partnerships where the owners have unlimited liability similar to a lawyer's practice? Maybe a special class of company needs to be created, for this purpose so they can be audited and tracked and to clarify their relationship with the government (for whom they act). Essentially ... the directors of the company can be held responsible for war crimes as would ranking officers in the army. To some extent the 'corporate veil' needs to be thinner for these companies."<br><br>The United Kingdom - and Australia - promote a complete re-think of the concept of national defense. Britain's public-private partnership dubbed the "Private Finance Initiative" revolves around "paying privately for the defence we cannot afford publicly". Thus, transport planes, ships, trucks, training, and accommodation - may all be on long term leases from private firms. The equipment will be leased to other customers during down time, reports the BBC.<br><br>After all, when rich countries pay poor countries to send their ill-disciplined, ill-equipped, and ill-trained soldiers on peacekeeping operations - isn't this a mercenary system in all but name? And atrocities are not the preserve of "dogs of war". American regular soldiers committed them in Kosovo and Japan, Nigerian conscripts perpetrated them all over West Africa, "national armies" are feared by their own civilians more than any mercenary troupe. Time to rid ourselves of self-righteous myths and privatize peace as we, alas too often, did war.<br><br>Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. <br>Sam Vaknin's Web site is at <!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://samvak.tripod.com">samvak.tripod.com</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--> <br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=11960">www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=11960</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>corporate accountability.<br>that's funny, but I'm not laughing.<br><br> <br><br> <br> <br> <p></p><i></i>
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...and in my left hand...

Postby rain » Sun Sep 11, 2005 6:48 am

Private armies, public wars<br>Suraya Dadoo examines the role of private military companies in armed conflicts around the world. <br><br>Shock and sadness greeted the news that a bomb had ripped through a Saudi military installation in Riyadh in May this year killing 91 people, including 10 Americans. The target was a U.S. private military corporation (PMC) called the Vinnell Corporation, which has, controversially, been responsible for training the Saudi Arabian National Guard (SANG) since 1975. SANG is a military force whose main job is to protect the Saudi monarchy from its own people, and to guard Saudi oilfields. <br><br>Vinnell has helped the Saudis build their National Guard from 26 000 troops to around 70 000, and has supplied American arms and training from about 750 retired U.S. military and intelligence personnel employed by the Virginia-based Vinnell. According to a 2001 Boston Herald report, the Congressional Research Service, a non-partisan adjunct to the Library of Congress reported that there was presently an estimated 35 000 to 40 000 PMC workers (mostly Vinnell) inside the Saudi kingdom - a presence which many Saudi’s despise.<br><br>The Riyadh bombing was the second time in eight years that Vinnell’s operations in Saudi Arabia had been the target of an attack. In 1995 a car bomb blasted through an army-training program Vinnell was involved with, killing five Americans and wounding thirty more. At the time, a retired American military officer familiar with Vinnell’s operations was quoted as saying: "I don’t think it was an accident that it was that office that got bombed. If you wanted to make a political statement about the Saudi regime you’d single out the National Guard, and if you wanted to make a statement about American involvement you’d pick the only American contractor involved in training the guard: Vinnell."<br><br>According to Dr. William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the World Policy Institute at the New School for Social Research in New York City, and the author of And Weapons for All (Harper-Collins, 1995), the story of how Vinnell ended up becoming the Saudi monarchy’s personal protection service is typical of the United States government’s reliance on unaccountable private companies and unrepresentative foreign governments to do its dirty work on the world stage, short-circuiting democracy at home and abroad in the process. "In the wake of the Iran-Contra scandal and the end of the Cold War, many observers of U.S. foreign policy have assumed that this penchant for covert policymaking has been put aside, but Vinnell’s role in Saudi Arabia puts the lie to that comforting assumption" Hartung said. <br><br>The "dogs of war" have their day<br><br>For over three hundred years, the accepted international norm has been that only nation-states should be permitted to fight wars. However, several factors have led to the proliferation of PMC’s in the 1990’s. According to David Shearer, a research associate at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, the unemployment of more than five million soldiers all over the world between 1987 and 1994, and the increasing inability of weaker, poorer governments to counter internal violence have created a ready market for PMC’s. Western governments’ fears of sustaining casualties have placed increased pressure on a declining UN peacekeeping force unable to keep up with the physical and financial demands of policing conflicts around the world. <br><br>Not surprisingly, then, the rise of PMC’s, particularly American, in the last decade - and the possibility that they may view conflict as a legitimate business activity - has provoked outrage, and sometimes violence, as the Vinnell case in Saudi Arabi demonstrated. This has prompted calls for the "mercenaries" and "dogs of war" - as they have been labelled in the popular press - to be outlawed. <br><br>"Mercenaries" are officially prohibited under Article 47 of the Geneva Convention, which defines them as persons recruited for armed conflict, by, or in a country other than their own, and motivated solely by personal gain. However, few modern PMCs fit that definition completely and, indeed, spokesmen for such companies insist they rarely engage in combat and provide military skills only to legitimate, internationally recognized governments.<br><br>The Vinnell Corporation is only one of at least 90 PMCs that have operated in 110 countries worldwide. Most of these companies provide services usually carried out by a national military force, including military training, intelligence, logistics, combat and security in conflict zones. Their headquarters can be found mainly in the United States, but Britain, France, Israel and South Africa also house PMC’s. The vast majority of their services are performed in covert operations in conflict-ridden countries in Africa, South America, Asia, and the Balkans. <br><br>The business of war <br><br>American PMC’s are making a killing (pardon the pun) through the business of war. As the American government seeks to extend its sphere of influence around the globe, the U.S. Defence Department has entered into 3 061 contracts with 12 of the 24 U.S.-based PMC’s since 1994. This is according to an International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) investigation that revealed Pentagon records value those contracts at more than $300 billion. <br><br>Interestingly, more than 2700 of those contracts were held by just two companies: Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR) and Booz Allen Hamilton. KBR is a subsidiary of the Halliburton Corporation, which Richard Cheney, the U.S. vice president, headed as CEO from 1995 to 1999.<br><br>In 1992, the Pentagon, then headed by Cheney, who was Defence Secretary at the time, paid KBR $3.9 million to produce a classified report detailing how private companies could help provide logistics for American troops in potential war zones. Later in 1992, the Pentagon gave KBR an additional $5 million to update the report. KBR was also awarded contracts in 1995 and 1997 to provide logistical support in the Balkans, where the U.S. military has been enforcing the 1995 Dayton Peace accord that ended the war in former Yugoslavia. Those contracts spiralled to $2.2 billion worth of payments over five years, according to the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, reported the ICIJ. <br><br>Frank Carlucci, who served as Defence Secretary in the waning years of the Reagan administration, was chairman of Vinnell’s parent company BDM when it acquired Vinnell. He is still chairman of the Carlyle Group, a merchant banking firm that owns BDM and counts George Bush Snr., his secretary of state James Baker, former British prime minister John Major, and former Philipino prime minister Fidel Ramos, as advisers and consultants. <br><br>In 1975, Vinnell won a $77 million contract to train SANG and protect oil fields. The Saudi deal was considered the first time a U.S. civilian company obtained an independent contract to provide a foreign government with military services, a development initially greeted by significant scepticism and debate. Copies of 1991, 1995 and 2000 contracts, reviewed by ICIJ, show a total estimated value of nearly $500 million, and include training in counter-intelligence, "chemical defence" and other areas of operational security. Vinnell refused to comment on the contracts. From 1995 to 2000, subsidiaries of Vinnell’s parent company BDM reportedly obtained more than $150 million in contracts to provide logistical support and other services to the Saudi air force. <br><br>Vinnell has also been awarded a $48 million contract to train the nucleus of the new Iraqi Army. According to a Pentagon press report, work will be performed within various locations in Iraq beginning on 1 July this year, and is expected to be completed by the end of June next year. <br><br>The strong links between the U.S. government, and PMC’s that have been awarded contracts, raises serious questions about the revolving door between government and the private sector. These, and other, deals also reflect how pervasive America’s reach is, in terms of military involvement, and the lengths to which the American government is willing go to protect its own interests. <br><br>From Bosnia to Colombia …<br><br>In 2001, the United States government was accused of aiding and abetting terrorists in Macedonia. The Americans were rumoured to have hired the services of Military Professional Resources Inc. (MPRI) to train and assist the rebels of the NLA, the Albanian National Liberation Army, which skirmished for months with the Macedonian police and military.<br><br>MPRI’s presence was also noted in other Balkan trouble spots, such as Croatia, Kosovo and Bosnia, where its performance has been less than sterling. Other governments, most notably Colombia´s and Nigeria´s, were less buoyant about the utility of MPRI´s services. Colombian officials complained "the MPRI´s contributions were of little practical use," while according to the Center for Democracy and Development, the vociferous objections of the Nigerian military led to the dismissal by the president of senior army officers, among them General Malu, the Nigerian chief of staff. <br> <br><br>According to reports, the Bush administration has already given the go-ahead to MPRI to train the Guinean security force that will be in charge of guarding the off-shore oil installations in the tiny African country. <br><br>DynCorp, which has been involved in Colombia, Haiti, Kosovo, and Bosnia, was caught in a scandal in 2000 when two employees deployed on the company’s $15 million annual contract for logistical support in Bosnia and Kosovo alleged that several of their colleagues had colluded in the black-market trade of women and children. DynCorp later said the company did not tolerate such behaviour and fired those accused of the offences. <br><br>Aviation Development Corporation flies surveillance planes for the CIA. Its involvement was revealed when, in Peru, it misidentified a civilian light plane as carrying narcotics, and was shot down by the Peruvian air force. <br><br>It must be remembered that this article focuses specifically on the US government’s use of American PMC’s. The track record of South African and British PMC’s in conflicts in Angola, Sierra Leone and the Congo is just as abysmal. <br><br>The litany of charges and allegations against PMC’s are endless, and with no regulation on the manner and involvement of PMC’s in global conflict, the situation is likely to worsen. The lack of transparency regarding the award of contracts further heightens suspicion and mistrust around the world regarding America’s motives in its use of private military outfits to secretly do its dirty work. Thousands of innocent lives have been lost through the use of a secretive network of companies and shadowy intelligence operatives. The Cold War is over, and the culture of deception and covert dealing should have come to an end with it.<br><br>*Suraya Dadoo is a researcher with Media Review Network, an advocacy group based in Pretoria. (<!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.mediareviewnet.com)">www.mediareviewnet.com)</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br> <br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.mediareviewnet.com/Private%20armies%20public%20wars.htm">www.mediareviewnet.com/Pr...20wars.htm</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>what's not to understand about this situation ?<br> <p></p><i></i>
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id

Postby wintler » Sun Sep 11, 2005 7:29 am

This is a big step up from rentacops, and they're bad enough.<br><br>Curious if Blackwater contractors wear id numbers, like police are supposed to. Cops often don't wear their numbers when they expect to get heavy, but its an important restraint nonetheless - theres 0 personal accountability for force-weilders without them.<br><br>Y'all need blanket independent media watching these goons, day and night. Especially nights.<br> <p></p><i></i>
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Somebody wants link for personal story on New Orleans

Postby greencrow0 » Sun Sep 11, 2005 10:09 am

<!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.rense.com/general67/people.htm">www.rense.com/general67/people.htm</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>Reason I didn't post link is because <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>on some forums</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->, anything that comes from Rense.com is disregarded out of hand. In fact, Rense is like a lot of other websites...some good some not so good.<br><br>Regards,<br><br>GC<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 0] --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/alien.gif ALT="0]"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> <p></p><i></i>
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'he's both of daddy's hands'

Postby rain » Sun Sep 11, 2005 11:20 am

for a few days there, people were asking the question 'where's Cheney?'. <br>my bet would be on that he was fluffing the cushions and consulting his interior decorator at the bunker.<br><br>Mike Ruppert, before he went Oliver Twist -<br><br>FTW October 24, 2000 - The success of Bush Vice Presidential running mate Richard Cheney at leading Halliburton, Inc. to a five year $3.8 billion "pig-out" on federal contracts and taxpayer-insured loans is only a partial indicator of what may happen if the Bush ticket wins in two weeks. A closer look at available research, including an August 2, 2000 report by the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) at www.public-i.org, suggests ...<br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ciadrugs/bush-cheney-drugs.html">www.fromthewilderness.com...drugs.html</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br><br><br><br><br><br> <br> <p></p><i></i>
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re:Marcel Proust a mercernary? Who knew?

Postby hanshan » Sun Sep 11, 2005 5:35 pm

<br>tx, rain. Both informative articles.<br>Highlighting some key aspects<br>(& some humor)<br><br>from Sam Vankin :<br><br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>PMC's have embarked on a concerted effort to alter their penumbral image. MPRI - its Web site <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>replete with literary quotes lifted from the works of Marcel Proust and other renowned soldiers of fortune</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> - has contracted with Enterprise Strategies and Solutions under the Department of Defence's Mentor-Protégé program. MPRI explains:<br><br>"ESSI's emphasis on economic well-being, technology transfer, corporate social investing, business incubation, and knowledge management complement the vital safety and security roles performed by MPRI. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>MPRI has the added advantage of being able to utilize the skill sets of a small, woman-owned, veteran-owned business.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> MPRI and ESSI form a comprehensive team that enables them to perform on a wide range of projects that would otherwise be inaccessible for one or the other."<br><br>"Today's mercenaries still fight for money, but in the context of global capitalism, some groups are becoming less morally objectionable. The organization of mercenaries into corporations that function like consulting firms has put distance between them and their activities. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Mercenary corporations' increasing efficiency and self-regulation is influencing the way legitimate governments view mercenaries as instruments of state policy.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->"</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br><br>emphasis added<br>amusing; as in black humor<br><br><!--EZCODE IMAGE START--><img src="http://www.movieconnection.it/schede/minority_report/minority_report.jpg" style="border:0;"/><!--EZCODE IMAGE END--><br><!--EZCODE IMAGE START--><img src="http://www.wherehouse.com/amgcover/dvd/full/t0/00/t00020ipagy.jpg" style="border:0;"/><!--EZCODE IMAGE END--><br><br>& from Suraya Dadoo:<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Not surprisingly, then, the rise of PMC’s, particularly American, in the last decade - <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>and the possibility that they may view conflict as a legitimate business activity -</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> has provoked outrage, and sometimes violence, as the Vinnell case in Saudi Arabi demonstrated. This has prompted calls for the "mercenaries" and "dogs of war" - as they have been labelled in the popular press - to be outlawed. <br><br>"Mercenaries" are officially prohibited under Article 47 of the Geneva Convention, which defines them as persons recruited for armed conflict, by, or in a country other than their own, and motivated solely by personal gain. However, few modern PMCs fit that definition completely and, indeed, spokesmen for such companies insist they rarely engage in combat and provide military skills only to legitimate, internationally recognized governments.<br></em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> <br><br>Conflict as a legitimate business activity? Well now. this happens to have been unofficial state policy of <br>both the former USSR & US governments. Throw in a few<br>Israeli & ChiCom actions & voila: RealPolitik.That violence<br>has become privatized & corporatized should come as no surprise. Follow the money. However, the disturbing aspects, of which there are many, can be seen in miniature in the streets of NO w/ the appearance of Blackwater. Blurrring the lines between state & non-state actors.<br><br>tx again, rain<br><br><br><!--EZCODE FONT START--><span style="color:blue;font-family:comic sans ms;font-size:xx-small;">....</span><!--EZCODE FONT END--> <p></p><i></i>
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Re:Mercenaries guard homes of the rich in New Orleans

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Sep 11, 2005 11:03 pm

Jamie Wilson in New Orleans<br>Monday September 12, 2005<br>The Guardian <br><br><br>Hundreds of mercenaries have descended on New Orleans to guard the property of the city's millionaires from looters.<br>The heavily armed men, employed by private military companies including Blackwater and ISI, are part of the militarisation of a city which had a reputation for being one of the most relaxed and easy-going in America.<br><br>After scenes of looting and lawlessness in the days immediately after Hurricane Katrina struck, New Orleans has turned into an armed camp, patrolled by thousands of local, state and federal law enforcement officers, as well as 70,000 national guard troops and active-duty soldiers now based in the region.<br><br><br>Article continues<br><br>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br><br>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br><br>Blackwater, one of the fastest-growing private security firms in the world, which achieved global prominence last year when four of its men were killed and their bodies mutilated in the Iraqi city of Falluja, has set up camp in the back garden of a vast mansion in the wealthy Uptown district of the city.<br>David Reagan, 52, a semi-retired US army colonel from Huntsville, Alabama, who fought in the first Gulf war and is commander of Blackwater's operations in the city, refused to say how many men he had in New Orleans but indicated it was in the hundreds.<br><br>Asked if they had encountered many looters so far, Mr Reagan said that the sight of his heavily armed men - a pump action shotgun was propped against the wall near to where he was standing - was enough to put most people off.<br><br>Two Israeli mercenaries from ISI, another private military company, were guarding Audubon Place, a gated community. Wearing bulletproof vests, they were carrying M16 assault rifles.<br><br>Gill, 40, and Yovi, 42, who refused to give their surnames, said they were army veterans of the Israeli war in Lebanon, but had been living in Houston for 17 years. They had been hired by Jimmy Reiss, a descendant of an old New Orleans family who made his fortune selling electronic systems to shipbuilders. They had been flown by private jet to Baton Rouge, the capital of Louisiana, and then helicoptered to Audubon Place, they said.<br><br>"I spoke to one of the other owners on the telephone earlier in the week," Yovi said. "I told him how the water had stopped just at the back gate. God watches out for the rich people, I guess."<br><br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/katrina/story/0,16441,1567656,00.html">www.guardian.co.uk/katrin...56,00.html</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--> <p></p><i></i>
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Re: Re:

Postby seemslikeadream » Mon Sep 12, 2005 11:10 am

<!--EZCODE IMAGE START--><img src="http://www.theexperiment.org/media/merc.jpg" style="border:0;"/><!--EZCODE IMAGE END--><br><br>US contractor recruits guards for Iraq in Chile <br> The US is hiring mercenaries in Chile to replace its soldiers on security duty in Iraq. A Pentagon contractor has begun recruiting former commandos, other soldiers and seamen, paying them up to $4,000 (£2,193) a month to guard oil wells against attack by insurgents. <br>Last month Blackwater USA flew a first group of about 60 former commandos, many of who had trained under the military government of Augusto Pinochet, from Santiago to a 2,400-acre (970-hectare) training camp in North Carolina. <br><br>snip<br><br>The privatisation of security in Iraq is growing as the US seeks to reduce its commitment of troops. <br><br>At the end of last year there were 10,000 hired security personnel in Iraq. <br><br>snip<br><br>Their salaries can be as high as $1,000 a day, the news agency AFP recently reported. Erwin, a 28-year-old former US army sergeant working in Iraq, told AFP: "This place is a goldmine. All you need is five years in the military and you come here and make a good bundle." <br><br>http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1162392,00.html<br><br><br>The security contractors killed in Fallujah represented a little known reality of the war in Iraq<br><br><br>A nation that goes to war on principle may not realize it will then have to hire private soldiers to keep the peace. The work of the four American civilians slaughtered in Fallujah last week was so shadowy that their families struggled to explain what exactly the men had been hired to do in Iraq. Marija Zovko says her nephew Jerry said little about the perils of the missions he carried out every day. "He wouldn't talk about it," she says. Even representatives for the private security company that employed the men, Blackwater USA, could not say what exactly they were up to on that fateful morning. "All the details of the attack at this point are haphazard at best," says Chris Bertelli, a spokesman for Blackwater. "We don't know what they were doing on the road at the time." <br><br>What the murder of the four security specialists did reveal is a little known reality about how business is done in war-torn settings all over the globe. With U.S. troops still having to battle insurgents and defend themselves, the job of protecting everyone else in Iraq—from journalists to government contractors to the U.S. administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer—is largely being done by private security companies stocked with former soldiers looking for good money and the taste of danger. Pentagon officials count roughly 20 private companies around the world that contract for security work, mainly in combat areas. They are finding plenty of it in Iraq. Scott Custer, a co-director of Custer Battles, based in Fairfax, Va., says as many as 30,000 Iraqis and "several thousand expats" are working for private outfits in Iraq. Security contractors make a lot more than the average soldier, but last week's events suggest that they may also be turning into more attractive targets for insurgents. "If they can chase us out," says Custer co-director Mike Battles, "then in a void, they become more powerful." snip<br><br>The current business boom is in Iraq. Blackwater charges its clients $1,500 to $2,000 a day for each hired gun. Most security contractors, like Blackwater's teams, live a comfortable if exhausting existence in Baghdad, staying at the Sheraton or Palestine hotels, which are not plush but at least have running water. Locals often mistake the guards for special forces or CIA personnel, which makes active-duty military troops a bit edgy. "Those Blackwater guys," says an intelligence officer in Iraq, "they drive around wearing Oakley sunglasses and pointing their guns out of car windows. They have pointed their guns at me, and it pissed me off. Imagine what a guy in Fallujah thinks." Adds an Army officer who just returned from Baghdad, "They are a subculture." <br><br>Indeed, the relationship between the private soldiers and the real ones isn't always collaborative. "We've responded to the military at least half a dozen times, but not once have they responded to our emergencies," says Custer. "We have our own quick-reaction force now." But the private firms are usually cut off from the U.S. military's intelligence network and from information that could minimize risk to their employees. Noel Koch, who oversaw terrorism policy for the Pentagon in the 1980s and now runs TranSecur, a global information-security firm, says private companies "aren't required to have an intelligence collection or analytical capability in house. It's always assumed that the government is going to provide intelligence about threats." That, says Koch, means "they are flying blind, often guessing about places that they shouldn't go." <br>http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,607775,00.html<br><br>Mercenaries 'R' U.S. <br>Private Pentagon contractors are paying soldiers of fortune from <br>Chile and South Africa up to $4,000 per month for stints in Iraq <br>by Bill Berkowitz<br>www.dissidentvoice.org <br>April 5, 2004<br><br><br>Currently there are thousands of soldiers under contract with private companies serving in Iraq. "Squads of Bosnians, Filipinos and Americans with special forces experience have been hired for tasks ranging from airport security to protecting Paul Bremer, the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority," The Guardian's Franklin reported. <br><br>Chile isn't the only country from which private companies have recruited mercenaries for Iraq. According to the South Africa newspaper, The Cape Times, "More than 1,500 South Africans are believed to be in Iraq under contract to various private military companies." The United Nations recently reported that South Africa "is already among the top three suppliers of personnel for private military companies, along with the UK and the US." <br><br><br>Institute for Security Studies military analyst Henri Boshoff told Tromp that it appeared most of the South Africans in Iraq were former members of the South African Defense Force and South African Police. "The guys over there are walking a thin line, close to contravening the Foreign Military Assistance Act," he added. <br><br>According to the Web site of the South African-based Democratic Alliance, the private companies appear to be working in Iraq "in contravention of South African law." South African law states that all security companies working outside the country must register with the National Conventional Arms Control Committee (NCACC), headed by Minister of Education Kader Asmal. "So far," according to Tromp, "two companies, Meteoric Tactical Solutions and Grand Lake Trading 46 (Pty) Ltd, have submitted applications to operate in Iraq." <br><br>Meteoric Tactical Solutions "is providing protection and is also training new Iraqi police and security units," while another company, Erinys, a joint South African-British company which has failed to register with the government, "has received a multimillion-dollar contract to protect Iraq's oil industry," the Cape Times reported. Earlier this year, an Erinys employee was killed when a car bomb exploded at a hotel where South Africans have been staying. <br>http://www.dissidentvoice.org/April2004/Berkowitz0405.htm<br><br>CHIDANAND RAJGHATTA<br><br>TIMES NEWS NETWORK< FRIDAY, APRIL 02, 2004 08:17:12 PM ><br><br><br>WASHINGTON: While the United States is still seething at the killing of four American 'contractors' in Iraq and planning to retaliate against those in Fallujah where the crime was perpetuated, the episode has brought attention to a little-known practice – the US outsourcing of its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to its private armies. <br><br>Reports suggest that the United States is using between 10,000 to 15,000 private "contractors," more than the size of the British armed forces in Iraq, for policing and protection of its operations. <br><br>Most of these 'contractors' – who would be called mercenaries or militias or vigilantes in other situations – are former US armed forces personnel employed through private agencies. They are said to earn as much as $ 1000 a day. <br><br>more<br>http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/... ...<br><br><br>Making a Killing: The Business of War <br> WASHINGTON, October 28, 2002 — At least 90 companies that provide services normally performed by national military forces but without the same degree of public oversight have operated in 110 countries worldwide, providing everything from military training, logistics, and even engaging in armed combat. Amid the global military downsizing and the increasing number of small conflicts that followed the end of the Cold War, governments have turned increasingly to these private military companies to intervene on their behalf around the globe, a new investigation by the Center for Public Integrity's International Consortium of Investigative Journalists has found.<br><br>Arms dealers have profited from a massive unregulated sell off of low price surplus armaments into the most fragile, conflict-ridden states and failed states. The weapons, mostly from state-owned Eastern European factories, have found their way to Angola, Sudan, Ethiopia, Colombia, Congo-Brazzaville, Sri Lanka, Burundi and Afghanistan where conflicts have led to the deaths of up to 10 million people during the past decade. <br><br>Drawing on classified intelligence files, government reports, court records and public documents, the investigation identifies the non-state actors in this growth industry and explains how they often influence the turn of world events. The nearly two-year investigation, conducted by 35 writers, researchers and editors working on four continents, will be published in 11 installments: <br><br>Today: Making a Killing: The Business of War An overview of privatization of combat since the end of the Cold War; <br>Today: Privatizing Combat, the New World Order A look at the world of private military companies, and the issues raised by the trend of outsourcing war; <br>Wednesday: Marketing the New Dogs of War How mercenaries, with the aid of public relations professionals, rebranded themselves as private military companies; <br>Nov. 4: Greasing the Skids of Corruption A case study of how the pursuit of oil in the third world fuels corruption and war;<br>Nov. 6: The Curious Bonds of Oil Production The U.S. government and a private military company court an oil rich state whose government has been accused of serious human rights violations; <br>Nov. 8: Conflict Diamonds are Forever Poor controls in the international diamond industry even in South Africa are undercutting attempts to clamp down on conflict diamonds that fuel wars in Africa and, possibly, fund terrorists;<br>Nov. 11: The Adventure Capitalist While Africa's wars have brought untold misery to millions, some have seen conflict in the region as a business opportunity; <br>Nov. 13: The Influence Peddlers An entrepreneur with global ties to arms smuggling, resource exploitation and private military companies epitomizes the business of war; <br>Nov. 15: The Field Marshal An arms trader who admitted to breaking a U.N. arms embargo also claimed ties to French intelligence, the Iranian government, and the since bought out oil company, Elf Aquitaine; <br>Nov. 18: Drugs, Diamonds and Deadly Cargoes When he was arrested on a drug charge in Milan, Leonid Minin, an arms trader under investigation across Europe, had his business records with him, providing a detailed look into the world of war commerce; <br>Nov. 20: The Merchant of Death Victor Bout, who has been accused of fueling Africa's bloodiest conflicts, ran a global transportation network with bases and front companies in Europe, the Middle East, Afghanistan, South Africa, Equatorial Guinea, and even the United States. <br>The Center is also providing access to ICIJ's searchable database that chronicles the global operations of the private military companies. Most of the PMCs, as they are known, are based in the United States, Britain and South Africa, but the vast bulk of their services are performed in conflict-ridden areas of Africa, South America and Asia.<br><br>more<br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.publicintegrity.org/report.aspx?aid=177&sid=100" target="top">www.publicintegrity.org/report.aspx?aid=177&sid=100</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br><br>Modern Mercenaries on the Iraqi Frontier <br> <br><br>In Iraq, hired guns guarding the American administrator, L. Paul Bremer III, second from right, and an Iraqi official.<br><br>By JAMES GLANZ<br><br>Published: April 4, 2004<br><br>IN his own way, Stevie is a modern soldier-of-fortune, paid by a private security firm to lead a 44-man unit that is protecting American officials in charge of rebuilding the infrastructure of Iraq. He left his native Glasgow, Scotland, to join the British army at 16, served for 24 years in conflicts around the globe, about half that time as a member of the special forces. In the shadowy tradition of his trade, he asked that only his first name be used and declined to say much about the wars he has fought. <br><br>"That is one topic I'd rather not talk about," he said in his rich brogue, speaking by phone from the Baghdad villa run by Kroll Inc., the company that employs him.<br><br>But as Stevie begins describing himself and the men in his unit, the footloose, swashbuckling stereotype of his profession evaporates. He reckons that 75 percent to 80 percent of his unit is married. He has been married for 19 years, with three children back home. Mostly in their 30's and 40's, his men typically have not just one or two decades of military experience, but clean driving records and stable lives back home - wherever home might be.<br><br>Such is the corporate but still consummately dangerous world of "security" or "risk management" firms that have struck gold in the lawless frontiers of Iraq. They are hired by private and government contractors, by the media, and by the Coalition Provisional Authority itself to provide protection from the bullets and bombs that still make up so much of daily life there. It was one of the largest of these firms, Blackwater U.S.A., that lost four employees in a horrific ambush in the central city of Fallujah last week. <br><br>more<br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/04/weekinreview/04glan.html&OP=34b86c28Q2FQ5DQ27x,Q5DDHQ3Bg0HH)3Q5D3CC2Q5DC2Q5DC2Q5DQ27xxQ3DtT0xmtxQ27Q5DC2VYGTQ25Q23)dY" target="top">www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/04/weekinreview/04glan.html&OP=34b86c28Q2FQ5DQ27x,Q5DDHQ3Bg0HH)3Q5D3CC2Q5DC2Q5DC2Q5DQ27xxQ3DtT0xmtxQ27Q5DC2VYGTQ25Q23)dY</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br><br>The use of private military forces raises tricky questions for the U.S. government. The most important one is why is the Bush administration is recruiting civilians to work there when our government can't possibly guarantee the security of the area. Another question: Why aren't these jobs in combat zones being carried out by American military forces, instead of mercenaries? <br><br>Building up a surrogate military force, along the lines of the French Foreign Legion or the Gurkhas, has been the ambition of conservatives for many years. The thinking is that future wars will be characterized by "low-intensity," or guerrilla, warfare. If the fighting is done by a force of irregular surrogates, people won't question their casualties as they would those of regular military personnel. The contras in Nicaragua were an example of what a surrogate fighting force might look like, and special ops types from South Africa’s former apartheid regime have long been involved in fighting in southern Africa. <br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.theexperiment.org/articles.php?news_id=2020" target="top">www.theexperiment.org/articles.php?news_id=2020</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>Post-war Contractors Ranked by Total Contract Value in Iraq and Afghanistan<br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.theexperiment.org/articles.php?news_id=2020" target="top">www.theexperiment.org/articles.php?news_id=2020</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>Campaign Contributions of Post-war Contractors<br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.publicintegrity.org/wow/resources.aspx?act=contrib" target="top">www.publicintegrity.org/wow/resources.aspx?act=contrib</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br><!--EZCODE IMAGE START--><img src="http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/2004/04/04/weekinreview/Glanz583.jpg" style="border:0;"/><!--EZCODE IMAGE END--><br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>THE DOGS OF WAR <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>and their blood money</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--></strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br>http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=125&topic_id=9558 <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=seemslikeadream@rigorousintuition>seemslikeadream</A> at: 9/12/05 9:13 am<br></i>
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Re:more on Blackwater

Postby seemslikeadream » Mon Sep 12, 2005 2:29 pm

<br>Blackwater’s best-kept secret: It s founder<br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=69806&ran=206879">home.hamptonroads.com/sto...ran=206879</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br><br><br>Inside Blackwater USA<br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=69804&ran=196624">home.hamptonroads.com/sto...ran=196624</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--> <p></p><i></i>
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Re: Re:more on Blackwater

Postby dbeach » Mon Sep 12, 2005 2:43 pm

the prince is a knave<br><br>gets af ree bee from Uncle Sam..all his neato commando training paid for by the US taxpayer..and he is only one..there are many like him..never served in a war zone and yet orders his monsters to kill other human beings many of whom have NEVER hurt anyone and have not hurt any Americans.<br><br>these chikenhawks make me ill and I know lots of Vets who are non-plussed with the entire situation..giving these guys a license to kill.<br><br>PUNKS .<br> shooting unarmed civilains..and they know they are unarmed.<br><br>bush destroyed 2 cities in Iraq cuz 4 illegal mercanaries were killed by the so called insurgents.<br><br>GET A LIFE!!!<br><br>Hiring mercenaries is illegal. <p></p><i></i>
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