A.Ceku & H.Thaçi
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corporations & contractors

highly informative article   excerpt
Remilitarizing Africa for corporate profit
10.00   John E. Peck ¹ ACAS Z Magazine

Testimony to this effect in Aug. 1997 before the UN chief war crimes prosecutor Louise Arbour was suppressed and only leaked to the media this year; see Steven Edward's 3.1.00 expose in Canada's National Post. Yet, to read Clinton apologists like David Shearer in Intl Insti. for Strategic Studies journal Survival (Summer 1999), one might think U.S. an innocent bystander rather than covert instigator of Africa's strife.
Also kept under wraps is that for past 5 years, U.S. Green Berets armed & coached Rwandan soldiers as well as their Ugandan allies to deadly effect. According to Wash.Post 7.12.98 investigation, Kagame's troops received low intensity conflict training in such areas as camouflage, small unit movement, marksmanship, patrolling, night navigation, and soldier team development, both at Ft. Bragg, SC and in Rwanda.

Beyond $12 million in official govt-to-govt U.S. arms sales to Africa in 1998, the White House also approved $64 million in private commercial weapons transfers, incl M-16s, pistols, revolvers, rifles and 10million rounds of ammunition. How much of this arsenal ended up with chronic human rights abusers, like Kagame, no one will ever know. Critics pointed to Pentagon subcontractor Ronco, supposed de-mining company, as the major U.S. gun runner to Rwanda 1994 to 1996 in violation of UN sanctions.
Florida-based Airscan also implicated in funneling Pentagon weapons for counter-insurgency operations of Uganda's People's Defense Force, as well as to rebels in southern Sudan fighting the Khartoum regime. AirScan founder retired Brig.Gen. Joe Stringham was responsible for secretive U.S. counter-insurgency activities against the FSLN during El Salvador's civil war. From the current conflicts in Sierra Leone & Liberia to protracted hostility between Ethiopia & Eritrea, U.S. military expertise & weaponry is deployed across the continent.

As already shown, ACRI poses no limits on Pentagon hiring of armed proxies to do dirty work in private security boom in Africa since Cold War end. Corporate concessions for mercenary protections are now "business as usual" throughout much of the continent. For example, British-based Defense Systems Ltd holds contracts not only for De Beers, but also Texaco, Chevron, Anglo-American and Bechtel in unstable countries as Mali, Nigeria, and Angola.

Colonial history has many examples of corporate mercenary collaboration. Dutch East India Co. was one of first to employ ex-soldiers from German state of Wurttemberg back in 1707. Defying the advice of classical political theorists like Sun Tzu, Machiavelli, and Weber, U.S. now abdicates its monopoly over exercise of lethal force in order to expand corporate free trade. Unlike assassins & thugs of yesteryear, Guy Arnold in 1999 book Mercenaries observes that today's hired guns are spun as wholesome cost-effective professionals, "claiming, spuriously or not, that they only work for legitimate govts."
Armchair technocrats seem esp. enamored with retrofitted mercenaries, as retired general & White House Office of National Drug Control Policy dir. Barry McCaffrey gleefully told Dallas Morning News 2.17.00 "I am unabashedly an admirer of outsourcing … there's very few things in life you can't outsource."

In African Studies Assoc. journal, Issues 1998 issue, Wm Reno duly notes that mercenaries must be licensed by State Dept's Office of Defense Technology Control and Pentagon's Defense Technology Security Admin. before they get federal contracts to screen "rogue elements," reckless freelancers such as 4 U.S. smugglers masquerading as missionaries who got caught entering Zimbabwe with a large cache of weapons last year. According to an unidentified State Dept. official quoted in the Nation 7.28.97, "Training a military is a lot more than teaching guys how to shoot guns straight …
The companies offer instruction in how to run a military in a democracy, subordination to civilian control and respect for human rights." Whether officially authorized and suitably sanitized or not, such subcontracting of state terror doesn't bode well for human rights & civil liberties in Africa. Once promising leaders hailed by White House as harbingers of "African Renaissance" since became brutal despots, an almost inevitable outcome when foreign policy places a premium on corporate free trade and military law & order, rather than sustainable development & genuine democracy.

Hypocrisy aside, geopolitical advantages of corporate militarism are numerous: scant media coverage, limited public awareness, as well as govt deniability when covert mission scenarios go awry. Few shed tears when soldiers of fortune come home in body bags from overseas conflagrations. That's just the cost of doing that sort of work, and no one officially knew about it anyway. Under 1949 Geneva Convention, mercenaries lack POW rights accorded regular combatants which is why, when Angola's MPLA captured several mercenaries back in 1976 there was little global outcry about their showcase trial & subsequent execution. S.African-based private defense firm Executive Outcomes (EO) did suffer 20 casualties fighting UNITA rebels under $40million per year contract with Angola 1993 to 1995.

Emerging "revolving door" relationship between the Pentagon & approved U.S. private defense outfits does offer today's corporate mercenary more perquisites than ever before. Some even enjoy amenities as embassy guards, standing in for regular marines in parts of Africa. Taxpayer-subsidized military expenditure also is "exempt" from challenge under Article XXI of the WTO; some predict a fresh arms race worldwide as ruthless regimes & greedy companies take advantage of this "free trade" loophole.
According to Pentagon officials, private defense firms hired via ACRI are also safe from the prying eyes of investigative journalists & concerned citizens since their WTO "proprietary rights" supercede meddlesome national legislation like Freedom of Information Act.

USIS also provides background investigation services to various state & local govt agencies as well as major corporations including Delta Airlines, Coca-Cola, DLJ Direct and IBM. The Company plans to continue to expand its service offering through selective acquisitions such as the completed acquisition of United Labs, Inc., which performs drug and alcohol testing to screen existing and prospective employees. The Company, headquartered in a high-security underground facility in rural western PA (Annandale) ¹   had approximately 1,000 full-time employees and 700 independent contractors at approximately 142 locations throughout the U.S. as of 8.31.99.

Police crossed line by arresting onlookers, protesters say 4.8.03   Shaila K. Dewan NY Times

New York   Antiwar protesters said the police arrested more than 70 people yesterday who were merely looking on as others lay down on a sidewalk to block the entrance of a Midtown office building. The police said they arrested only those who broke the law.
The demonstrators gathered about 8 a.m. on 56th St near Fifth Aven across the street from a building that houses offices of an affiliate of Carlyle Group investment firm that the protesters contend is profiting from the war in Iraq. About 20 people crossed to the south side of the street and lay in front of the building, said Mark Milano, a member of the M-27 Coalition, a group that planned the demonstration. Scores of others who were neither willing nor prepared to be arrested stayed on the north side, he said.

After the police arrested those on the south side of the street, Mr. Milano said, they moved across the street and penned in the crowd there, arresting them as well. Coalition spokeswoman Cheree J. Dillon said the latter group was not told to disperse and was not allowed to leave.
There were 94 arrests in all, for civil disobedience and obstructing govt administration, the police said, adding that the protesters were blocking pedestrian traffic. "The police effected arrests of people who broke the law," said Capt. James Klein, a police spokesman. "If they have questions about their innocence or guilt, they will be allowed to voice that in a court of law."

Antiwar organizers said the arrests were part of a pattern of police harassment, which they said has included holding protesters arrested on misdemeanor charges for as long as 10 hours. "We're alarmed at the police trying to intimidate antiwar protesters," said William K. Dobbs, a spokesman for United for Peace and Justice, which organized large NYC antiwar marches in Feb. & March.
The police maintain that they have not violated any free speech rights.
The protesters say the Carlyle Group & affiliate, Riverstone Holdings, which invests in the energy industry, stand to profit from the war and any subsequent rebuilding in Iraq. But a spokesman for the Carlyle Group, Chris Ullman, responded that "Carlyle is proud to own a few companies that make products that keep America safe."

[ Taking genocide public, dumping to re-pump ]
Computer Sciences to buy Dyncorp
12.13.02   Reuters   ¹ ²

Exchange ratio of Computer Sciences granted for each DynCorp share will depend on CSC shares closing price for 15 days leading up to a DynCorp shareholder vote on the merger. If av. CSC closing share price is above below $28 for that period, CSC has the right to increase the cash component of the deal such that the total value is equal to $55 per DynCorp share. If CSC elects not to do so, DynCorp has the right to terminate the takeover.
Shares of Computer Sciences closed at $34.67 on NYSE on Thursday.
CSC lowered its FY2003 11.5.02 profit forecast to $2.60 per share from a range of $2.73 to $2.88 per share, citing slack demand for its consulting & systems integration services in N.America and a challenging environment in Europe.

"With this transaction, we are seizing an opportunity to significantly strengthen our leadership position in the U.S. federal marketplace, augment our capabilities to support the requirements of the new Homeland Security Dept and respond to the federal govt's initiative to increase its reliance on service providers," said CSC chair & CEO Van B. Honeycutt.
The deal will help Computer Sciences compete against rivals IBM & Electronic Data Systems in the market for supplying technical consulting & computer services.

Shareholders OK Northrop-TRW deal
12.12.02   AP

The sale is expected to close within a day or two. The votes came a day after Northrop announced an agreement with the Justice Dept that the merger will not impede fair & open competition related to electronics in spacecraft. Its competitors include #1 defense contractor Lockheed Martin.
  [ cf. Michael Moore documentary film "Bowling for Columbine" (2002) re Lockheed Martin social service subsidiary. ]

Titan worker claims he was abandoned in Iraq
Friendly-fire victim says he's fighting for compensation
7.24.05   David Washburn, Bruce V. Bigelow SD UT

As U.S. soldiers advanced on Baghdad in March 2003, Mazin al Nashi was in a Titan Corp. conference room in Fairfax VA, preparing for his own deployment. At 50, the Iraqi-born La Mesa resident was too old for the military. But he was fluent in Arabic, French and English, a valuable skill to the San Diego defense contractor as it scoured the nation and beyond for translators willing to help the war effort. Nashi was more than willing. He felt a duty to serve his adopted country.
"When President Bush said, 'You are either with us or against us,' I wanted to serve because I knew for sure that I could help," Nashi said recently.
He quit his job as a private security guard to join Titan as a translator, a job that would pay more than $70,000 a year. By April 2003, he was on the ground in Iraq. 7 months later he was back home, a victim of a friendly-fire accident that he said left him blind and in constant pain.
Nashi said going to work for Titan was the biggest mistake of his life.

He said Titan neglected him from the time he set foot in Iraq and has fought him over medical costs and disability payments since his return home.
"Titan did not treat me with respect," he said.
Co. spokesman Wil Williams confirmed that Nashi worked for Titan in Iraq but declined to elaborate. Likewise, Army representatives declined to comment on specifics regarding Nashi's claims. U.S. Labor Dept, which is involved in Nashi's disability claim, confirmed the accident and said Nashi was wounded by a piece of shrapnel.

Nashi's tenure with Titan started full of promise. A March 27, 2003, welcome letter from the company began, "We are most impressed by your capabilities and past performance and are delighted to consider you part of our growing team."
In Fairfax, he passed the language tests and was told that his diabetes would be no problem in Iraq because he would have ready access to needed medication. He said he also was told that he would be housed, fed and supervised by a site manager throughout his time there.
But he said that after landing in Kuwait he was put on a bus, without Army escort, on its way to Camp Bucca, a U.S.-run prison 300 miles south of Baghdad. He said he was dropped off at the prison and, from that point on, essentially left to fend for himself.
"I was thinking we would have a building to live and work in, cold water, a generator," Nashi said. "We had nothing. Titan made absolutely no arrangements."

Titan officials say many linguists from U.S. have been taken aback by the austere conditions in Iraq. The company even mentions in employment ads that linguists work in harsh environments. Nashi said that at first he couldn't even get a tent. U.S. soldiers, whom he said were often jealous of civilians who make far more money, told him they didn't have a tent for him. He said he ended up sleeping in a tent provided by the British army.
His worries escalated when he learned that the fledgling Iraqi insurgency had put a $250,000 bounty on the heads of interpreters. He had never received any body armor from Titan.
"I couldn't go out on the streets," he said. "I would have been killed."

As Nashi's months in Iraq went by, his wife grew increasingly worried about his situation. She said she called Titan repeatedly, but that no one responded. Eventually, she turned to the San Diego office of the Red Cross. Layla al Nashi's call was answered by San Diego chapter's Armed Forces Emergency Services call-center coordinator Fabrizio Casini. He still remembers details from her initial 8.11.03 call.
"She was in tears. She was desperate for help," Casini recalled. "She was afraid that he was dead."
The Red Cross was able to get her message to her husband within a week. On Aug. 16, the couple spoke, but it was only for minutes because the phone kept cutting out.

Over the next 3 days, Mazin al Nashi's situation got worse. He said that on Aug. 19, he was riding in a Humvee with a group of soldiers from the 400th Military Police Battalion when a soldier accidentally fired his weapon. He said the bullet ricocheted inside the vehicle and hit him on the side of his helmet.
"It felt like a big hammer had hit me on the head," Nashi said.
Another bullet punctured the Humvee's gas tank, and everyone began a mad dash out of the vehicle, fearing that it would explode, Nashi said. In the confusion, he was hit with the butt of a rifle and knocked unconscious. He was alone in the Humvee until a soldier dragged him to safety. But because he was a civilian, the MPs didn't know what to do with him. So they took him back to his tent at the jail.
"I was crying. The pain was terrible," Nashi said.

He said that a few hours later, a Titan official came to his tent and took him to the Army hospital at the Baghdad airport. But he said no tests were done and that he received no treatment other than pain relievers. Then, at 4:45 that afternoon, the United Nations compound in Baghdad was bombed in one of the first major blows by the insurgency in Iraq. The hospital was suddenly overrun with patients in more critical condition than Nashi, so he was discharged. The Titan official took him back to his tent at the Army base at the airport and left, Nashi said.
For 3 days he lay alone in his tent, slipping in and out of consciousness, he said. Despite his injuries, Nashi said, he decided to return to work because it seemed safer than remaining alone and semiconscious in his tent. But he said his eyesight deteriorated over the next 2 months to the point where he could no longer walk without assistance.

He begged his Army handlers to send him to Kuwait, which they eventually did. From Kuwait he was sent to the Army's Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. William Black, an American working in Germany at the time, said he took Nashi under his wing after finding the forlorn translator sitting alone at the hospital.
"I remember him; he was kind of an odd duck," Black said in a telephone interview from his home in Germany. Nashi was spending 18 hours a day in a bunk at Ramstein Air Force Base and apparently trying without success to get medical treatment at Landstuhl.
Black, a former Marine Corps officer, had just started a volunteer effort to help wounded warriors who were hospitalized at Landstuhl. He included Nashi in one of the first trips he organized, which included dinner at a local restaurant and a tour of a famous German castle. During the dinner, Nashi said his blurry vision was suddenly getting worse.

Alarmed, Black quickly ended the dinner and returned Nashi to the emergency room at Landstuhl. He said he also tried to get someone from Titan to help.
"We contacted Titan 4 or 5 times, and they just gaffed off," Black said. "They didn't care."
On 11.25.03, just over 6 months after an excited Nashi had hugged his wife and boarded a plane to Fairfax, he was back at Lindbergh Field in a wheelchair. In addition to his blindness, Nashi said he has stroke like symptoms on the right side of his body. He said he experiences pain in his neck so severe that he cannot stand up straight for any length of time. He said he rarely sleeps through the night.
He is receiving disability payments though AIG, Titan's insurance carrier, but said the payments are hundreds of dollars less a month than he is due. He has also spent thousands on medical care that he said Titan should pay. The former security guard now spends most of his days sitting at home. Every Wednesday, he attends life-skills classes at the San Diego Center for the Blind and Vision Impaired.

"He is an American citizen. He went to serve his country," Layla al Nashi said, crying. "What we created for our life is going down the drain."

Weak link in chain of command could prove deadly   With some 2,000 U.S. Marines to be under British command and an untold number of America's elite soldiers taking orders from the CIA, serious problems could arise from an unusual chain of command
3.8.03   Christopher Bollyn American Free Press

Several thousand U.S. soldiers will be taking orders directly from foreign commanders in the event of a joint military invasion of Iraq's southern port of Basra. Meanwhile, untold numbers of elite U.S. soldiers, already in Iraq, are serving under the command of the CIA. Although Pentagon & Langley VA CIA HQ refuse to discuss these matters, military experts warn that a confused chain of command could cause "some quite serious problems" in the heat of battle.
In what is described as an "unprecedented" development since WWII, some 2,000 U.S. troops will be placed under British command in the event of war on Iraq, London's Financial Times reported 3.4.03. 15th Marine Expeditionary Force was named as one of the American units expected to be under British command. U.S. Marines will be under the "technical command" of British Brigadier Jim Dutton, commander of Britain's 3 Commando Brigade. U.S. Marines would "most likely" accompany a British-led force of some 4,000 Royal Marines in an amphibious assault on the southern city of Basra, Iraq's only port.

The unusual arrangement by which the Pentagon will hand over control of some of its forces to a British field commander was said to be giving a political boost to British PM Tony Blair, who is under intense pressure for his support of military action in the gulf. "This is a surprise departure from usual U.S. policy," Jane's World Armies ed. Charles Heyman said. "There must have been quite a lot of political maneuvering in the background to achieve this."
Former British army officer Heyman expressed concern about how the line of command would work in practice after British defense officials confirmed that USMC commanders could question an order from a sr British officer by going over his head to U.S. central command, directed by U.S. Gen. Tommy Franks, based in the gulf emirate of Qatar.
"It is not an ideal situation. In the heat of battle this could cause some quite serious problems. I suspect Jim Dutton is trying to figure out at the moment exactly what this means," he said.

Pentagon spokesman Dave Lapan said he could not discuss the matter. When asked about U.S. Marines falling under British command in the field, a spokesman for the secretary of the Navy said, "I don't have any information about that."
"That is correct, some U.S. troops will be under British technical command," Britain's Ministry of Defense spokesman Jonathan Spencer told American Free Press. However, Spencer refused to answer when asked if any British troops would be under direct U.S. command, or why it was necessary for U.S. troops to be under British command. Minister of Defense Geoff Hoon said Britain has 30,000 troops in the region while the United States is reported to have more than 200,000.

Who is Tommy Franks?
"Overall command is 4 star general Gen. Tommy Franks, " Spencer said. "Franks will work jointly with Air Marshall Brian Burridge, Britain's national contingent commander." U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) is a "unified joint command," which was developed from the concept of the Rapid Reaction Task Force initiated by President Reagan. Central Command is under the direct command of only 3 men: President Bush, DefSec Rumsfeld and Franks.
CENTCOM has no forces of its own. Troops & assets from the various branches of the military are allocated to Franks's command to carry out his mandate. Franks has been mentioned as the man who will administer Iraq in the event that U.S. & British military forces occupy the MidEastern state of 25 million people.

Questions about Franks's background are not answered in any biographical sources or the spokesmen of CENTCOM. Biographical entries about Franks are unusual in that they do not include the names of his parents or his religion. Asked about why so little information is available about the man who will lead the nation's forces in war, a Defense Dept spokesman said: "He's had his bio out that he wants to put out. He has certain rights."
"Because we are in a different age, that is force protection," Pentagon spokesman Dan Hetlage said about the secrecy behind Franks's background. "That's a personal decision [to release personal information]. [His religion] makes no difference. He takes his orders from the president. Would it make a difference if Gen. Franks or Gen. Hetlage were in command?"

Franks is said to be the only child of Wynnewood, OK construction worker Ray Franks & seamstress & homemaker Lorene Franks. Soon after his birth in 1945, his family is said to have relocated to Bush's former hometown of Midland, TX, where Franks was a lineman on the high school football squad.
An archivist in Midland checked the town records and found the Franks family listed only from 1955 to 1962, during which time Ray worked at a local hardware store. From 1945 to 1955 there is no mention of the Franks family in Midland records, according to the archivist.

Having attended the same high school in Midland as the president's wife, Laura Welch Bush, Franks moved to Austin, where he attended UT for about 2 years before dropping out and joining the Army. After serving in Vietnam, Franks was selected to participate in the Army's "Boot Strap Degree Completion Program," and subsequently attended UT Arlington, where he graduated with a degree in business administration in 1971. After a long career in the Army, Franks was promoted to general by former DefSec Wm Cohen and placed in charge of Central Command, which is responsible for the entire MidEast area.

Franks's precise religion is in question to many. "My faith in God is important," Franks said in an interview. One independent investigator, James W. von Brunn of Easton, Md., told AFP, "That in itself says a lot. He's hiding something." Having conducted "an intensive search" into Frank's background, von Brunn was "unable to find anything."

"Hordes of Rambos" serving under CIA Deputy Director of Operations James L. Pavitt are already scouring Iraq searching for targets and testing Iraqi responses, according to the German news magazine Der Spiegel. Its March 1 cover story featured photos of the CIA's heavily armed advance commandos moving through Iraq. These paramilitary forces, bearded & without uniforms, appeared to be mixed with non-Americans alongside recruits from elite U.S. forces.
"Specialists from the U.S.'s large reservoir of elite troops are being assigned to Langley, a move that has infuriated the commanders of these highly effective Pentagon units," Der Spiegel reported. "They [Defense Dept] are being forced to give up their people, while the CIA takes the credit for their successes."

The CIA recruits its "shadow warriors" in the bars of Fayetteville, NC near Army's elite Green Berets HQ. The CIA pays its special commandos just under $10,000 more than the Pentagon pays its soldiers, the article said. Teams of elite soldiers are also "officially borrowed" from the Navy Seals and the special forces of the Air Force. When a soldier is transferred to the CIA's top-secret unit, his military papers are modified to mimic an honorable discharge into civilian life, according to Der Spiegel.

Asked about the factual basis of the story, CIA spokes man Tom Crispell told AFP, "We are not going to comment on the story." Asked if active U.S. military personnel are serving with Pavitt's paramilitary units in Iraq & Afghanistan, Crispell said, "We would not comment" on military personnel being assigned to the CIA. Spokesmen for the Pentagon & different branches of the U.S. military all refused to answer any questions.

President Bush has officially elevated the CIA to the leadership position in the war against terrorism, according to Der Spiegel. FBI agents must now report the findings of their terrorism investigations to the director of the CIA, it said. "For the first time since Vietnam & Watergate, CIA special commandos are once again permitted to commit murder, and can do so without consulting the White House," the article said.
"We are doing these things. We have always done these things," CIA head of clandestine operations Pavitt said in a speech to the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Law & National Security 1.23.03. "We understand that secrecy is a grant of trust, not a grant of immunity. We understand that we act in the name of the American people, and that we must act in keeping with the laws they honor and the values they cherish," Pavitt said.

Former CIA expert on Iraq Robert Baer speaking of Pavitt's Directorate of Operations, home of the CIA's paramilitary army, said it is "the only institution within the federal govt that devotes itself entirely to the task of breaking laws, the laws of other countries."

U.S. companies hired to train foreign armies
4.14.02   Esther Schrader LA Times

"The war on terrorism is the full employment act for these guys," said Pentagon's Defense Security Cooperation Agency spokesman D. B. Des Roches. A little-known but increasingly essential addition to the modern battlefield, the firms, studded with retired American generals, have been training the world's more ragtag armies since the 1970s when a group of Vietnam veterans discovered that there was money to be made marketing military expertise and sold Saudi Arabia on a plan to teach its army how to guard its oil fields.
Business has burgeoned in the messy post-Cold War world. The firms, modern-day mercenary companies armed with Powerpoint presentations instead of weapons, operate today in more than 40 countries, often under contract to the U. S. govt. For the Pentagon, with one-third fewer soldiers than a decade ago but a growing number of entanglements in unlikely places, hiring out foreign armies' training has become indispensable. Every U. S. military operation in the post-Cold War era has involved significant levels of support from private military firms, from the Persian Gulf to Somalia, Zaire, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo and Croatia. But the industry has met with growing criticism by military experts who charge that the firms work with little oversight and less accountability, particularly when hired by foreign govts.

Plans to use the firms in Afghanistan are still preliminary. Although training of an Afghan military force has begun, there is no timetable for turning the task over to contractors. With Afghanistan still volatile, Pentagon officials are grappling with just how private trainers, who typically do not carry weapons, should be employed. Since 9.11.01 and Pentagon's launch of the war on terrorism, stock prices of the publicly traded contractors have soared. Already, trainers from private military companies are in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, where Al Qaeda operatives are believed to be hiding. Executives of several private military companies have met with Pentagon officials about training other armies in Central Asia. "A lot of people have said, 'Ding ding ding, gravy train,' " Des Roches said. "But in point of fact, it makes sense. They're probably better at doing these sorts of missions than anyone else I could think of."
Boasts MPRI executive retired Army Lt. Gen. Harry E. Soyster, most prominent of the private contractors: "We've got more generals per square foot here than in the Pentagon." Although the most successful of the U. S. firms carefully screen their employees, prohibit them from carrying arms and generally reject contracts with govts the U.S. considers unsavory, they operate in a world populated by a darker breed of ex-soldiers who serve as guns for hire to thugs throughout the world. Competing military companies in Britain & S.Africa have hired out their employees as combatants in Angola & Sierra Leone. Employees of the U. S. companies sometimes take up weapons themselves, employees of the firms say.

"We're talking about places where the govts have very little control over their territory . . . where our govt has no control over what these firms tell the sometimes very questionable people they work for about how to fight," said, George Washington Univ. political science prof. Deborah Avant, authority on the the private sector role in war.
"The more we put these people in riskier areas, the more they have to make these judgments on their own." The U.S. based companies say their goals dovetail with a long-held U. S. policy of encouraging military-to-military ties worldwide in the hope that professional armies can help stabilize fragile democracies.
[ PMC outsourcing is corporate welfare, not defense of democracy. ]

MPRI, founded in 1988 by former Army Chief of Staff Carl Vuono & 7 other retired generals, has trained militaries throughout the world under contract to the Pentagon. It counts 20 former senior military officers on its board of directors. The firm operates from a bland office building in Alexandria, VA., its halls as hushed as an insurance firm. Decor betrays its founders' tough credentials . A statue of a knight in armor stands in a corner of the lobby. MPRI's emblem is an unsheathed sword.
"These guys are not about to destroy reputations they've spent 30 years building just for a buck," said Soyster, who once headed the Defense Intelligence Agency. "We go someplace because we are either sent there by the U. S. govt or we're contracted by another govt. We do it for the money, I'm not ashamed to say. But we do it right."
The financial rewards presumably beat Pentagon salaries. Since 9.11.01, per-share price of stock in L3 Communications, which owns MPRI, has more than doubled. The top 5 executives at Science Applications Intl 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.

Revenues from the global international security market, of which the firms are a part, are expected to rise from $55.6 billion in 1990 to $202 billion in 2010, according to a 1997 study by Equitable Services Corp., security industry analyst. Renting trained killers dates back hundreds of years; privately recruited regiments were common in the U. S. Civil War. But selling military expertise has roots in Vietnam, when commercial teams funded by the Pentagon provided military & police training to South Vietnamese forces.
In 1975, McLean, VA based Vinnell Corp. won a $77-million contract to train Saudi Arabian infantry & artillery battalions to defend oil fields. It was the first time American civilians were permitted to sell military training directly to a foreign military. The job was controversial, and Senate Democrats held hearings. But the contract stuck. Other similar firms began to emerge. End of cold war led to dramatic growth. Suddenly, there was a pool of skilled former officers, some from Special Forces units, eager to sell the expertise they had developed as relatively low-paid soldiers. They found a ready market at the Pentagon, and in dozens of countries in Africa, Asia and the former Soviet sphere eager to professionalize their militaries.

The major U. S. firms in the field include MPRI, Vinnell, BDM International Inc. of Fairfax, Va., Armor Holdings Inc. of Jacksonville FL.; DynCorp of Reston, Va., and SAIC. Armor Holdings was among Fortune magazine's 100 fastest-growing companies in 1999 and 2000, one of the few firms on the list not related to technology. The people they hire are hardly soldiers of fortune. They are generally former military officers with 20 to 30 years of experience, generously pensioned retirees for whom the money is just part of the allure.

Many describe their work as public service, a way to practice military diplomacy. Often they freelance, taking on contracts that send them abroad for a year or so. They train armies how to use such complex hardware as armored personnel carriers, surface-to-air missiles, shoulder-fired antitank missiles, ships and aircraft, and other equipt typically sold to foreign armies by U.S.. They prep officers in military strategy, run battle simulation centers, and have helped support peacekeeping efforts in troubled regions under contract to the Pentagon & State Dept.

MPRI has trained military forces in dozens of countries, including Croatia, Bosnia, Macedonia and Colombia. DynCorp trained the Haitian police force after the 1994 U. S. intervention in the island nation. MPRI & several other firms, under contract to the State Dept, established the African Ctr for Strategic Studies to teach fledgling democracies how to run professional armies. French Foreign Legion they are not. "One leitmotif of the business is how boring the individual jobs can be on almost all of the contracts that the big U. S. firms have. It is like being in the peacetime Army, Navy or Air Force," said one Special Forces former member, airborne infantry who for more than 2 decades has trained foreign militaries in Indochina & the MidEast. "I'm not a mercenary," this trainer said. "I like excitement, but I have to be on the side of angels. Do not look for me to look for excitement [by] working on the side of vicious people."

But even the most polished of the firms have blemished histories. Employees of DynCorp were fired after being accused 2 years ago of keeping Bosnian women as concubines. Companies hired by the CIA in the 1980s trained foreign fighters later charged with atrocities in El Salvador and Honduras. When the firms are hired by the Pentagon or State Dept, as they would be in Afghanistan, their work is audited and sometimes supervised by U.S. military personnel, a process the State Dept says helps prevent abuse. But when they sell their services directly to other countries, there are minimal controls.
The only U. S. regulation of such foreign contracts is through the State Dept, which issues export licenses under the Arms Export Control Act. The law regulates the sale of military services just as it does the export of a crate of guns.

The dept reviews applications to ensure that no sales are made or services performed that would "undercut U. S. interests," spokesman Jason Greer said. The firms say this prevents them from working with govts that the U. S. disapproves of. When MPRI tried to get a license to train the Angolan army in 1994, for example, the State Dept turned it down.

But Congress is notified only of contracts worth more than $50 million. Sometimes there are conflicting views of what is in the U. S. interest. 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. In 1998, MPRI applied for a license to help the govt of Equatorial Guinea build its coast guard. The tiny African country is run by a military dictator who has been implicated in human rights abuses. It has no U. S. Embassy. The contract was initially rejected by 2 State Dept desks, according to a dept official & Soyster. But the decision was reversed 2 years later after MPRI lobbyists argued that if it was not allowed to do the job, a competitor from another country would.
"There are people who think you should not help people, that they don't deserve to be helped, even though they want to make a change," Soyster said. "We say, don't let past mistakes get in the way of doing something that should be done today." Even when doing the job they describe, the firms' role is sometimes cloudy. In 1995, during a UN embargo on arms sales to Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Yugoslavia, MPRI persuaded the State Dept to grant it a license to train Croatia's military, pledging that it would teach only leadership skills, budgeting and military ethics. When the Croatian military, in a highly effective offensive called Operation Storm, captured the Serb-held Krajina enclave later that year, there were suspicions that MPRI instructors must have been directly involved. The operation played a key role in reversing the tide of war against the Serbs and, consistent with American policy, in bringing both sides to the negotiating table. But the same Croatian military was subsequently implicated in uprooting more than 150,000 Serbs from their homes.

The company denies that its employees played any direct role in the Croatian army's sudden transformation into an effective fighting force. "I can assure you if we had the capability to train an army in a month to turn it around that fast, I wouldn't be talking to you, I'd be flying you over to the Riviera on the way to see it for yourself," Soyster said. "If we could do that to Croatia, we could straighten out Afghanistan in a couple of months." But critics charge that the help MPRI provided the Croatians may have allowed the U. S. to secretly influence events in the war while maintaining its neutral posture and without sending U. S. troops, advisors or trainers.
"MPRI had all these different meetings with top Croatian defense officials right before the offensive. It's inconceivable that they did not have some kind of impact," said one military analyst who has followed the company's involvement in the Balkans. "It was followed by massive ethnic cleansing. Now, had American troops been on the ground, we would have been held accountable for that. The fact that it was a private company made the connection a lot less clear." The line between training foreign troops and fighting with them sometimes blurs.

When Saddam Hussein's army invaded the Saudi Arabian border town of Khafji in February 1991, Vinnell employees accompanied Saudi national guard units into combat, according to 2 employees of Vinnell and an employee of another private military company who was in Saudi Arabia at the time. The Vinnell employees had been stationed in the region to instruct Saudi soldiers in operating heavy weapons systems. "Their job was to teach those guys, not to fight with them, but sure, the Vinnell instructors accompanied those units into combat," an employee who witnessed the counterattack said. "Under extraordinary circumstances, but very, very rare circumstances, you will see employees of the MPRIs of this world get into a circumstance where they can't say no. . . . Let's face it, they're human beings."
Said Vinnell spokesman Kevin O'Melia: "I'm not aware that that happened, and our company policy is that they not be directly involved. They're hired as advisors only . . . and that's the capacity in which we expect them to act."

In Afghanistan, the plan is for up to 150 U. S. Special Forces troops to begin training Afghan recruits, then to turn the effort over to private U. S. contractors. Defense officials have said for months that only by having an army of its own can Afghanistan hope to create the stability that is critical if the country is to avoid remaining a haven for terrorists. DefSec. Rumsfeld has said he might seek money from Congress and other foreign govts to finance the army. Some basic training of several hundred Afghan recruits is already underway, led by British & German members of the international security force there. But thousands of other potential Afghan soldiers have yet to be tapped, and international financial support for building Afghanistan's army has been slim.
It is unclear how large an Afghan force would be needed to suppress factional conflicts and patrol the country's borders. But some defense officials have put the number at more than 20,000. "I think we'll start off with our own guys because the Afghans are more comfortable at this point with people in uniform who they know," said a sr defense official familiar with the plan. "But at some point down the pike, we will move to contractors. We have to. We don't have the people to do it all ourselves."

And if the corporate warriors succeed in Afghanistan, the Pentagon will be eager to send them elsewhere, defense officials said. "This is big business among these companies. They are furiously bidding on involvement in Afghanistan and the war on terrorism," said P. W. "Pete" Singer, an Olin Fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies Program at the Brookings Institution in Washington. "The minute the Pentagon started to use the phrase 'a program to train & equip the Afghan army,' buzzers went off."

Iraqi mob kills 4 Americans   Civilians' bodies are mutilated by a cheering crowd in Fallouja 4.1.04   E.Sanders, T.Perry, A.J.Rubin, S.Rifai L.A. Times

Fallouja, Iraq   A mob of angry Iraqis attacked 2 vehicles carrying U.S. civilian security workers Wednesday in this anti- American stronghold, killing the 4 contractors, mutilating their remains and hanging 2 of the charred corpses from a bridge over the Euphrates River. In scenes reminiscent of the 1993 attack against U.S. soldiers in Somalia, at least one of the torsos was tied to a car and dragged through the street as scores of adults & children cheered & danced.
The assault came hours after 5 U.S. soldiers were killed about 12 miles away by a powerful roadside bomb that hit their armored personnel carrier. The bombing brought to 597 the total number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq since the war began in March 2003.

The Fallouja attack's brutality nearly a year after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime underscored rage many Iraqis feel toward the occupation as well as the continuing challenge faced by the U.S. military in hot spots such as Fallouja. U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad rejected comparisons to the Somalia attack, in which images of an American soldier's mutilated body being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu spurred the U.S. to pull its troops out of the African nation.
Coalition forces spokesman Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said U.S. would not back down. "In fact, it would be disgracing the deaths of these people if we were to stop our missions," he said. U.S. officials said the assailants did not represent the views of most Iraqis. White House press secretary Scott McClellan in Wash.D.C. called killing of the U.S. civilians "a despicable attack, it is a horrific attack. Our thoughts & prayers are with the families of those victims," he said. "But we will not be intimidated. And the best way to honor those who have lost their lives is to continue to show resolve in the face of these cowardly, hateful acts designed to intimidate and roll back the democratic progress and the freedom for the Iraqi people that we are achieving."

Wednesday's attacks culminated one of the bloodiest months since President Bush declared an end to the major combat phase of the war on 5.1.03 and came as occupation officials hurried to prepare to hand over sovereignty to a new Iraqi interim govt 6.30.04. U.S. officials declined to identify the contractors who were killed Wednesday, pending notification of their families.
But Blackwater Security Consulting, based in Moyock, NC, said the contractors worked for the firm. Blackwater is a security company that has been guarding convoys delivering food in the Fallouja area. An American passport & U.S. Defense Dept identification card were found near one of the bodies, AP reported. The report could not be independently confirmed. Video footage also showed a Fallouja resident displaying what appeared to be dog tags taken from a body.

Witnesses said the victims were in 2 sport utility vehicles driving through the center of Fallouja's commercial district about 9:30 a.m. While stopped at an intersection, they were attacked by a gang of insurgents whose head scarves covered their faces. After being struck by rocket-propelled grenades, the vehicles caught fire or were set ablaze by the mob, witnesses said.
"One person fell out of the car and was attacked by the crowd," said a car dealer who watched the attack from his lot. "People were saying they were CIA." Cameras captured images of one of the contractors, dressed in a white shirt & beige pants, lying face down on the pavement next to the car door in a pool of blood.

As flames & plumes of black smoke shot from the vehicles, scores of Iraqis pulled the charred bodies from the wreckage. They repeatedly struck one of the corpses with a long pole and hacked apart torsos with shovels. Triumphant-looking Iraqis watched, chanting, "Kill the Americans!" and "We sacrifice our blood & souls for Islam!"
"There's the leg of one of the Americans!" shouted one boy about 8 years old, pointing to a charred limb that had been flung over a telephone wire. One charred torso was tied with a yellow cord to the back of a car and dragged through the street as cheering men, most of them in Western-style clothing, ran alongside and cheered, according to witnesses & officials.
  [ Proof aplenty Arab civilization is devolved; public celebration via corpse desecretion is barbarity unmatched even by remote control Western genocide & Vietcong ear collectors ]

The scene at the bridge over the Euphrates resembled a public lynching. 2 badly burned corpses were hung upside down by ropes on the metal frame of the structure and members of the mob waved their arms in the air and posed for photos. A sense of euphoria appeared to envelope the crowd in a city that has been the scene of nearly constant fighting with the Army & Marines since the fall of the Hussein regime. It also may have included an element of revenge in the wake of a series of firefights late last Friday in which one Marine and at least 18 insurgents & others were killed.
U.S. military forces did not arrive on the scene until several hours after Wednesday's attack, witnesses said. A few Iraqi police officers watched the violence unfold, but did little to stop it.

At a briefing in Baghdad 7 hours after the attack, a senior U.S. military official said he did not know whether U.S. Marines had yet arrived on the scene to offer assistance and restore the peace. "It's my understanding that the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force is currently either there or going there," Kimmitt said. Asked whether military officials believed that it was too dangerous to enter the city, Kimmitt said, "I don't think that there is any place in this country that the coalition forces feel is too dangerous to go into."
Kimmitt blamed the attack on supporters of Hussein's former regime. "Fallouja remains one of those cities in Iraq that just don't get it," he said. "It's a former Baathist stronghold. This was a city that profited immeasurably and immensely under the former regime."

Officials with U.S. led Coalition Provisional Authority condemned the attack and characterized it as an isolated incident that did not reflect the views of the majority of Iraqis. "The people who pulled those bodies out and engaged in this attack against the contractors are not people we are here to help," said coalition spokesman Dan Senor. "They are people who have a much different vision for the future of Iraq than the overwhelming majority of Iraqis. They are people who want Iraq to turn back to an era of mass graves, of rape rooms and torture chambers and chemical attacks," he said.
Several Fallouja residents called the incident a response to last week's deadly firefight between insurgents and Marines, who recently arrived to take control of the volatile city in the so-called Sunni Triangle. "This is retaliation for the genocide of last Friday's attacks," said Fallouja resident Fadhil Dulaimi.

The assault came only a few hours after 5 soldiers with the 1st Engineer Battalion of the 1st Brigade of the Army's 1st Infantry Division were killed several miles away when a powerful improvised device exploded beneath their 20-ton armored personnel carrier. The 5 were part of a convoy hunting for explosives along rural roads outside Habbaniya, a farming village in the Sunni Triangle.
Iraqis in Fallouja said Wednesday's attacks took place in a climate marked by Iraqi frustration over the pace of the nation's reconstruction and U.S. troops' continuing raids into local mosques and private homes. "As soon as Americans respect the people of Fallouja, we will start respecting them," said the Fallouja car dealer, who would give his name only as Abu Ali. "The Americans have done nothing, and people are angry. Now when they see Americans, they want to kill them."

In Baghdad, the attacks drew a mixture of shock and empathy. Halla Samurrai, 34, a pharmacist in the Sunni neighborhood of Adamiya in western Baghdad, expressed distaste and distress over the Fallouja slayings, although she added that she understood Iraqi frustrations. "I don't approve of killing Americans," she said. "But most Iraqis are illiterate. They don't know what they want. They feel furious, and they don't know how to show it."
By early afternoon, downtown Fallouja remained tense, with many residents bracing for what they considered the inevitable counter-strike by U.S. troops. Local clerics condemned the mutilation of the contractors' bodies but did not criticize the initial attacks.
One resident predicted that violence would continue. "These retaliatory attacks are going to increase," said Abdula Khamis. "The coming summer is going to be even hotter for Americans than the previous one."

3.31.04   AP

Fallujah residents said insurgents attacked the contractors with small arms fire & rocket-propelled grenades. After the attack, a jubilant crowd of civilians, none of whom appeared to be armed, gathered to celebrate, dragging the bodies through the street and hanging 2 of them from the bridge. Many of those in the crowd were excited young boys who shouted slogans in front of TV cameras.
AP Television News pictures showed one man beating a charred corpse with a metal pole. Others tied a yellow rope to a body, hooked it to a car and dragged it down the main street of town. 2 blackened & mangled corpses were hung from the green, iron bridge spanning the Euphrates River.

"The people of Fallujah hung some of the bodies on the old bridge like slaughtered sheep,'' resident Abdul Aziz Mohammed said. Some corpses were dismembered, he said. The White House blamed terrorists and remnants of Saddam Hussein's former regime for "horrific attacks" on the American contractors.
… State Dept spokesman Adam Ereli said the contractors, all men, "were trying to make a difference and to help others." U.S. officials did not identify the dead or the nature of their work because the next of kin had not yet been notified.

However, early evidence indicated they worked for Blackwater Security Consulting, a company based in Moyock, N.C., the company said in a statement. The security firm hires former military members from the U.S. & other countries to provide security training & guard services. In Iraq, the company was hired by the Pentagon to provide security for convoys that delivered food in the Fallujah area, the company statement said.

Abuse & mutilation of the contractors' corpses was similar to the scene more than a decade ago in Somalia, when a mob dragged corpses of U.S. soldiers through the streets of Mogadishu, eventually leading to the American withdrawal from the African nation. The images were broadcast worldwide and became the subject of the book and movie "Black Hawk Down."
Wednesday's images of the 4 civilians killed in Iraq filled TV screens worldwide Wednesday but were largely shunned by American television that deemed them too graphic. In London, Channel 4 News broadcast an electronically blurred body being dragged through the street. In Paris, LCI television station showed the footage of the bodies without blurring them. In Germany, ZDF News showed riot scenes but not any bodies.

On Wednesday, a man held a printed sign with a skull & crossbones and the phrase "Fallujah is the cemetery for Americans" beneath the blackened corpses after they were pulled from the vehicles. One body was tied to a car that had a poster in its window of Palestinian militant group Hamas founder Sheik Ahmed Yassin, assassinated by the Israeli military in Gaza City.
One resident displayed what appeared to be dog tags taken from one body. Residents also said there were weapons in the targeted cars. APTN showed an American passport near a body and a U.S. DoD identification card belonging to another man. Some of the slain contractors were wearing flak jackets, resident Safa Mohammedi said.

In Baghdad, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said the coalition would not be deterred from its mission to rebuild Iraq, and that numerous reconstruction projects were moving forward nationwide even though attention was focused on the attacks. The roadside bomb that killed the 5 American soldiers Wednesday was in Malahma, 12 miles northwest of Fallujah, where anti-U.S. insurgents are active.
Their deaths raised the number of U.S. troops killed in March to at least 48, making it the second-deadliest month for U.S. troops since President Bush declared an end to major combat 5.1.03. The deadliest month was Nov. 2003, when 82 U.S. troops were killed.

In all, at least 597 U.S. troops have died in Iraq since the war began 5.20.03. Of the total, 459 have died since 5.1.03 when Bush flew onto an aircraft carrier off the California coast to declare the end of major combat. Kimmitt said that over the past week, there has been an average of 28 attacks daily against coalition military, compared with an average of just under 20 daily attacks in previous weeks.
In the deadliest previous incident this year, 9 soldiers were killed 1.8.04 when their Black Hawk medevac helicopter crashed near Fallujah, apparently after being shot down. Fallujah is in the so-called Sunni Triangle, where support for Saddam was strong and rebels often carry out attacks against American forces. U.S. Marines recently took over authority in the region from the departing U.S. Army's 82nd Airborne Division.

In an effort to forcefully establish their presence, the newly arrived Marines have conducted numerous patrols in Fallujah and have engaged in fierce firefights with rebels. In recent months, U.S. soldiers were not seen as often in the center of town. The Marines have said they will aggressively pursue guerrillas in Fallujah. However, no U.S. troops or Iraqi police were seen in the area after the attacks Wednesday, and the city was quiet.
In nearby Ramadi, insurgents threw a grenade at a govt building and Iraqi security forces returned fire Wednesday, witnesses said. It was not clear if there were casualties. Also in Ramadi, a roadside bomb exploded near a U.S. convoy, witnesses said. U.S. officials in Baghdad could not confirm the attack.
Northeast of Baghdad, in the city of Baqouba on Wednesday, a suicide bomber blew up explosives in his car when he was near a convoy of govt vehicles, wounding 14 Iraqis and killing himself, officials said.

Blackwater gets new Iraq contract from U.S.
Deal is renewed for a year while FBI investigates fatal shootings   4.4.08   MSNBC

Wash. DC   U.S. State Dept has agreed to renew Blackwater USA's license to protect diplomats in Baghdad for one year while the FBI investigates a 2007 incident in which the company's guards are accused of killing 17 Iraqis.
Assistant Secretary of State Gregory Starr told reporters Friday that because the shooting of Baghdad civilians is still under investigation, there is no reason not to renew the contract when it comes due in May. Blackwater has a five-year deal to provide personal protection for diplomats, which is reauthorized each year.

Iraqis were outraged over a Sept. 16 shooting in which 17 civilians were killed in a Baghdad square. Blackwater said its guards were protecting diplomats under attack before they opened fire, but Iraqi investigators concluded the shooting was unprovoked.
A measure issued by the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority in 2004 prevents foreign security contractors from being prosecuted in local courts. It is unclear whether they could be prosecuted under U.S. law.
After the incident, the State Department changed several elements of the contract, including tightening up rules of engagement, putting cameras on all convoys and having a diplomatic security officer ride along with the detail.

Starr said Blackwater was operating with the agreement of the Iraqi government and he did not know when the FBI's investigation of the incident would be completed. Asked whether the Blackwater Baghdad deal could be scrapped if the FBI investigation found wrongdoing, Starr said: "We can terminate contracts at the convenience of the govt if we have to."
"I am not going to prejudge what the FBI is going to find in their investigation. I think really, it is complex. I think that the U.S. government needs protective services," he said. "Essentially I think they do a very good job. The September 16th incident was a tragedy. It has to be investigated carefully," he added. "I am concerned (about the Iraqi response) and yet at the same time there have only been about three incidents, three escalation of force incidents, since Sept. 16," he said.

Blackwater Worldwide officials have announced they are pulling their application to build a training center on an 824-acre site in the East County community of Potrero. The North Carolina-based company dropped off a letter to the county planning department today notifying officials of their decision not to pursue plans for the project on a former chicken and cattle ranch.
“Although our project would have brought a great benefit to San Diego County, providing local, state, and federal law enforcement with access to low-cost superior training facilities while bringing much-needed jobs to the area, the proposed site does not meet our business objectives at this time,” states the letter from Blackwater vice president Brian Bonfiglio.

Bonfiglio said noise tests the company conducted at the site did not meet county standards, and the cost of reducing the noise was too expensive. He said Blackwater had spent well over $1 million in its effort to get govt approval for the site. The company's effort to build the training center for law enforcement and the military met with a storm of criticism. Opponents said the training center would bring more noise and traffic to the quiet rural community, and others were critical of Blackwater's role as a military contractor in Iraq.
Bonfiglio said opposition to the project played no role in the company's decision to withdraw the project. Opponents of the project were stunned and pleased to hear the news.

“It's great news for the community of Potrero,” said Carl Meyer, the recently-elected chairman of the Potrero planning group. “I think Potrero will start to rejoice tonight. We'll have a party".
Raymond Lutz, an El Cajon-area resident who created an anti-Blackwater Web site, said he's glad the controversy is over. “This poor community has been put through enough,” he said. “There's a lot of people who were friends who were on different sides of the issue.”

Tens of thousands of Hurricane Katrina victims remain without homes. The environment is devastated. People are disenfranchised. Financial resources, desperate residents are told, are scarce.
New Orleans has a Wal-Mart parking lot serving as a FEMA Disaster Recovery Center with perhaps the tightest security of any parking lot in the world thanks to the more than $30 million Washington has shelled out to the Blackwater USA security firm since its men deployed after Katrina hit.

Under contract with the Homeland Security Dept's (DHS) Federal Protective Service, Blackwater's men are ostensibly protecting federal reconstruction projects for FEMA. Documents show that the govt paid Blackwater $950 a day for each of its guards in the area. Interviewed by The Nation last September, several co. guards stationed in New Orleans said they were being paid $350 a day.
That would have left Blackwater with $600 per man, per day to cover lodging, ammo, other overhead and profits.

Shortly after the hurricane hit, Blackwater "launched a helicopter and crew with no contract, no one paying us, that went down to New Orleans," says co. vice chair Cofer Black. "We saved some 150 people that otherwise wouldn't have been saved. As a result of that, we've had a very positive experience."
Days after the company arrived, it started reeling in lucrative deals. According to Blackwater's govt contracts from 9.8-30.05, obtained by The Nation, Blackwater was paid $409,000 for providing 14 guards and 4 vehicles to "protect the temporary morgue in Baton Rouge LA." That contract kicked off a hurricane boon for Blackwater.

From September to the end of December 2005, govt paid Blackwater at least $33.3 million, well surpassing the amount of Blackwater's contract to guard Ambassador Paul Bremer when he was head of the US occupation of Iraq. The company has likely raked in much more in the hurricane zone. Exactly how much is unclear, as attempts to get information on Blackwater's current contracts in New Orleans have been unsuccessful.