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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings, Torture and Big Money |
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October 18th,
2007 - Blackwater Likely to Be Cut Out of Iraq |
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Blackwater Likely to Be Cut
Out of Iraq By Anne Gearan Associated Press October 18, 2007 A State Department review of
private security guards for diplomats in Iraq is unlikely to recommend firing
Blackwater USA over the deaths of 17 Iraqis last month, but the company
probably is on the way out of that job, U.S. officials said. Blackwater's work escorting
U.S. diplomats outside the protected Green Zone in Baghdad expires in May,
one official said Wednesday, and other officials told The Associated Press
they expect the North Carolina company will not continue to work for the
embassy after that. It is likely that Blackwater
does not compete to keep the job, one official said. Blackwater probably will
not be fired outright or even "eased out," the official added, but
there is a mutual feeling that the Sept. 16 shooting deaths mean the company
cannot continue in its current role. State Department officials
spoke on condition of anonymity because Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
has not yet considered results of an internal review of Blackwater and the
other two companies that protect diplomats in Iraq. Department officials said no
decisions have been made and that Rice has the final say. They gave admiring
appraisals of Blackwater's work overall, noting that no diplomats have died
while riding in Blackwater's heavily armed convoys. President Bush did not
directly answer a question Wednesday about whether he was satisfied with the
performance of security contractors. "I will be anxious to
see the analysis of their performance," Bush said at a news conference. "There's
a lot of studying going on, both inside Iraq and out, as to whether or not
people violated rules of engagement. I will tell you, though, that a firm
like Blackwater provides a valuable service. They protect people's lives, and
I appreciate the sacrifice and the service that the Blackwater employees have
made." A panel that Rice appointed
to review the contractors will report to her as soon as Friday, and Rice's
announcement of what to do next probably will follow quickly, one department
official said. A transition from Blackwater
would take time. The company employs more
people and has more equipment than its two competitors in Iraq. Any outside
company that might replace Blackwater would have to provide trained U.S.
citizens, with security clearances. That may mean that if Blackwater leaves,
competitors hired some of its workers. Blackwater spokeswoman Anne
Tyrrell said, "We will follow the lead of our client. If they want us to
stay we will stay. If they want us to leave we will do so." The team of State Department
management experts and outside specialists is expected to recommend greater
oversight of security contractors and better coordination of their work with
military forces, two officials said. It is practically impossible
to eliminate private security contractors altogether in Iraq because there
are not enough department security agents to fill the gap, officials said. Blackwater and two other
contractors share a $571 million annual contract to protect diplomats and
others in Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel and other countries. The Iraq share of
the contract accounts for about $520 million, although not all goes to
Blackwater. The review also looked at
the rules of engagement for department escorts and whether there is anything
unique to Blackwater's training, operations and corporate culture that made
mistakes in judgment or civilian deaths more likely. It is not clear whether the
review will extend to consideration of an idea floated by Defense Secretary
Robert Gates to consolidate management of security contractors that work in
Iraq for numerous U.S. government agencies, including the Pentagon and State
Department. Gates discussed the idea
with Rice during a joint meeting last week in Moscow, a State Department
official said. Pentagon press secretary
Geoff Morrell said Gates thinks "it is worth exploring" whether one
chain of command should oversee all private security contractors in Iraq.
Morrell said it would be going too far to say that Gates is advocating this
approach. In the Sept. 16 incident,
Iraqi officials say Blackwater guards opened fire without provocation in
Baghdad's Nisoor Square and killed 17 Iraqi citizens. The Iraqi government is
demanding that Blackwater be expelled from the country within six months. Copyright © 2007 The
Associated Press. All rights reserved. External link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071018/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_iraq_blackwater_11 By Brian Bennett Time Magazine October 18, 2007 Close to midnight last
Christmas Eve, a Blackwater security contractor named Andrew Moonen emerged
from a boozy party in Baghdad's Green Zone and took a wrong turn on the way
back to his hooch. There is as yet no satisfactory explanation for what
happened next. An Iraqi guard named Raheem Khalif, who was protecting the
compound of Vice President Adel Abdul Mahdi, was fatally shot three times.
TIME interviewed three Iraqi guards who were on duty that night and reviewed
two signed witness statements: all say the shooter was a white male, wearing
an ID badge typically used by security contractors. The day after the
shooting, Moonen was fired by Blackwater and flown out of Iraq. His name was
not directly linked to the incident until earlier this month, when a Seattle
lawyer told the New York Times he was representing Moonen, 27, a former Army
paratrooper, in connection with the investigation into the shooting. The killing of Khalif barely
registered outside the Green Zone. For Iraqis, it was just another in a long
series of stories - stretching back to the early days of the U.S. occupation
- about how private security contractors seem to operate with impunity in
their country. Brought into Iraq because an undermanned U.S. military
couldn't guard vital facilities and top American officials, contractors were
armed with a decree by U.S. administrator L. Paul Bremer that made them
practically exempt from prosecution under Iraq law). They quickly earned a reputation
as cowboys: the kind that shoot first and never have to answer any questions
afterward. As the number of contractors has grown, so has the volume and
frequency of Iraqi complaints. A report by the House Committee on Oversight
and Government Reform found that Blackwater alone has been involved in 195
"escalation of force" incidents since early 2005. But these went largely
unnoticed outside Iraq until Sept. 16, when a Blackwater security convoy shot
and killed 17 civilians at a major traffic intersection in western Baghdad.
The company claimed its men were responding to an attack on the convoy, but
an investigation by the Iraqi Ministry of Interior the week of the shooting
said the contractors had fired first. The incident sparked furor in the U.S.,
where it was seized upon by Bush Administration critics as yet more proof of
botched planning of the Iraq war and the consequence of outsourcing too many
military tasks. Back in Baghdad, the Iraqi
government briefly pulled Blackwater's authorization to carry weapons and
gave the U.S. embassy six months to end all contracts with the firm.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice launched an internal review to determine
if U.S. embassies are too reliant on contractors. Guns for Hire Blackwater has more than
1,000 men under arms in Iraq, but it is just one of dozens of security
companies there. Across the country, there are now anywhere from 20,000 to
30,000 armed contractors, many of them performing duties that in previous
conflicts were the domain of uniformed soldiers. Contractors are often the
first line of defense on roads and at checkpoints to government compounds.
They guard food and fuel convoys that supply the troops and protect
embassies, aid workers and foreign businesses. Hundreds of contractors are based
in the Green Zone, 4 sq. mi. (about 10 sq km) of riverfront buffered from the
rest of Baghdad by concrete walls and manned checkpoints. Conversations with
current and former guns for hire paint a picture of a world unique unto
itself: insular, tribal, wary of the limelight, competitive and, for the most
part, highly professional. The contractors - and they are almost all men -
tend to be former soldiers and come from the U.S., as well as Britain,
Ireland, South Africa, Nepal, Fiji, Russia, Australia, Chile and Peru. Their
motivations vary from a thirst for adventure to a desire for a nest egg (or
to pay down debt) to a refracted form of patriotism. James Thornett was typical.
The rugged 34-year-old fought in the invasion of Iraq as a British
paratrooper. When the war ended, he left the military rather than take a
quieter assignment. "I didn't join the military to sit at a desk,"
he says. "I joined the military to jump out of airplanes and
fight." Seeking that excitement, he returned to Baghdad with Global Risk
Strategies, a London-based firm that had set up security for the U.S.
embassy. Thornett discovered that he liked Baghdad, and the money was
"great" - contractors can make up to $12,000 to $33,000 a month. So
he stayed on, switching first to Edinburgh Risk and Security Management, then
to Aegis, both British firms. Then, for a change of pace, he set up a bar and
restaurant in the Green Zone called the Baghdad Country Club, a popular
hangout for contractors until it was shut down last May. Not all contractors have
Thornett's entrepreneurial instinct, and their lives in the Green Zone are
far from plush. The typical contractor lives in half an aluminum trailer that
has been reinforced with sandbags. The work is often dangerous, especially convoy
duty beyond the concrete walls in what is known as the Red Zone. Some security convoys keep a
low profile, using cars and dress that blend into the bustling streets of the
city. Others - especially Blackwater - "roll heavy" in large
convoys of big, armored SUVs, driving aggressively to keep a 100-ft. (about
30 m) bubble of space around the client at all times, intended to ward off
suicide car bombers. To maintain that bubble, convoy drivers bump other cars
off the road, and gunners fire shots into radiators. Iraqi drivers have
learned from painful experience to stay well clear of convoys, but in crowded
Baghdad streets it's not always possible to swerve out of the way. All too
often, accidents turn fatal. (There are no reliable statistics on the number of
Iraqis killed or hurt in such incidents.) Contractors defend their
actions by pointing out that they are targeted by insurgent and terrorist
groups; convoys frequently come under fire or are hit by roadside bombs and
suicide bombers. Aggressive driving is a defensive measure, they say,
designed to safeguard their clients. And it works. Blackwater founder Erik
Prince told a congressional hearing this month that although 27 of his
employees have died in Iraq, no one under the firm's care had been killed. President
Bush on Wednesday praised Blackwater, saying, "They protect people's
lives. And I appreciate the sacrifice and the service that the Blackwater
employees have made." But some security men carry
the aggression too far, treating all the Iraqis they encounter as potential
enemies, using hostile body language and verbal abuse - and sometimes worse.
Many uniformed American soldiers regard the contractors with disdain,
describing them as reckless and trigger-happy. Since Iraqis don't always
distinguish between private and military convoys, soldiers say, bad behavior
by contractors only deepens Iraqi antagonism toward the military. "The
contractors caused problems that the Iraqi leaders - imams, tribal sheiks,
elected officials, military commanders - expected the U.S. [military] to
solve," says retired Army Major General John Batiste, who commanded the
1st Infantry Division in Iraq in 2004 and '05. "Their attitude was,
They're Americans and therefore they work for you." Last December, a few
weeks before the Christmas Eve shooting, a senior Western diplomat told TIME
he was especially alarmed by the attitude of the men guarding senior U.S.
embassy officials. "They behave like Iraq is the Wild West and Iraqis
are like 'Injuns,' to be treated any way they like," he said, asking to
remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of inter-embassy relations.
"They're better-armed and -armored than the military, but
they don't have to follow military rules, and that makes them dangerous." The men he was
describing worked for Blackwater. Who Guards the Guards? Ten months after the
Christmas Eve shooting, there has been little movement on the case. Moonen's
lawyer tells TIME his client has not been charged with any crime. Blackwater
won't confirm or deny that Moonen ever worked for the firm but has said that
an employee was fired for handling a weapon while using alcohol - and that it
is cooperating with the FBI investigation into the shooting. The FBI
collected forensic evidence at the crime scene, but none of it has been
tested in court. Neither the U.S. government nor the Iraqi government can say
what laws apply in this case or who has jurisdiction. Vice President Abdul
Mahdi's office is angry and frustrated that the U.S. has done little to catch
Khalif's killer. "We had hoped the trial would be here in Baghdad,
" says Azaid Saeed, the Vice President's head of security, "but, of
course, it won't happen; it's only our dreams." Erik Prince confirmed to the
House committee that Blackwater had paid the guard's family $20,000 in
compensation. Reached by phone in Baghdad, Khalif's widow Wijdan Muhsin Said
would not comment on the payment but told TIME she was disappointed that the
Iraqi government had not put her husband's killer before a judge. She said
she expected nothing to come from the U.S. investigation:
"Unfortunately, it seems that Iraqi blood is cheap to them." In the days after the
shooting, relations between Abdul Mahdi's staff and the U.S. embassy grew
testy. Some embassy staffers were nervous about driving past the Vice
President's guards every day. "We were getting death stares," says
an American official. Saeed had to keep his men from storming the gate of the
chancellery, where Khalif's killer had taken shelter. He calmed them by
saying, "We already lost one. We don't need to lose another 10 and gain
nothing." Inside the embassy, debate
about Blackwater's conduct heated up. Stories of Blackwater guards throwing
full water bottles at pedestrians and indiscriminately firing warning shots
made some diplomats feel as if their security details were undermining their
efforts to win Iraqi hearts and minds. Some felt that the embassy's
diplomatic-security team, which is meant to supervise all security
contractors who protect embassy personnel, was too close to its charges to
police its conduct. "They're all drinking buddies, and they cover for
each other," says a U.S. embassy official who recently served in Baghdad. But no serious attempt was
made to rein in Blackwater until the Sept. 17 shootings. When the Iraqi government
temporarily rescinded the firm's gun permits, it forced the embassy to cancel
all convoys into the Red Zone. As a compromise, the embassy announced that
all future Blackwater convoys will include video cameras and a
diplomatic-security agent to keep a close watch on the contractors. Some U.S.
Congressmen have proposed legislation to close the legal loopholes that
exempt contractors from Iraqi and American laws. As the larger issues are
parsed in Washington, there's a growing sense in Baghdad that private
security companies have to change their ways. On Oct. 9, with Blackwater
still dominating the headlines, two women were shot and killed by contractors
from Unity Resources Group, a Dubai-based Australian firm. It was the same
old story: the women's car had come too close to a convoy protected by Unity.
It was the sort of incident that only a few months ago might have gone
unnoticed. Now Unity is being investigated by the Iraqi government. The days
of the cowboy contractor may be numbered. Copyright © 2007Time Inc External link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20071018/wl_time/americasotherarmy |