mercenaries

Obama’s secret war in Somalia where ‘the Americans are creating a monster’

by Paul Woodward 08.11.2011

“Mercenary” is a word with lots of ugly connotations — not least for men who’ve been jailed for being mercenaries. So, Bancroft Global Development, a private company based in Washington DC currently providing “military services” for the US State Department and the UN in Mogadishu, doesn’t like the term “mercenaries.” It describes itself instead as [...]

Read the full article →

Secret desert force set up by Blackwater’s founder

by News Sources 05.15.2011

The New York Times reports from Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates: Late one night last November, a plane carrying dozens of Colombian men touched down in this glittering seaside capital. Whisked through customs by an Emirati intelligence officer, the group boarded an unmarked bus and drove roughly 20 miles to a windswept military [...]

Read the full article →

FEATURE: Blackwater

by Paul Woodward 01.30.2008

Showdown in Blackwater’s backyard By Bruce Falconer, Mother Jones, January 28, 2008 Marshall Adame is a Democrat running for Congress in North Carolina’s 3rd District, a jurisdiction along the Tar Heel state’s low-lying eastern coast that is home to the U.S. Marine Corps’ Camp Lejeune, Air Station Cherry Point, and Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Blackwater might evade justice; signs of Iraq’s economic progress turn out to be baseless

by Paul Woodward 01.16.2008

Blackwater case faces obstacles, Justice Dept. says By James Risen and David Johnston, New York Times, January 16, 2008 Justice Department officials have told Congress that they face serious legal difficulties in pursuing criminal prosecutions of Blackwater security guards involved in a September shooting that left at least 17 Iraqis dead. In a private briefing [...]

Read the full article →

FEATURE: Hired guns

by Paul Woodward 11.26.2007

While the volunteer Army struggles, the business of war booms By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos, The American Conservative, November 19, 2007 “There are many questions as to how a myriad of heavily armed private armies can serve the purpose of the US military and foreign policy,” writes Robert Young Pelton, in Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: The other safe haven for mercenaries

by Paul Woodward 11.20.2007

Nobody guarding Afghanistan’s guards By Aunohita Mojumdar, Asia Times, November 21, 2007 The Afghan government and its international partners are struggling to bolster the country’s security forces, fighting the twin problems of boosting the numbers of the national army and trying to disband illegal armed groups. Yet, an unmonitored, unregulated and unauthorized force is on [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Iraqi Cabinet votes to repeal immunity for American mercenaries

by Paul Woodward 10.30.2007

Iraqi Cabinet votes to repeal immunity for U.S. guards By Christian Berthelsen, Los Angeles Times, October 30, 2007 The Iraqi Cabinet today approved and sent on to parliament a proposed law repealing the immunity from prosecution in Iraqi courts that has been extended to foreign security contractors operating in the country. A government statement said [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Waxman’s on the job

by Paul Woodward 10.25.2007

White House feels Waxman’s oversight gaze By Jonathan Weisman, Washington Post, October 25, 2007 For months, Rep. Henry A. Waxman, chairman of the House oversight committee, has been threatening, subpoenaing and just plain badgering Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to come before his panel to answer questions about the run-up to the Iraq war, corruption [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Blackwater fallout

by Paul Woodward 10.25.2007

State Dept. ousts its chief of security By Karen DeYoung, Washington Post, October 25, 2007 The State Department’s security chief was forced to resign yesterday after a critical review found that his office had failed to adequately supervise private contractors protecting U.S. diplomats in Iraq. Richard J. Griffin, a former Secret Service agent who was [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: American mercenaries evade justice

by Paul Woodward 10.16.2007

Iraqis shot by contractors stymied in search for justice By Tina Susman, Los Angeles Times, October 16, 2007 In the days after Usama Abbass was shot dead in a Baghdad traffic circle by security guards working for Blackwater USA, his brother visited the U.S.-run National Iraqi Assistance Center seeking compensation. Like other Iraqis who have [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: America’s own unlawful combatants

by Paul Woodward 10.15.2007

America’s own unlawful combatants? By Julian E. Barnes, Los Angeles Times, October 15, 2007 As the Bush administration deals with the fallout from the recent killings of civilians by private security firms in Iraq, some officials are asking whether the contractors could be considered unlawful combatants under international agreements. The question is an outgrowth of [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS & EDITOR’S COMMENT: Accounting for Blackwater

by Paul Woodward 10.11.2007

Blackwater case highlights legal uncertainties By Alissa J. Rubin and Paul von Zielbauer, New York Times, October 11, 2007 Roughly 100,000 American contractors are working in Iraq, but there has yet to be a prosecution for a single incident of violence, according to Scott Horton, a specialist in the law of armed conflict who teaches [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Foreign guards in another drive-by killing

by Paul Woodward 10.09.2007

Foreign guards kill two women in Baghdad By , , October , 2007 Foreign security guards killed two women on Tuesday, opening fire on their car in the centre of the Iraqi capital and then speeding off “like gangsters,” witnesses and Iraqi security officials said. The shooting in Karrada came two days after Iraq vowed [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS & EDITOR’S COMMENT: Will Blackwater face Iraqi law?

by Paul Woodward 10.08.2007

NEWS: Will Blackwater face Iraqi law? Iraqi authorities seek Blackwater ouster By Steven R. Hurst and Qassim Abdul-Zahra, AP, October 8, 2007 Iraqi authorities want the U.S. government to sever all contracts in Iraq with Blackwater USA within six months. They also want the firm to pay $8 million in compensation to families of each [...]

Read the full article →

OPINION: The administration that harbors murderers

by Paul Woodward 10.07.2007

Licensed to kill By Scott Horton, Harper’s, October 6, 2007 The Bush Justice Department does have an essential law enforcement mission, though sometimes it seems to behave much more like a criminal syndicate. It warmly embraces the crime of torture as a tool for collecting human intelligencenotwithstanding both its manifest illegality and immorality and the [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS & EDITOR’S COMMENT: The State Department’s reckless protectors

by Paul Woodward 10.05.2007

Blackwater faulted in military reports from shooting scene By Sudarsan Raghavan, Joshua Partlow and Karen DeYoung, Washington Post, October 5, 2007 U.S. military reports from the scene of the Sept. 16 shooting incident involving the security firm Blackwater USA indicate that its guards opened fire without provocation and used excessive force against Iraqi civilians, according [...]

Read the full article →

OPINION: Blackwater is an extension of the U.S. government

by Paul Woodward 10.04.2007

Blackwater’s enablers at the State Department By John Nichols, The Nation, October 2, 2007 House Oversight and Government Reform Committee chair Henry Waxman finally got to the heart of the Blackwater contract-killing scandal when he reviewed emails detailing how the U.S. State Department worked with the private security firm to hide bloody trail of its [...]

Read the full article →

OPINION & NEWS: Blackwater’s Prince of Death

by Paul Woodward 10.03.2007

The man from Blackwater, shooting from the lip By Dana Milbank, Washington Post, October 3, 2007 …when [Blackwater CEO Erik] Prince made a rare public appearance before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee yesterday, he acted as if the lawmakers were wasting his time. How much does Blackwater, recipient of $1 billion in federal [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Blackwater’s drive-by gunmen

by Paul Woodward 10.02.2007

Report says firm sought to cover up Iraq shootings By John M. Broder, New York Times, October 2, 2007 Employees of Blackwater USA have engaged in nearly 200 shootings in Iraq since 2005, in a vast majority of cases firing their weapons from moving vehicles without stopping to count the dead or assist the wounded, [...]

Read the full article →

OPINION & EDITOR’S COMMENT: War is not a private business

by Paul Woodward 10.01.2007

Subcontracting the war Editorial, New York Times, October 1, 2007 There is, conveniently, no official count. But there are an estimated 160,000 private contractors working in Iraq, and some 50,000 of them are “private security” operatives — that is, fighters. The dangers of this privatized approach to war became frighteningly clear last month, after guards [...]

Read the full article →

FEATURE: America’s merchants of death

by Paul Woodward 09.28.2007

Making a killing By Jeremy Scahill, The Nation, September 27, 2007 Four days after being grounded, Blackwater was back on Iraqi streets. After all, Blackwater is not just any security company in Iraq; it is the leading mercenary company of the US occupation. It first took on this role in the summer of 2003, after [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Blackwater “may be worse than Abu Ghraib”

by Paul Woodward 09.27.2007

Private security puts diplomats, military at odds By Sudarsan Raghavan and Thomas E. Ricks, Washington Post, September 26, 2007 A confrontation between the U.S. military and the State Department is unfolding over the involvement of Blackwater USA in the shooting deaths of Iraqi civilians in a Baghdad square Sept. 16, bringing to the surface long-simmering [...]

Read the full article →

NEWS: Mercenaries hurt the war effort; State Dept. shields Blackwater; insurgents launch assassination campaign against Iraq’s Interior Ministry

by Paul Woodward 09.26.2007

New study: private security firms hurt U.S. mission in Iraq By Spencer Ackerman, TPMmuckraker, September 26, 2007 A forthcoming study by private-military contractor expert P.W. Singer obtained by TPMmuckraker finds that Blackwater and other private security firms in Iraq are detrimental to U.S. counterinsurgency efforts. Singer, author of the landmark book Corporate Warriors: The Rise [...]

Read the full article →