Posted on 04/02/2004 4:54:03 PM PST by dts32041
Although the media repeatedly refers to the men killed in the recent attack in Iraq as "civilian contractors,? they were in fact mercenaries used as part of the U.S. government's outsourcing of jobs, reports the Progressive Review.
Firms overseeing the specialized contractors include Blackwater, the one involved in the recent incident, as well as Dyncorp and the Steele Foundation.
The Steele Foundation, the third largest supplier of mercenaries, has 500 troops in Iraq and recently distinguished itself by -- depending on who's telling the story -- failing to protect Haitian president Aristide from kidnapping by the U.S. government or participating in the act.
According to the Progressive Review, the international convention against the recruitment, use, financing and training of mercenaries defines a mercenary is any person who:
A mercenary is also any person who, in any other situation:
The bottom line of the rule of war: "A mercenary, as defined in article 1 of the present Convention, who participates directly in hostilities or in a concerted act of violence, as the case may be, commits an offence for the purposes of the Convention.?
Meanwhile, the phenomenon grows, says the Review, which points to a San Francisco Chronicle piece quoting Deborah Avant, a professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
"The rate of growth in the security industry is phenomenal," Avant said "If you had asked a year ago whether there would be 15,000 private security in Iraq, everyone would have said you're nuts. It has moved very quickly over the past decade, but Iraq has escalated it dramatically."
The trend is highly controversial. Some critics point out that security firms are largely unaccountable to governments, the courts or the public.
Some examples:
Steele, the world's fifth-largest security firm, employs around 500 agents in Iraq, about one-third Westerners and the rest Iraqis. As elsewhere -- the firm operates in 20 countries -- it offers far more than just Hollywood-style firepower. The company's brief includes corporate consulting and high-tech investigations.
Last month Blackwater USA flew a first group of about 60 former commandos, many of whom had trained under the military government of Augusto Pinochet, from Santiago to a 970-hectare training camp in North Carolina.
From there they would be taken to Iraq, where they were expected to stay between six months and a year, the president of Blackwater USA, Gary Jackson, said.
"We scour the ends of the earth to find professionals - the Chilean commandos are very, very professional and they fit within the Blackwater system."
Mountain Yards were, too.
The forces were more "Terry and the Pirates" than standard US military. Twenty-four Special Forces soldiers led and paid the motley crew of Civilian Irregular Defense Group (CIDG) mercenaries: Vietnamese and Montagnard, the latter from two tribes, Bru and Hre. Chinese mercenaries (Nungs), Rhade Montagnards, and Australians would later play a part, as would Special Forces soldiers of SOG (Studies and Observation Group, a classified organization). Add to this already diverse group the 33d Royal Laotian Elephant Battalion (which got in the way after crossing into Vietnam, which later refused to join the battle, and whose soldiers in fact clambered over wounded to board evacuation helicopters); some 6,000 US Marines at Khe Sanh; and Marine tactical air, inclined to bomb anything not stamped USMC. (Previously over 100 tribesmen in the Bru hamlet of Lang Vei died as the result of a Marine air attack in January 1967. This event required considerable effort on the part of the SF team to retain the services of these indigenous people.)
Armed men hired by the military are mercenaries by the definition, even if they help to protect some humanitarian operation.
In some sense it is true. But the security guard is not expected to use weapon on a regular bases, only in a case of emergency and not to be involved in an armed struggle. Mercenary is a private soldier who will fight against organized armed opponents.
Should whistles and bells sound anywhere on the site's 310 square miles, Wackenhut's Special Response Team - similar to a SWAT team - can storm the area within seconds, either by ground, air or both.
Members are armed with M-16 rifles or M-60 machine guns, stun grenades and 9 mm Glock sidearms, according to Ernest Tussey, director of operations. A BK-117 jet helicopter is equipped with a mounted M-60 machine gun with a laser sight and a 30 million candlepower spotlight.
The chopper also carries an infrared luminating system, which when activated from above allows team members wearing night vision goggles to hone in on heat sources in the dark.
Wackenhut has two helicopters parked at SRS, along with a jet boat used to patrol a stretch of the Savannah River.
If you're not military, and you're not law enforcement, but your job requires you to be armed with rifles or machine guns, what are you?
You can have domestic mercenaries as well as foreign.
Well, such person is not civilian by the definition:
civilian [sý'výljən] nouna a person whose primary occupation is civil or nonmilitary b (as modifier) example: civilian life [ETYMOLOGY: C14 (originally: a practitioner of civil law): from civile (from the Latin phrase jus civile civil law) + -ian]civilian - source: The Collins English Dictionary © 2000 HarperCollins Publishers
If you are paid to fight in organized chain of command you are a mercenary. If you are an armed civilian engaged in fight then you are a criminal or a vigilante or insurgent or a militant or acting in self-defence.
Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, who runs the Angry Left Daily Kos blog, had this to say in a post yesterday about the murders of four American contractors who were helping to deliver food in Fallujah, Iraq:
Every death should be on the front page
Let the people see what war is like. This isn't an Xbox game. There are real repercussions to Bush's folly.
That said, I feel nothing over the death of merceneries [sic]. They aren't in Iraq because of orders, or because they are there trying to help the people make Iraq a better place. They are there to wage war for profit. Screw them.
This made me even angrier than the mob in Fallujah.
'Screw Them'
Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, who runs the Angry Left Daily Kos blog, had this to say in a post yesterday about the murders of four American contractors who were helping to deliver food in Fallujah, Iraq:
Every death should be on the front page
Let the people see what war is like. This isn't an Xbox game. There are real repercussions to Bush's folly.
That said, I feel nothing over the death of merceneries [sic]. They aren't in Iraq because of orders, or because they are there trying to help the people make Iraq a better place. They are there to wage war for profit. Screw them.
Zuniga has taken down the original post, but in a new post he acknowledges it and offers a partial retraction, which essentially amounts to saying he didn't actually "feel nothing"; in fact, he was angry at the victims. Blogger Michael Friedman has a screen shot of the original post.
It's worth noting that the Daily Kos is popular among Democratic leaders. Zuniga is a principal in the Armstrong Zuniga political consulting firm, which touts the Daily Kos as "the most popular political weblog with over 3 million monthly visits." Friedman has a list of congressional candidates who advertise on the site, and in a February posting Zuniga reported that Terry McAuliffe, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, "asked if I would post" a "Message to Blog Community."
About Zuniga's comments, we have nothing to say. They speak for themselves.
primary concerned with money or other reward; 1) a hired soldier in foreign service. 2) someone offering his or her services to anyone prepared to pay.
Every death should be on the front page.
Let the people see what war is like. This isn't an Xbox game. There are real repercussions to Bush's folly.
That said, I feel nothing over the death of mercenaries. They aren't in Iraq because of orders, or because they were trying to help the people make Iraq a better place. They were there to wage war for profit. Screw them.
Getting food convoys in doesn't make the place better?
Mercenaries are warmongers AND capitalists, a lefty twofer. Commies have been whining about mercenaries for years.
Those Blackwater guys were not mercenaries any more than Mike Spann was a mercenary. American citizen US Special Operations veterans who take jobs as paramilitary contractors are just another branch of service as long as they are working for the US Government and supporting US objectives in the area.
Chuck Skeen, 40 from Lampas, Texas, a civillian contractor from Northrop Grumman installs a Blue Force Tracker system in an M998 HMMWV Humvee at Camp New York in Kuwait. The system displays the positions of friendly and reported enemy vehicles all over the battlefield and allows data communication between vehicles and command centers.
Does Chuck fit your definition of a mercenary?
If you can disobey an order from a boss or superior without risking being convicted a crime and fined or imprisoned, you're a civilian, regardless of what kind of work you're doing.
Read this
You made it out of the blue. Mercenaries can have their views, preferences or special considerations. There are mercenaries who will fight for specific causes or who will not risk the displeasure of their own government.
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