Private security contracts are risky

WASHINGTON — An hour or two’s drive south of Norfolk, Va., you pass through a North Carolina swamp where once, it is said, black bears abounded. That is why Blackwater USA, the large American private security contractor now mired in controversy, the result of a shootout in Baghdad that reportedly killed 20 people, has as its symbol the distinctive five-clawed foot of the bear.

Just beyond the swamp lies Blackwater headquarters, which could be easily mistaken for an American military camp. The big main building, new this spring, has the bear’s-foot symbol atop its entranceway. Across the camp you can see small planes landing, men dressed as al-Qaida insurgents attacking Americans in exact replicas of Iraqi villages, and Blackwater men protecting disguised American “diplomats.” All getting ready for the real thing in Iraq!

It’s not really surprising that, despite all of this exceedingly authentic training, a few of Blackwater’s private soldiers — part of the approximately 50,000 private soldiers (some would call them “mercenaries") in Iraq — have got into trouble. Because many of them are former Special Forces, Navy Seals, retired police and other security men, they are widely considered the most aggressive of the private contractors, known for at least half a dozen incidents in which Blackwater guards allegedly shot civilians.

So when last Sunday, Blackwater guards ostensibly protecting an American diplomatic caravan (they protect people like the American ambassador, for instance) came up against a car bomb exploding near the motorcade, all hell broke loose. Blackwater appears to have deemed it an ambush, as its men clambered out of the cars and began shooting. But Iraqi soldiers manning local checkpoints said they got out of their SUVs and wildly started shooting randomly at people.

Show of wills

Thus started a show of wills between the Iraqi government and the American government as to who controls Blackwater and the other private security groups — all of whom have been the subject of severe disagreement between the two. After Sunday, the Iraqi Interior Ministry announced that the operating license of Blackwater was canceled — but was there really a license?

The company has had a one-year operating license from the Interior Ministry since 2005, but this is now totally outdated, although a new application has been made. The 100 or so mostly American security firms operating in Iraq are actually under contract with the State Department. (Such contracts since 2003 total $678 million; contracts with the Pentagon add up to $48.5 million.)

There is constant discussion and debate as to what kinds of controls these private security men, who have taken over so much of the working and the fighting in Iraq, have over them. The Geneva Conventions? Hardly. Do they even come under State Department or Pentagon authority at all? Are they supposed to be under Iraqi control? Under the original rules after the occupation, private security contractors were authorized by the Coalition Provisional Authority to work in Iraq but had to register their weapons. The situation remains legally ambiguous.

These are the immediate questions being raised by day-to-day conflicts in Iraq. However, events such as Sunday’s firefight, in addition to other random killings committed by these private contractors, raise questions far more profound for America.

Intelliegence work

Are we, in essence, preparing America for a time when even more of our major fighting and security work will be carried through by men and women who do not operate under the rules and regulations of our armed forces? Are we at the point where all sorts of activities will be “contracted out” to people who do not serve under the laws, discipline and traditions of our professionals? (Only last week, it was announced that American intelligence work might be contracted out to non-professionals.)

For the last six years since 9/11, the country seems not to have come together on anything, whether it be the Iraq war, Katrina or congressional decision-making. The word that has been rolling around in my mind is “disconnect.” I haven’t been able to quite put my finger on what I was seeing and feeling, but it has felt as though America has become disconnected. Somehow the government doesn’t function as it once did; citizens no longer receive what is their due.

Universal Press Syndicate