An interesting Op-Ed in the LA Times the other day by Jeremy Scahill, also covered by DemocracyNow, about the rise of the Blackwater Corporation, which provides mercenaries to the U.S. in Iraq and elsewhere. Scahill is a fellow at the Nation Institute and the author of the forthcoming “Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army.”
Blackwater began in 1996 with a private military training camp “to fulfill the anticipated demand for government outsourcing.” Today, its contacts run from deep inside the military and intelligence agencies to the upper echelons of the White House. It has secured a status as the elite Praetorian Guard for the global war on terror, with the largest private military base in the world, a fleet of 20 aircraft and 20,000 soldiers at the ready.
The article discusses Bush’s proposal in his State of the Union speech for a Civilian Reserve Corps that, “[W]ould function much like our military Reserve. It would ease the burden on the armed forces by allowing us to hire civilians with critical skills to serve on missions abroad when America needs them,” Bush declared.
The article continued:
Already, private contractors constitute the second-largest “force” in Iraq. At last count, there were about 100,000 contractors in Iraq, of which 48,000 work as private soldiers, according to a Government Accountability Office report. These soldiers have operated with almost no oversight or effective legal constraints and are an undeclared expansion of the scope of the occupation. Many of these contractors make up to $1,000 a day, far more than active-duty soldiers. What’s more, these forces are politically expedient, as contractor deaths go uncounted in the official toll.
The president’s proposed Civilian Reserve Corps was not his idea alone. A privatized version of it was floated two years ago by Erik Prince, the secretive, mega-millionaire, conservative owner of Blackwater USA and a man who for years has served as the Pied Piper of a campaign to repackage mercenaries as legitimate forces. In early 2005, Prince – a major bankroller of the president and his allies – pitched the idea at a military conference of a “contractor brigade” to supplement the official military. “There’s consternation in the [Pentagon] about increasing the permanent size of the Army,” Prince declared. Officials “want to add 30,000 people, and they talked about costs of anywhere from $3.6 billion to $4 billion to do that. Well, by my math, that comes out to about $135,000 per soldier.” He added: “We could do it certainly cheaper.”
As Mao Tse-tung said, political power grows from the barrel of a gun. The federal government should shut down these private armies immediately and stop hiring mercenaries. Our state-controlled armed forces, run by an elected civilian, should have a monopoly on military power.
On one hand, at least the privatization freaks are applying that principle to the military, usually the most sacred of their budgetary cows. So I guess it’s worth trying.
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On the other hand, it’s icky. I fear well-healed rival bidders who want certain secrets kept or assets left untouched. These contractors aren’t trained to fight for us, they’re mercenaries.
Private militias are necessary so that we can have an armed rebellion against the government if it becomes too tyranical. I am not willing to give that up. It’s the whole point of the second amendment. What army do you think fought the Revolutionary War? It certainly wasn’t the one run by the government.
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I don’t think the government should hire mercenaries though. We should be allowed to create our own private armies, but the government shouldn’t be sponsoring them. In general, it should take real tyranny before people start actually forming militias. You don’t want a standing private militia that will be looking for something to do during times of peace.
of the use of the phrase “well regulated” in connection with “militia” in the 2nd amendment? Also the fact that the 2nd amendment is stated in the singular – “a well regulated militia” – not the plural “militias,” as you seem to be suggesting.
You summarized my position on this issue in your comment.
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Hiring mercenaries to fight wars for us just feels wrong, even though it is a very old tradition and even something that was done during the Revolutionary War.
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You are slightly off on the first part of your comment. There were both militias and government sponsored armies that fought for the US in the Revolutionary War.
While I understand the attraction of private armies, I do believe that a lot of money has already been wasted on privatizing the services that the military needs. Look at the money Haliburton recieves for feeding and housing our troops in Iraq among other things.
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If Bush was serious about the war in Iraq he would have made sure there was shared sacrifice. If Iraq was as dangerous as he says it was he should have had a draft to supply enough troops and support personnel and RAISED TAXES to pay for it.
Not taxes, he should have reinstated war bonds so that people could put thier money where there mouth is or so the saying goes.