By DEBORAH HASTINGS
The Associated Press
Saturday, August 11, 2007; 2:10 PM
-- There are now nearly as many private contractors in Iraq as there are U.S. soldiers _ and a large percentage of them are private security guards equipped with automatic weapons, body armor, helicopters and bullet-proof trucks.
They operate with little or no supervision, accountable only to the firms employing them. And as the country has plummeted toward anarchy and civil war, this private army has been accused of indiscriminately firing at American and Iraqi troops, and of shooting to death an unknown number of Iraqi citizens who got too close to their heavily armed convoys.
Not one has faced charges or prosecution.
There is great confusion among legal experts and military officials about what laws _ if any _ apply to Americans in this force of at least 48,000.
They operate in a decidedly gray legal area. Unlike soldiers, they are not bound by the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Under a special provision secured by American-occupying forces, they are exempt from prosecution by Iraqis for crimes committed there.
The security firms insist their employees are governed by internal conduct rules and by use-of-force protocols established by the Coalition Provisional Authority, the U.S. occupation government that ruled Iraq for 14 months following the invasion.
But many soldiers on the ground _ who earn in a year what private guards can earn in just one month _ say their private counterparts should answer to a higher authority, just as they do. More than 60 U.S. soldiers in Iraq have been court-martialed on murder-related charges involving Iraqi citizens.
Some military analysts and government officials say the contractors could be tried under the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act, which covers crimes committed abroad. But so far, that law has not been applied to them.
Security firms earn more than $4 billion in government contracts, but the government doesn't know how many private soldiers it has hired, or where all of them are, according to the Government Accountability Office. And the companies are not required to report violent incidents involving their employees.
Security guards now constitute nearly 50 percent of all private contractors in Iraq _ a number that has skyrocketed since the 2003 invasion, when then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said rebuilding Iraq was the top priority. But an unforeseen insurgency, and hundreds of terrorist attacks have pushed the country into chaos. Security is now Iraq's greatest need.
The wartime numbers of private guards are unprecedented _ as are their duties, many of which have traditionally been done by soldiers. They protect U.S. military operations and have guarded high-ranking officials including Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Baghdad. They also protect visiting foreign officials and thousands of construction projects.
At times, they are better equipped than military units.
Their presence has also pushed the war's direction. The 2004 battle of Fallujah _ an unsuccessful military assault in which an estimated 27 U.S. Marines were killed, along with an unknown number of civilians _ was retaliation for the killing, maiming and burning of four Blackwater guards in that city by a mob of insurgents.
"I understand this is war," said Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., whose efforts for greater contractor accountability led to an amendment in next year's Pentagon spending bill. "But that's absolutely no excuse for letting this very large force of armed private employees, dare I say mercenaries, run around without any accountability to anyone."
___
Blackwater has an estimated 1,000 employees in Iraq, and at least $800 million in government contracts. It is one of the most high-profile security firms in Iraq, with its fleet of "Little Bird" helicopters and armed door gunners swarming Baghdad and beyond.
The secretive company, run by a former Navy SEAL, is based at a massive, swampland complex in North Carolina. Until 9-11, it had few security contracts.
Since then, Blackwater profits have soared. And it has become the focus of numerous contractor controversies in Iraq, including the May 30 shooting death of an Iraqi deemed to be driving too close to a Blackwater security detail.
"The shooting of that Iraqi driver has intensified tensions," Schakowsky said. "The Iraqis are very angry."
Company spokeswoman Anne Tyrrell, in an e-mail to The Associated Press, said the shooting was justified. "Based on incident reports and witness accounts, the Blackwater professional acted lawfully and appropriately," she wrote. There was no response to AP inquiries seeking further details.
Other alleged shootings involving private contractors include:
_ An incident in which a supervisor for a Virginia-based security company said he was "going to kill somebody today" and then shot at Iraqi civilians for amusement, possibly killing one, according to two employees.
The two, former Army Ranger Charles L. Sheppard III and former Marine Corps sniper Shane B. Schmidt, were fired by the company, Triple Canopy, and responded with a wrongful termination lawsuit. Their suit did not identify the shift leader they said deliberately opened fire on civilians in at least two incidents while their team was driving in Baghdad. He was described only as a former serviceman from Oklahoma.
On its Internet site, the company said all three were fired for failing to immediately report incidents involving gunfire. Triple Canopy, after an initial investigation, reported no one had been hurt and handed its information to the U.S. government.
Patricia Smith, a lawyer representing Sheppard and Schmidt, said the U.S. Justice Department declined to investigate. The Justice Department declined comment on the case.
On Aug. 1, a Fairfax County, Va., jury ruled that Triple Canopy did not wrongly fire the two men. But jury forewoman Lea Overby also issued a scathing note on behalf of the panel, saying the company displayed "poor conduct, lack of standard reporting procedures, bad investigation methods and unfair double standards."
The judge's jury instructions, Overby said, left no choice but ruling against the former employees. "But we do not agree with the Triple Canopy's treatment of (them)," she wrote.
_ Disgruntled employees of London-based Aegis Defence Services, holder of one of the biggest U.S. security contracts in Iraq _ valued at more than $430 million _ posted videos on the Internet in 2005 showing company guards firing automatic weapons at civilians from the back of a moving security vehicle.
In one sequence, a civilian car is fired on, causing the driver to lose control and slam into a taxi. Another clip shows a white car being hit by automatic weapons fire and then coming slowly to a stop.
In the videos, the security vehicle doesn't stop. It speeds on, leaving the civilians and their shot-up vehicles behind.
After initially denying involvement, Aegis, run by former Scots Guard Lt. Col. Tim Spicer, issued a statement saying the shootings were legal and within rules-of-force protocols established by the now-defunct CPA. Those guidelines allow security guards to fire on vehicles that approach too close or too quickly. U.S. Army auditors, in their own investigation, agreed with Aegis.
In the chaos of Iraq, where car bombings and suicide attacks occur over and over on any given day, such contractor shootings are commonplace, military officials say. The numbers of Iraqis wounded or killed by private guards is not known.
_ Sixteen American security guards were arrested and jailed by U.S. Marines in battle-scarred Fallujah in 2005 following a day of shooting incidents in which they allegedly fired on a Marine observation post, a combat patrol and civilians walking and driving in the city, about 40 miles west of Baghdad.
The guards, employed by Zapata Engineering of North Carolina, were imprisoned for three days. "They were detained because their actions posed a threat to coalition forces. I would say that constitutes a serious event," Marine spokesman Lt. Col. Dave Lapan said at the time.
The contractors were released and returned to the U.S., where they claimed the Marines humiliated and taunted them in prison, calling them "mercenaries" and intimidating them with dogs. The private guards denied taking part in the shootings.
Last year, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service closed its criminal investigation of the case "for lack of prosecutive merit," a spokesman said. None of the 16 men where charged.
But days after the shootings, Marine Maj. Gen. Stephen T. Johnson, commander of western Iraq, banned the 16 contractors from every military installation in the area.
In letters to each man, the general wrote: "Your convoy was speeding through the city and firing shots indiscriminately, some of which impacted positions manned by U.S. Marines.
"Your actions endangered the lives of innocent Iraqis and U.S. service members in the area."
___
Since American contractors first swarmed into Iraq, animosity has run high between soldiers and private security guards. Many of the latter are highly trained ex-members of elite military groups including Navy SEALS, Green Berets and Army Rangers.
"Most military guys resent them," said former Marine Lt. Col. Mike Zacchea, who spent two years in Iraq training and building the Iraqi army. "There's an attitude that if these guys really wanted to do the right thing, they would have stayed in the military."
Zacchea, now retired in Long Island, N.Y., said that as a senior battalion adviser, he was offered jobs by several security companies, with average salaries of $1,000 a day. He wasn't interested. "I didn't want to go to Iraq as a mercenary. I don't believe in it. I don't think what they're doing is right.
"Really, these guys are free agents on the battlefield. They're not bound by any law. They're non-uniformed combatants. No one keeps track of them."
In late 2004, the Reconstruction Operations Center (ROC) opened in Baghdad. Its purpose was to track movement of contractors and military troops around the country and to keep records of violent incidents.
Participation, however, is voluntary.
Military leaders say the government should demand that contractors report their movements and use of weapons. Last year, officials of the 3rd Infantry Division in Baghdad told visiting GAO auditors that lack of coordination continued to endanger the lives soldiers and contractors. Private security details continued to enter battle zones without warning, the military leaders said. In some cases, military officers complained they had no way of communicating with private security details.
Many large contractors say their guards coordinate with the ROC, and file "after-incident reports" of shooting episodes. But government auditors in Iraq reported last year that some contractors said they stopped detailing such shootings because they occurred so often it wasn't possible to file reports for each one.
Mon Aug 13, 2007 11:25 am
false flag VIP
Joined: 15 Jul 2006 Posts: 445 Location: melbourne, Australia
This is truly sickening that these soldiers of fortune are allowed to commit these atrocities. Where is the media highlighting the genocide that is taking place? Oh that's right they are probably too busy making another doco about the bloody holohoax. Forget a mythical holocaust and instead make people aware of what's happening here & now!
Is this the USA's idea of democracy? kill all who oppose it?
Mon Aug 13, 2007 3:23 pm
Sponsor
madthumbs
Joined: 22 Feb 2006 Posts: 8221 Location: Fingerlakes - NY usa
AJ - No, not Alex Jones wrote:
Blackwater are a dangerous group of people. Those asshats killed Iraqi people indiscriminately and laughed while doing it. We had little trouble in our AO before they started sexual intercourse things up. Then we moved to the Al Anbar province and they wouldn't go there because some of their contractors were killed in that area. Their funding has increased upwards to like 500 million dollars since the war. There are 14,000 thousand of those merc bastards and everyone of them seem hellbent on killing something.
Mon Aug 13, 2007 8:23 pm
madthumbs
Joined: 22 Feb 2006 Posts: 8221 Location: Fingerlakes - NY usa
Quote:
What happens to private contractors who kill Iraqis? Maybe nothing
By Alex Koppelman and Mark Benjamin
An incident this past weekend in which employees of Blackwater USA, a private security firm that has become controversial for its extensive role in the war in Iraq, allegedly opened fire on and killed several Iraqis seems to be the last straw for Iraqi tolerance of the company. Iraqi government officials have promised action, including but not limited to the suspension or outright revocation of the company's license to operate in Iraq.
But pulling Blackwater's license may be all the Iraqis can do. Should any Iraqis ever seek redress for the deaths of the civilians in a criminal court, they will be out of luck. Because of an order promulgated by the Coalition Provisional Authority, the now-defunct American occupation government, there appears to be almost no chance that the contractors involved would be, or could be, successfully prosecuted in any court in Iraq. CPA Order 17 says private contractors working for the U.S. or coalition governments in Iraq are not subject to Iraqi law. Should any attempt be made to prosecute Blackwater in the United States, meanwhile, it's not clear what law, if any, applies.
"Blackwater and all these other contractors are beyond the reach of the justice process in Iraq. They can not be held to account," says Scott Horton, who chairs the International Law Committee at the New York City Bar Association. "There is nothing [the Iraqi government] can do that gives them the right to punish someone for misbehaving or doing anything else."
Joined: 22 Feb 2006 Posts: 8221 Location: Fingerlakes - NY usa
Quote:
Blackwater Heavies Sue Families of Slain Employees for $10 Million in Brutal Attempt to Suppress Their Story By Daniel J. Callahan and Marc P. Miles, AlterNet. Posted June 8, 2007.
The lawyers representing the families of four American Blackwater contractors killed in Fallujah make the case that the company's executives are suing the families to keep them quiet and to avoid any accountability.
Blackwater crushed car with three kids, old man to avoid traffic: former US official
John Byrne
Published: Saturday October 6, 2007
Janessa Gans, a visiting political science professor at Principia College who served as a US official in Iraq from 2003 to 2005, opened fire on the private security contractor Blackwater in Saturday's edition of the Los Angeles Times.
"When the Iraqi government last month demanded the expulsion of Blackwater USA, the private security firm, I had one reaction: It's about time," she begins in an editorial.
Gans says she witnessed firsthand "over-the-top zeal" of the behemoth US mercenary force.
"We would careen around corners, jump road dividers, reach speeds in excess of 100 mph and often cross over to the wrong side of the street, oncoming traffic be damned," she writes. "I began to wonder whether my meetings, intended to further U.S. policy goals and improve the lives of Iraqis, were doing more harm than good. With our drivers honking at, cutting off, pelting with water bottles (a favorite tactic) and menacing with weapons anyone in their way, how many enemies were we creating?"
Gans describes a particularly "infuriating" incident where the lead Chevy Suburban in her convoy allegedly crashed into a sedan ferrying an older man, a young woman and three children.
"As we approached at typical breakneck speed, the Blackwater driver honked furiously and motioned to the side, as if they should pull over," she pens. "The kids in the back seat looked back in horror, mouths agape at the sight of the heavily armored Suburbans driven by large, armed men in dark sunglasses. The poor Iraqi driver frantically searched for a means of escape, but there was none. So the lead Blackwater vehicle smashed heedlessly into the car, pushing it into the barrier. We zoomed by too quickly to notice if anyone was hurt."
"Where do you all expect them to go?" she allegedly cried. "It was an old guy and a family, for goodness' sake. Was it necessary for them to destroy their poor old car?"
"Ma'am, we've been trained to view anyone as a potential threat," she says the driver, who she did not identify, replied. "You don't know who they might use as decoys or what the risks are. Terrorists could be disguised as anyone."
"Well, if they weren't terrorists before, they certainly are now!" she says she replied.
According to Gans, the Pentagon's rules of engagement and the private security contractor's seeming indifference created a stark contrast for local Iraqis, who saw the US military as a more responsible force. "Blackwater seemed to have no such rules, paid no compensation and, per long-standing Coalition Provisional Authority fiat, had immunity from prosecution under Iraqi law."
"As we do the work of bridge building and improving our host citizens' lives, if the people providing our transportation and security are antagonizing, angering and even killing the people we are putatively trying to help, our entire mission is undermined," she concluded.
Founder and president of The Euphrates Institute, Gans also keeps a blog, "Letters from the Sandbox."
Sun Oct 07, 2007 9:15 am
madthumbs
Joined: 22 Feb 2006 Posts: 8221 Location: Fingerlakes - NY usa
Pioneering Blackwater Protesters Given Secret Trial and Criminal Conviction
By Jeremy Scahill, AlterNet. Posted January 29, 2008.
Protesters who re-enacted one of Blackwater's worst civilian massacres in Iraq got jail time, while the real killers remain free.
Last week in Currituck County, N.C., Superior Court Judge Russell Duke presided over the final step in securing the first criminal conviction stemming from the deadly actions of Blackwater Worldwide, the Bush administration's favorite mercenary company. Lest you think you missed some earth-shifting, breaking news, hold on a moment. The "criminals" in question were not the armed thugs who gunned down 17 Iraqi civilians and wounded more than 20 others in Baghdad's Nisour Square last September. They were seven nonviolent activists who had the audacity to stage a demonstration at the gates of Blackwater's 7,000-acre private military base in North Carolina to protest the actions of mercenaries acting with impunity -- and apparent immunity -- in their names and those of every American.
The arrest of the activists and the subsequent five days they spent locked up in jail is more punishment than any Blackwater mercenaries have received for their deadly actions against Iraqi civilians. "The courts pretend that adherence to the law is what makes for an orderly and peaceable world," said Steve Baggarly, one of the protest organizers. "In fact, U.S. law and courts stand idly by while the U.S. military and private armies like Blackwater have killed, maimed, brutalized and destroyed the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis."
A month after the Nisour Square massacre, on Oct. 20, a group of about 50 activists gathered outside Blackwater's gates in Moyock, N.C. There, they reenacted the Nisour Square shooting and staged a "die-in," involving a vehicle painted with bullet marks and blood. The activists stained their clothing with fake blood and dramatized the deadly shooting spree. Some of the demonstrators marked Blackwater's large welcome sign -- with the company's bear claw in a sniper scope logo -- with red hand prints. The demonstrators believed these "would be a much more appropriate logo for Blackwater," according to Baggarly. "We're all responsible for what is happening in Iraq. We all have bloody hands." It took only moments for the local police to respond to the protest, the first ever at Blackwater's headquarters. In the end, seven were arrested.
The symbolism was stark: Re-enact a Blackwater massacre, go to jail. Commit a massacre, walk around freely and perhaps never go to jail. All seven were charged with criminal trespassing, six of them with an additional charge of resisting arrest and one with another charge of injury to real property. "We feel like Blackwater is trespassing in Iraq," Baggarly later said. "And as for injuring property, they injure men, women and children every day." The activists were jailed for five days and eventually released pending trial.
When their day in court arrived, on Dec. 5, the activists intended to put Blackwater on trial, something the Justice Department, the military and the courts have systematically failed to do. Their action at Blackwater, the activists said, was in response to war crimes, the killing of civilians and the fact that no legal system -- civilian or military -- was holding Blackwater responsible. The Nisour Square massacre, they said, "is the Iraq war in microcosm."
But District Court Judge Edgar Barnes would have none of it. So outraged was he at Baggarly, the first of the defendants to appear before him that day, that the judge cleared the court following his conviction. No spectators, no family members, no journalists, no defense witnesses remained. The other six activists were tried in total secrecy -- well, secret to everyone except the prosecutors, sheriffs, government witnesses and one Blackwater official. Judge Barnes swiftly tried the remaining six activists behind closed doors and convicted them all. It was as though Currituck, N.C., became Gitmo for a day.
It's not unusual for a judge to clear a courtroom when there is a disruption by the public. Nor is it rare for judges to try to prevent activists from turning the tables and attempting to put the government -- or in this case a mercenary company -- on trial. But witnesses that day report that there was no disruption -- and the defendants say they were immediately cut off when they strayed from the narrow scope of the trespass charge to discuss Blackwater's actions or the war. So why clear the courtroom? That may be a question for Judge Barnes in the end, but it's hard not to view his conduct through the same veil of secrecy that shrouds all of Blackwater's actions -- and the seemingly endless lengths to which the Bush administration will go to protect Blackwater.
