Blackwater Mercenaries Usurp Contracts Meant for Small Businesses

photo from Mosquito Blog

I wonder when the time of corporate, blatant disregard of rules, regulations and the law will be over?

So we all already know Blackwater is despicable. But it seems that the billions of dollars of government contracts that they were legally eligible for (using the word loosely) were not enough. A recent audit reveals that in the efforts to be the only game in town, Blackwater illegally applied for and received contracts that were designated for small businesses. The maxim being of course that too much is never enough.

Washington - Blackwater Worldwide, the contractor whose provision of private security in Iraq has been under scrutiny, and its affiliated companies may have improperly obtained more than $100 million in contracts meant for small businesses, according to federal auditors.

A report by the Small Business Administration's inspector general, issued in July, found that Blackwater and its affiliates, including Presidential Airways, won 39 contracts in the fiscal years 2005, 2006 and 2007 despite indications that the companies employed more than the number specified by the U.S. government. In some cases, the report said, the companies also had higher revenues than allowed for a small business. --Elizabeth Olson, International Herald Tribune

These companies, like Blackwater-- are going to work very hard to support John McCain for President.

We need a new ad featuring him side by side with mercenaries, oil company moguls, fawning media celebrities, and racists. After all- these are his base.

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1953 Secret Pact to Ignore Crimes Committed by USA Military in Japan

BBC News Photo Oct. 2005

According to new research on old documents from post WWII Japan, there is a long history of agreement that USA Forces serving overseas should be exempt from being charged when breaking the law. Talk about slippery slopes... from there to Blackwater and exemptions for private contractors. And here we find ourselves.

Act only on major U.S. forces crimes, prosecutors told 1953 Justice Ministry ordered charges waived -Kyodo News

The Justice Ministry in 1953 ordered prosecutors nationwide to act only on major crimes committed by U.S. service personnel in Japan, according to multiple internal documents, including those of the ministry.

It is the first time Japan's detailed measures on the issue have come to light, although the existence of a 1953 Japan-U.S. secret pact regarding the exemption of U.S. service personnel from Japanese justice was already known.

The documents, compiled by the ministry's Criminal Affairs Bureau and the National Police Agency's Criminal Investigation Bureau from 1954 to 1972, were obtained by Shoji Niihara, a researcher on Japan-U.S. relations, and Kyodo News.

The article goes on to talk about the fact that the Japanese and USA governments decided to let a few high profile cases go through mostly to keep the public happy and avoid the public outcry, but they established very lenient rules of what was considered on and off base activity etc. I can only imagine the kind of secret agreements we are in with factions of governments in the Middle East and South East Asia now. I think it is a reasonable expectation that we should hold our military personnel to standards including not breaking the the local laws of the land. If they cannot do that, then frankly they should not leave base.

And certainly private contractors working for corporate interests in a war zone should NOT be exempt from criminal charges.

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Mercenaries to Train Iraqi Local Forces

U.S. Seeks Contractors To Train Iraqi Military- the Washington Post.

"There is a lot of pressure on the active Army, and during this transition period where the military is converting to noncombat roles, a shift to contractors as trainers for the expanding Iraqi military is a natural step." He added, however, that the outcome "depends on the quality of those the contractors recruit."- Anthony H. Cordesman, a former Pentagon official

The quality of the contractors? yeah, right. This is just great. I wonder how well this will be received by the local civilians, and insurgents? I am sure there will be dancing in the streets...(not)

Does anyone else see this as the next step in the KBR/Blackwater/Halliburton plan to become the GOP's standing army?

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Withdrawal, mercenary withdrawal

It is time to withdraw...the contractors and mercenaries.

There are hundreds of thousands of them. They have cost the US government, meaning the U.S. taxpayers, tens of billions of dollars. They have exacerbated the cultural and political conflict through improper behavior and improper training. They have participated in massive fraud - losing billions of dollars in government allotted contract money, extorting and cheating on critical deliveries of necessary items and supplies.

They perform (actually they DON'T!) tasks that could and should be performed by the Iraqi people; tasks that could and should be performed by the US military. The Iraqi people have the expertise, know-how, and connections to do construction, rebuilding, maintenance, and security - cheaper, more efficiently, and with a better eye for their own peoples' needs. The US military can (and up until this conflict, always has) provide meals, shelter, water, and logistical support for the troops and forward bases.

Halliburton, KBR, Bechtel, Blackwater and all the other corporate leeches getting fat off of taxpayer dollars and FAILING to deliver on the promised critical supplies and support, need to go. We do not need to keep paying them to do the job: 1) Because the job cannot be done by them, and 2) Because they have patently failed to do that job, even with billions of dollars of cash, the support of the US military, and a free hand to do as they please in Iraq, regardless of the consequences of their actions.

Let's begin the immediate drawdown of the estimated 100,000 to 150,000 private contractors in Iraq. Let congress legislate the removal of the estimated 40,000 mercenaries in Iraq. I dont think Americans should be paying for the Iraqi PM's security and certainly not at the rates Blackwater charges - Iraqis can do that.

We do not think the US taxpayer should pay for overpriced, poor quality construction projects in Iraq - Iraqis can build schools, bridges, and power plants! If we want to pay for it, we should be paying the Iraqi construction companies, not the contractors. Besides, Bechtel is the same company that completely fucked up the Big Dig in Boston - how can we expect that they would be able to complete anything in a war zone, in a foreign nation?? They have not delivered on ANY of their promises...but the profits keep rolling in.

We think calling for the withdrawal of all non-essential personnel from Iraq would be a prudent thing at this stage. Democrats in the House and Senate can point to the billions we are paying these people without oversight. It's time to take these men and women out of harms way.

Using mercenaries and outsourcing war was never a good idea. Nor was
it ever, by any stretch of the imagination, cost effective. There were only 10,000 civilian contractors used in the first gulf war. This is 10- or 20-fold increase, all at the expense of the American taxpayer, with reduced results...and one could argue exceptionally bad, negative results. Remember Fallujah? That area blew up in large part due to the actions of "contractors"...and it has been these same "contractors"
(read mercenaries) who have been at the "forefront" of cultural estrangement, shooting up houses, strong-arming the locals, and even worse, on a regular basis.

We call for the immediate withdrawal of all non essential personnel, which would mean all private contractors and mercenaries in the employ of the Bush administration.

Time to stop pouring money into the (offshore) accounts of the big multinationals; time to stop letting them run roughshod over the locals, over our soldiers, and exacerbating a conflict that they had a big hand in bungling; time to remove that particular bit of salt from the wounds. Bring those "contractors" home, save a bundle of money, remove a serious irritant, and use the savings to fully protect our troops.

-- Hubris Sonic and RedDan
reprinted from thenewsblog.net

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