The Real Surge is Already Here

The Bush Administration is employing private armies to fight in Iraq. These "private military contractors," that is, mercenaries, are often ex-U.S. special forces soldiers with additional paramilitary training operating below the radar. Their legal status in Iraq falls under neither civilian nor military jurisdiction, and they earn far more money than American troops.

This may sound crazy, but it's all true. Not all "contractors" are civilian truck drivers or mechanics.

The five Americans killed in the helicopter incident last week were employed by the largest military contractor company and war-profiteer, Blackwater, just like the contractors killed and mutilated on the Fallujah bridge in 2004. In his movie "Iraq for Sale," Robert Greenwald exposes the shady dealings between Blackwater and the government. The company was founded by Erik Prince, a former Navy SEAL and heir to a billion-dollar fortune, and who also happens to be an ultra-Christian Republican campaign donor. Blackwater is still operating under a $300 million State Department no-bid contract to guard administrator L. Paul Bremer in Iraq, among other contracts.

The problem is that there is zero transparency with such private companies since their actions, costs, and casualties are not reported like military information is. Often their work takes place under multiple layers of sub-contracting. According to Jeremy Scahill of the Nation Institute, there are about 100,000 contractors in Iraq, of which 48,000 work as private soldiers. The Myrtle Beach Sun-News reported on 12/26/06 that as of last October, a whopping 646 U.S.-financed contractors had been killed in Iraq, a relatively high percentage of troop deaths. Further, every private contractor is insured by the U.S. taxpayers because of two WWII-era laws.

But it's not just about the money; it's about what these mercenaries are doing when nobody is watching. On 1/11/07 the Virginian-Pilot reported that a Blackwater contractor shot and killed an Iraqi security officer, but that no charges were ever filed. In fact, no private contractor has ever been charged for any illegal conduct in Iraq, in part because of "a legal gray area, in which it's uncertain whether they're subject to civilian law, military law or neither."

The problem of out of control contractors has become such a problem that U.S. Rep. David Price (D-NC) has introduced legislation to bring transparency and accountability to private contractors, and subjects them to oversight in civilian courts. "The lack of a legal framework for battlefield contracting has allowed certain rogue contractor employees to perpetrate heinous criminal acts without the threat of prosecution," Price said.

It turns out that the Fallujah incident itself also has some question marks behind it. On 9/29/06 the Raleigh News & Observer reported that congressional testimony regarding the incident revealed that the Army had not actually authorized Blackwater to guard convoys or carry weapons. "One unsolved mystery at the hearing," the newspaper notes, "was whether Blackwater . . . was ultimately working for U.S. taxpayers when its contractors were killed." The families of the Fallujah victims are currently suing Blackwater for wrongful death.

With tens of thousands of completely unregulated American mercenaries at his disposal, George Bush commands a considerably larger military presence in Iraq than most people realize. It is important to remember that each of these people are American citizens - at least one of the recent helicopter casualties was fresh out of the Marines. However, there are serious problems with subcontracting national defense to private corporations under secretive conditions with no oversight.

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