tagged w/ DynCorp
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Corporations carry out some of the most horrific human rights abuses of modern times, but it is increasingly difficult to hold them to account. Economic globalization and the rise of transnational corporate power have created a favorable climate for corporate human rights abusers, which are governed principally by the codes of supply and demand and show genuine loyalty only to their stockholders. http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/recent-news/43017-some-of-the-qmost-wantedq-corporate-human-rights-violatorsCorporations carry out some of the most horrific human rights abuses of modern times,... more
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The U.S. government’s plan to rapidly grow the ranks of Afghan police officers has run into a shortage of instructors and training camps, prompting U.S. and NATO officials to cut basic training for Afghan recruits from eight weeks to six.The U.S. government’s plan to rapidly grow the ranks of Afghan police officers... more
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The US special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction says the US state department's gross mismanagement of a multibillion-dollar contract for training Iraqi police has left US funds vulnerable to waste and fraud. In a scathing report, Stuart Bowen, strongly criticizes both the state department and DynCorp International, the firm that won the $2.5 billion dollar contract in 2004.The US special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction says the US state... more
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The Orwellian-named mercenary trade group, the International Peace Operations Association, didn't waste much time in offering the "services" of its member companies to swoop down on Haiti for some old fashioned humanitarian assistance disaster profiteering. Within hours of the massive earthquake in Haiti, the IPOA created a special web page for prospective clients, saying: "In the wake of the tragic events in Haiti, a number of IPOA's member companies are available and prepared to provide a wide variety of critical relief services to the earthquake’s victims."
While some of the companies specialize in rapid housing construction, emergency relief shelters and transportation, others are private security companies that operate in Iraq and Afghanistan like Triple Canopy, the company that took over Blackwater's massive State Department contract in Iraq. For years, Blackwater played a major role in IPOA until it left the group following the 2007 Nisour Square massacre.
In 2005, while still a leading member of IPOA, Blackwater’s owner Erik Prince deployed his forces in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Far from some sort of generous gift to the suffering people of the US gulf, Blackwater raked in some $70 million in Homeland Security contracts that began with a massive no-bid contract to provide protective services for FEMA. Blackwater billed US taxpayers $950 per man per day.
The current US program under which armed security companies work for the State Department in Iraq -- the Worldwide Personal Protection Program -- has its roots in Haiti during the Clinton administration. In 1994, private US forces, such as DynCorp, became a staple of US operations in the country following the overthrow of Jean Bertrand Aristide by CIA-backed death squads. When President Bush invaded Iraq, his administration radically expanded that program and turned it into the privatized paramilitary force it is today. At the time of his overthrow in 2004, Aristide was being protected by a San Francisco-based private security firm, the Steele Foundation.
What is unfolding in Haiti seems to be part of what Naomi Klein has labeled the “Shock Doctrine.” Indeed, on the Heritage Foundation blog, opportunity was being found in the crisis with a post titled: "Amidst the Suffering, Crisis in Haiti Offers Opportunities to the U.S." "In addition to providing immediate humanitarian assistance, the U.S. response to the tragic earthquake in Haiti earthquake offers opportunities to re-shape Haiti's long-dysfunctional government and economy as well as to improve the public image of the United States in the region," wrote Heritage fellow Jim Roberts in a post that was subsequently altered to tone down the shock doctrine language. The title was later changed to: "Things to Remember While Helping Haiti."The Orwellian-named mercenary trade group, the International Peace Operations... more
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According to retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, Americans should prepare to accept up to 500 hundred U.S. casualties each month in Afghanistan as a result of upcoming spring offensives against the Taliban.
McCaffrey should know. An adjunct professor of international affairs at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, the retired general also sits on the board of directors for military industry companies such as McNeil Technologies and Dyncorp, which has a lucrative government contract to train the Afghan National Security Forces.According to retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, Americans should prepare to accept up to... more
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Major television networks continue to host retired generals as military analysts without alerting viewers to their extensive ties to military contractors and the Pentagon.Major television networks continue to host retired generals as military analysts... more
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Iraq's government says it won't give Blackwater a license to operate in the country. So does that mean the firm's cadre of tattooed gunslingers will be gone from Iraq, forever? Not exactly.
Sure, Blackwater as a corporate entity probably won't be roaming the streets of Baghdad or Mosul for much longer. But the individual mercenaries who've been working for years in Iraq, serving as a Praetorian Guard for the State Department's diplomats — those guys likely will be able to stay.
The State Department has a contract for "worldwide personal protective services" with three firms: Blackwater, DynCorp, and Triple Canopy. If Blackwater is no longer allowed to operate in Iraq, a lawyer steeped in the field tells Danger Room, there's no legal reason why the other two firms can't scoop up Blackwater's employees. "State simply issues a new task order to DynCorp or Triple Canopy, who turn around and hire some or all of Blackwater's employees," he says.Iraq's government says it won't give Blackwater a license to operate in the... more
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An Afghan construction company and eight of its employees filed a federal lawsuit against Falls Church-based DynCorp International, alleging that the large government contractor engaged in fraud, threatened workers and took $2.5 million worth of equipment and materials that belonged to it.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Virginia, states that after being awarded a contract worth $50 million from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2007 to build a military base for Afghan troops in Jalalabad, DynCorp hired Mainawal Rahman Building & Construction (MBC) as a subcontractor on the deal.
As part of the contract, MBC was to be paid $12 million, but it says DynCorp still owes it an estimated $7 million in unpaid invoices and expenses.
In the lawsuit, MBC alleges that DynCorp fired it from the project in August without notice and days later sent security guards, armed with "AK-47 assault rifles at the 'ready' position," to a camp where MBC workers lived, ordering 135 of them to leave in one hour and abandon their equipment.
DynCorp provides law enforcement training, construction management and translation services in Iraq and Afghanistan. Last year, nearly 40 percent of DynCorp's roughly $2.1 billion in revenue came from work it did on contracts in those two countries.
DynCorp spokesman Douglas L. Ebner said the company ended its contract with MBC because it "had performance issues" with MBC's work. He declined to elaborate and said DynCorp had been "in discussions" with MBC about "equipment left at the site and outstanding invoices, but then they moved precipitously to a lawsuit."
Bruce J. Huffman, a spokesman for the Army Corps in Afghanistan, said the military base was only 50 percent finished and a month behind schedule.
An Afghan construction company and eight of its employees filed a federal lawsuit... more
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Army officials and executives of the three companies are planning to meet in the next few weeks to start the complex process of breaking up KBR’s sprawling operations in Iraq.
KBR, previously a subsidiary of Halliburton, once headed by Mr. Cheney, has collected more than $24 billion since the war began. It has 40,000 employees in Iraq and 28,000 more in Afghanistan and Kuwait.
But KBR has come under fire from Congress and Pentagon auditors for complaints ranging from making more than $200 million in excessive charges, including meals never served to soldiers, to delivering unsafe water to American troops to doing little to prevent sexual assaults of its female employees, often by their KBR co-workers.
Army officials acknowledge that they were under intense pressure from Capitol Hill to give KBR some competition, yet leading Democratic lawmakers and other critics say the new contract will merely paper over the fundamental problems that stem from the Pentagon’s heavy dependence on outside contractors in Iraq.
Five companies submitted bids (primarily covering work in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan), and the Army initially awarded contracts to KBR, Fluor and DynCorp last June. But the two losing companies protested, and the Government Accountability Office upheld their protests in October, ruling that the Army had given preferential treatment to the winning companies. The Army then made some adjustments in the contract and announced in April that the same three companies had won again.
Like KBR, DynCorp, based in Falls Church, Va., has had serious problems in past contracting work, including allegations that its employees engaged in sex trafficking in Bosnia while working on a police training contract there in the late 1990s. In addition, government auditors concluded last year that the State Department’s $1.2 billion contract with DynCorp for police training in Iraq was so badly managed that they could not determine exactly what was done for the money.Army officials and executives of the three companies are planning to meet in the next... more
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