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Use of Iraq contractors costs billions, outnumber soldiers
The United States this year will have spent $100 billion on contractors in Iraq since the invasion in 2003, a milestone that reflects the Bush administration’s unprecedented level of dependence on private firms for help in the war, according to a government report to be released Tuesday.
Iraq is the first war zone where employees of private contractors now outnumber American troops. The United States this year will have spent $100 billion on contractors in Iraq since the invasion in 2003, a milestone that reflects ... more -
Iraqi government poised to yank Blackwater immunity
A withdrawal plan currently being worked out between American and Iraqi negotiators includes the acknowledgment that military security contractors such as Blackwater, whose employees have been accused of recklessness and mass murder during the occupation, would be newly subject to Iraqi law, the Washington Post reported Sunday.
Negotiators are in agreement on most of the plan, which will have to meet the approval not only of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, but also officials within his Council of Ministers and, finally, the Iraqi parliament.
It could be weeks, if not longer, before the agreement sees those votes, said one official. "They are obviously going to be extremely attentive not just to the substance but also to the presentation," added another.
Excerpts from the article follow:
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The Bush administration has opposed such a timetable but has bowed to Iraqi demands for target dates. Officials on both sides said dates will be couched in language that allows the withdrawal to speed up or slow down, depending on conditions on the ground.
The U.N. mandate authorizing the U.S. troop presence in Iraq expires at the end of this year. Negotiations on the bilateral arrangements to replace it began in March, with a completion target of July 31 that would have given the two governments time to gain political and popular approval and arrange logistics for the transition.
Negotiators initially began with two separate agreements. The first, called a strategic framework, outlines long-term political, economic, cultural and security arrangements between the two countries. A second accord, a status-of-forces agreement, was to cover more specific rights and responsibilities of the U.S. military in Iraq. When negotiations over the status-of-forces agreement stalled in June, negotiators decided to attach it to the larger framework as an implementing memorandum on security arrangements. A withdrawal plan currently being worked out between American and Iraqi negotiators includes the acknowledgment that military security... more -
Losing immunity would hurt Iraq mission
Can't imagine WHY American Security Contractors are so frightened about losing their immunity!?!
(CNN) -- An American contractor said Thursday the U.S. mission in Iraq will be undermined if the Iraqi government succeeds in revoking blanket legal immunity for American security contractors.
Carter Andress reacted to a Wednesday government report that said the removal of legal immunity for American private security contractors could set off an "exodus" from war-ravaged Iraq and "impose significant limitations" on American reconstruction efforts.
The scenario is outlined in the quarterly report issued to Congress by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.
Andress, whose firm builds bases for the Iraqi army and police and supplies those places with water, food, fuel and maintenance services, said about 40 percent of his staff is involved in security.
"We would undermine the U.S. mission here because they are so reliant on contractors," said Andress, co-founder of the American-Iraqi Solutions Group. "For better or for worse, that's reality."
Even though 90 percent of his employees are Iraqis, he fears that new laws could force him to shut down.
But the "exodus" comment in the report also prompted skepticism from a scholar who studies the subject. Peter Singer, a Brookings Institution scholar who is an authority on private security firms, says, "I don't think we should worry about a market collapse, so to speak. There's simply too much money to be made."
The Iraqi government has criticized the blanket immunity because of the actions of security contractors, such as the September shootings in Baghdad of Iraqi citizens that involved Blackwater contractors. Seventeen people died in that incident,
"From a relief and reconstruction perspective, one of the most critical issues under discussion is contractor immunity," the inspector general's report says. Can't imagine WHY American Security Contractors are so frightened about losing their immunity!?! ... more -
Blackwater says oversight and media scrutiny not part of master plan
Blackwater Worldwide said Monday that it planned to shift away from the lucrative security contracting business because U.S. government scrutiny and negative media attention had made the business too costly.
Blackwater executives say that they have unfairly become a symbol for all contractors in Iraq and that the company has become a flash point for those opposed to the war. It plans to focus on training, aviation and logistics.
Blackwater has been under intense scrutiny since September when its security contractors opened fire in a crowded Baghdad intersection while responding to a car bombing. Seventeen Iraqis were killed, prompting congressional hearings and an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigations.
In 2005 and 2006, security jobs, including guarding U.S. diplomats in Iraq and helping to secure New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, represented more than 50 percent of the company's business.
Security now represents about 30 percent of revenue, and Gary Jackson, president of Blackwater, said it would go much lower.
"If I could get it down to 2 percent or 1 percent, I would go there," he said, adding that "security was not part of the master plan, ever." Blackwater Worldwide said Monday that it planned to shift away from the lucrative security contracting business because U.S. governmen... more -
DOD contracts out contractor oversight
Just when you thought there was nothing left to privatize ...
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Controversial contractor's Iraq work divided up
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 few weeks to start the complex process of breaki... more -
Getting away with rape in Iraq
"As news broke of the rape of yet another US military contractor employee in Iraq [see "Another KBR Rape Case" at thenation.com], the Senate Foreign Relations Committee convened a hearing April 9 to demand that the Justice Department explain why it has failed to prosecute a single sexual assault case in the theater since the Iraq War began." "As news broke of the rape of yet another US military contractor employee in Iraq [see "Another KBR Rape Case" at thena... more
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