Iraq's murky waters

ALMOST NO ONE SEEMS TO KNOW that American government officials in Iraq are not guarded by the U.S. military, but instead are protected by what are known as "private security contractors" or PSCs. The Baghdad incident on Sept. 16 in which Blackwater USA contract soldiers fired on civilians, killing 17 and wounding 27 while protecting a Foreign Service convoy outside the Green Zone, changed that to a limited degree only. Some Americans now have read or heard that Blackwater and other PSCs are in Iraq and Afghanistan in large numbers, but they still do not believe it. Thus, we have--and have had--a hidden army in Iraq, one equal in size to the formal military force of 160,000 or more.

Department of State (Foreign Service) personnel in Iraq are not protected by the Department of Defense (U.S. military), as most Americans assume. Instead, State employees are protected by three firms: Blackwater, USA; DynCorp; and Triple Canopy. Few of our citizens think through the complexities of governmental budgeting. The Defense budget includes defense of the U.S., but does not include defense of the Foreign Service. They have to protect themselves. To do this, they hired Blackwater, a private company, to provide security for them around the world.

What is a "private security contractor" anyway? In Blackwater, Jeremy Scahill uses the subtitle, The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army. Mercenaries, or soldiers for hire, have a long history--thousands of years--including service for, and against, the U.S., but PSCs generally reject the term "mercenary" in favor of the less unsavory "private security contractor." PSCs indeed do operate on business contracts--for the companies that bring them together and for the individuals they hire. Most are former military personnel and the services they provide are a substitute for formal soldiers and airmen. Therein lies one of the major problems created by private armies--why fight for $100 a day when you can do the same thing in the private sector for $500 to $1,000 per day?

There roughly are 170 PSC companies in Iraq at this point. Daniel Schorr of National Public Radio estimates the number of PSC employees in Iraq at 180,000, considerably more than the amount of U.S. and Coalition military forces. Other estimates have been lower, but all are in the range of 150-160,000, with 40-50,000 under arms. These private armies have--and operate--helicopters and armored personnel carriers. Their behavior, including these killings, is not covered by U.S. military jurisprudence or Iraqi or international law.

There is no common command structure for this second army in Iraq. The Oct. 9 killing of two Iraqi women by contractors typifies the problem. The contractors who did the shooting were employed by Unity Resources Group, a PSC that is Australian-run, headquartered in Dubai, and registered in Singapore. Actually, it is more complicated than that. Unity Resources is in Iraq to provide security for RTI International, which is carrying out a nation-building contract for the Agency for International Development (AID), which is a quasi-independent agency of the Department of State. Are you following this? If so, you will understand how a Bush Administration official can argue that "AID does not direct the security arrangements of its contractors. These groups are contractually responsible for the safety of their employees. That responsibility falls entirely on the contractor." Blackwater protects State Department personnel, but not those of AID, its own arm, let alone RTI, AID's arm. In other words, it is everyone for themselves in Iraq, even if the work is at the bidding of the U.S. government.

Iraqis, as well as our citizens, do not see a difference between the formal U.S. military in Iraq and private firms and other Americans under arms or others employed by Americans. Shootings like those of Sept. 16 and Oct. 9 reflect on the image of the U.S., as well as being a part of the U.S. mission. Apparently, though, no one is in charge of that mission. Like Americans, Iraqis see the U.S. government as being in control--and responsible. Blackwater or Unity Resources behavior blackens the image of the U.S., not just the contractors or individuals doing the shooting. A lack of coordination in the U.S. mission in Iraq, including protecting the pieces of the institution-building puzzle, is a good part of the reason there is no "mission accomplished"--in part or in whole--in the country.

Iraq has become the definition of morass and a black mark on the entire concept of privatization. In the aftermath of the Sept. 16 Black water shootings, the State Department has discovered that it did not know what its own contractors were doing and conducted an immediate and thorough--although after the fact--investigation of every aspect of the relationship. The Democrats now have to figure out how to withdraw 150,000 or more security contractors from Iraq, not just 160,000 troops. Somewhere there has to be a place in law for private armies that are larger than public ones. Shouldn't we be counting the PSC casualties? PSC deaths are estimated at more than 1,000 (to add to the 3,800 U.S. military losses) and the wounded are many thousands more. There are many societal costs to be considered here and, importantly, U.S. foreign policy has to be conducted in such a way that it excludes the power of rich entrepreneurs like Erik D. Prince, the founder and president of Blackwater and a personal friend of the Bush Administration. Contracts of $1,000,000,000 cannot be dropped in the unmonitored hands of political cronies.