Reply #4: It’s a job

[seemslikeadream]

It’s a job
About half of all Iraqis are out of work. But there’s a bull market in being on the right end of a gun.

One beneficiary is Fiji, which has basically outsourced its army to the self-styled Coalition. About a thousand Fijians are working as soldiers and security in Iraq. They’re highly regarded, riding shotgun on currency exchange convoys. Wages are about US$1,300 a month, insurance pays out on death or injury.

Nice work if you don’t get it.



Fiji Mercenary Killed In Iraq
SUVA, Fiji (FijiSUN, Feb. 10) - Lance Corporal Tevita Ramatau was to have arrived home from Iraq in a week’s time.
But he never will - much to the loss of his wife, Una, and six-month-old baby, Taniela.

LCpl Ramatau, 31, of Navunievu, Bua, was shot dead while guarding the Baghdad International Airport.

He left the country in October last year after signing in with UK-based private security firm Global Risk Strategies in search of a better life for his family.

Seven hours before he died he called home to tell his wife he would be back home on the 28th of this month instead of the 15th.

Ramatau died from injuries caused by mortar shrapnel that ripped through his head on Sunday.

GRS Fiji representative Col Sakiusa Raivoce said Ramatau was evacuated by helicopter to a United States military hospital but was pronounced dead on arrival.

more
http://www.soulpacific.com/archives/racketeers/000473.html



Specialists in suits train new Iraqi army

BORZOU DARAGAHI IN KIRKUSH
Armed employees of Custer Battles, a Virginia firm, guard Baghdad airport. Erinys, a British company with offices in the Middle East and South Africa, guards the oil fields. Global Risk, a British firm that offers "risk management" has the contract to provide armed protection for the Coalition Provisional Authority, the US-led occupation power. DynCorp of Reston in Virginia, has been hired to help train Iraq’s police.

Much of the work conducted by the contractors is secret. Western security officials in Iraq say the companies aren’t yet going out on combat operations as they do in Colombia and other countries.

Mostly they safeguard sites, but occasionally they are needed for a specific task - for example, quietly snatching a suspected Saddam Hussein loyalist.

"The CIA has recruited ex-military people to do operations in Iraq," said one Iraq-based former US military official. "These people have security clearances."

Coalition and US military officials say the contractors have the flexibility to do some things quickly that armed forces simply can’t.

Contractors can also cast a wider net in hiring, helping to internationalise the forces in Iraq, even as US attempts to attract more foreign troops stall.

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1081922003