Privatization of 'Obama's War'

[laststeamtrain]

Privatization of 'Obama's War'

By Michael Winship
June 5, 2009

<snip>

According to new Pentagon statistics, in the second quarter of this year, there has been a 23 percent increase in the number of private security contractors working for the Pentagon in Iraq and a 29 percent hike in Afghanistan. In fact, outside contractors now make up approximately half of our forces fighting in the two countries.

"This means," according to Jeremy Scahill, author of the book, Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, "there are a whopping 242,647 contractors working on these two U.S. wars."

Scahill, who runs an excellent new website called "Rebel Reports," spoke with my colleague Bill Moyers on the current edition of Bill Moyers Journal on PBS.

"What we have seen happen, as a result of this incredible reliance on private military contractors, is that the United States has created a new system for waging war," he said.

By hiring foreign nationals as mercenaries, "You turn the entire world into your recruiting ground. You intricately link corporate profits to an escalation of warfare and make it profitable for companies to participate in your wars.

<snip>

"I feel that the end game of all of this could well be the disintegration of the nation-state apparatus in the world. And it could be replaced by a scenario where you have corporations with their own private armies. To me, that would be a devastating development. But it's happening on a micro level. And I fear it will start to happen on a much bigger scale."

<more>

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/060509b.html

[BeFree]

1. Obama's war

Gawd I hate that, the truth of it hurts to the bone.

Their armies of corporate lawyers is now being co-joined with their own style of dispensing justice through the use of guns and ammunition. It will only continue to grow.

For now we are blessed to have a semblance of justice in the homeland but nowhere else is there such a blessing. We are the last stronghold but the beginning of the end came on 9/11.

As designed.

[malaise]

2. Scahill was on Bill Moyers last night

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/06052009/profile.html

[KharmaTrain]

3. Stuck As Stuck Can Be...

No surprise on the mercenaries...there really hasn't been a full accounting, but it's been around the 50% level for several years now. This was the masterpiece of Rummy's "smaller and leaner" military and cheney looking to get a nice bang on his millions in defense contractor stocks. They outsourced EVERTHING. A couple years ago, I met an Iraqi vet who complained that the mercenaries were the biggest problem in that war...controlling supplies, running vital convoys and other critical jobs while demoralizing the military at the same time. At the time he said that these mercenaries would be the reason we lost these wars. I'm sure he still feels that way.

Here's the shit sandwich...we have an overstretched military on a mission that it shouldn't have gotten into in the first place and getting out isn't as easy as packing bags and heading to the airport. President Obama made big strides in his Middle East trip to begin to forge the diplomatic muscle that will be necessary to drawn down and then withdraw troops, but that creates a Catch-22. Whle troops are rotated out or around, mercenary jobs still remain. Short of some major mobilization, there no way to quickly replace 150,000 (I have doubts about the 250 number) or so mercenaries.

This mess is another one that needs to be investigated but real reform in the military that will get rid of these blood suckers once and for all has to take a back seat to the safety of our troops (and their needs) and this military adventure is over.

[HamdenRice]

4. Impeach Obama for taking us into a "war of choice" under false pretenses!!!1!

It's all Obama's fault!

[Buzz Clik]

5. Scahill is rapidly falling into the Media Whore category. His premise is WRONG!

Go here and read: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5771845&mesg_id=5771845

Scahill, either through active intent or laziness, is being incredibly misleading about this. I'll give him credit for writing something that is getting him an enormous amount of face time, even though he is wrong.

[laststeamtrain]

6. Axiom: Never apologize to a 'center-right' whore. n/t.

[Buzz Clik]

7. The text in your response is a bit vague, but the message from your image is clear enough.

You really don't care that Scahill is spreading bullshit?

[mopinko]

8. how many times is this going to have to be debunked

before people stop posting it?
i suggest that you alert on your own thread and ask that it be removed. surely you wouldn't have posted it if you had know, right?