Blackwater USA says it can supply forces for conflicts

[Rose Siding]

Stepping into a potential political minefield, Blackwater USA is offering itself up as an army for hire to police the world's trouble spots.

Cofer Black, vice chairman of the Moyock, N.C.-based private military company, told an international conference in Amman, Jordan, this week that Blackwater stands ready to help keep or restore the peace anywhere it is needed.

Such a role would be a quantum leap for Blackwater and raises a host of policy questions.
...
"We're low-cost and fast," Black was quoted as saying. "The issue is, who's going to let us play on their team?"
...
"We clearly couldn't go into the whole country of Iraq," Taylor said. "But we might be able to go into a region or a city."

Another place where Blackwater could help restore order, Taylor said, is the Darfur region of Sudan, where millions have been killed or displaced by civil strife. The company could send troops under the control of the United Nations, NATO or the African Union, he said.

http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=102251&ran=202519&tref=po

[flobee1]

1. Am I wrong?

Didn't these folks recently get nailed for fraud?
getting paid for a service that never happened?

[saigon68]

38. THEY ARE GOOD AT THIS STUFF

[TX-RAT]

2. Dupe

[Rose Siding]

4. Of what?

I searched and nothing came up for "Blackwater".

[CottonBear]

7. Google Blackwater USA. They are mercenaries.

Remember the burned corpses hung from a brodge in Iraq? Blackwater mercenaries.

[TX-RAT]

8. here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=786796&mesg_id=786796

[Rose Siding]

14. Oh, ok. Thanks, TX

I think it's ok to post in separate forums.

[TX-RAT]

24. No prob, it did have a different title.

[CottonBear]

3. "We're low-cost..."

Bwahahahahahahahahaha! Who are they freaking kidding? :grr:

[shadowknows69]

37. The Wal-Mart of Mercs?

n/t

[allisonthegreat]

53. great...the f-troop..this whole affair sure does...

SMELL!!!:wtf:

[CrispyQ]

5. Low-cost?

Really????

[Marie26]

43. if you consider $100,000 in tax-free salaries low-cost.

But there is a benefit, because these private mercenaries are not covered by the "Uniform Code of Military Justice" (you know, the one that was just amended to prohibit torture).

[Emillereid]

6. The rise of these private militaries is freakin scary!

I am convinced they will provide the military force when America formally become a dictatorships. They are paid mercenaries who are not governed by either loyalty to our country or constitution.

Private militaries should be illegal.

[Zodiak]

16. And the long-standing argument that private

...companies are exempt from honorign the Constitution is reall going to bite us in the butt if Blackwater ever has to do "peace-keeping" here. After all, if Wal-MArt can piss test people for a menial job with minimal responsibilities, then why can't Blackwater get hired by BushCo. to break into your house, confiscate your property, and send you to a private prison without charges (or worse).

Corporate personhood will eventually destroy this country if it has not already.

[coalition_unwilling]

77. Blackwater USA mercs were sighted in New Orleans, following

Katrina. I remember thinking they were there to extra-judicially execute residents without having to fear much in the way of consequences. But I have not been able to research further any kind of information from New Orleans Medical Examiner's office about deaths by gunshot wounds in the immediate aftermath of Katrina.

[0007]

50. Guess who'll be paying out the ass for this pond scum?

Guess who'll be serving these psycho's? How do you spell Halliburton?

Guess who'll be making big bucks off these nut job? Did I hear the Carlyle Boys?

Guess who'll be lobbying big time for this?

Guess what junior & Rumsfeld & the rest of lthe crime cabal want?

[kevsand]

9. So, are they brown shirts or death heads?

It's so hard to keep track of our fascisti these days...

[C_U_L8R]

19. Pin Heads

Deadly Smelly Pin Heads

[HereSince1628]

10. Sorta hard to believe that US law allows a nongovernmental military

headquarters to operate in the open. I suppose it's ok because it's all part of global trade while those wacko state militias so villified in the '90s were nonprofits.

[formercia]

11. I thought it illegal

for US citizens to act as mercs for a foreign government. Oh, Us citizens operating inside the US, now that's a different story. (sarcasm)

[leveymg]

12. Cofer Black, as much as anyone at CIA, is responsible for 9/11

http://www.williambowles.info/911/cia_perjury.html
Perjury by CIA Counterterrorism Center Director -
CIA Blocked Hijacker Memo to FBI

10/6/05
www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/
duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3826660
June 10, 2005. The LA Times reports that in early 2000, the CIA intentionally withheld a memo from the FBI that reported the entry of key 9/11 hijackers into the US. See:

www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-
terror10jun10,0,510936,print.story?coll=la-home-headlines

In his testimony before the Joint Congressional Intelligence Committee in September 2002, Cofer Black, former head of the CIA Counter-Terrorism Center (CTC) stated under oath that his office had inadvertently neglected to inform the FBI when it became known in early 2000 that Flight 77 hijacker, Nawaf al-Midhar, had entered the U.S. However, it was revealed yesterday that a memo informing the FBI had actually been drafted at CTC, but an order was issued blocking transmission of that information.

In this sworn testimony, Black stated that the CTC had simply missed the importance of reports that known al-Qaeda terrorists had entered the US after attending an al-Qaeda planning summit. According to Black — who, after 9/11, was promoted by President Bush to head State Department Counterterrorism — the CIA Center failed to pass this information on to the FBI in early 2000 because staff were distracted and overworked. For more information see:

www.democraticunderground.com/articles/03/03/01_crimes.html

www.democraticunderground.com/articles/02/09/p/26_failed.html

www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0310/S00257.htm

However, as we learned yesterday, Black’s testimony to Congress was a material misrepresentation of what is the most important question that Congress had for the CIA. Why wasn’t the FBI informed in a timely way of this obviously critical development in tracking known al-Qaeda terrorists?

As ranking officer at CTC, Cofer Black was in a position to know about the Center’s memo that had been prepared for transmittal to the FBI at the time. He was also clearly in the chain of command that would decide to block the memo’s transmission to the FBI. Nonetheless, Black told Congressional investigators something quite different, and his testimony under oath before the Joint Committee was patently false, in light of the facts that were released yesterday

SNIP

[oasis]

17. Cofer Black's a traitor who seeks to be hired by the country he betrayed.

Gimme some justice.

[leveymg]

18. Standard BushCo career path: commit a crime, become a contractor.

Kick-back some of it to the GOP.

No kidding.

[wordpix]

61. I know, this just enrages me! That this BushCo traitor is now head of

Blackwater mercs getting huge contracts from BushCo, is criminal.

[Uncle Joe]

13. Does anyone have Dwight Eisenhower's farewell speech

warning of the dangers of the military industrial complex becoming too powerful. The neocons apparently have not heard it, I guess this is why they have a love of all things mercenary.

[0007]

15. Argh! Blackwater can fuck off!

[Vidar]

20. Execute the entire lot of them!

[Coastie for Truth]

21. What About Letters of Marque and Reprisal

for a Maritime Blackwater?

" Fifteen men on a dead man's chest
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum
Drink and the devil had done for the rest
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.
The mate was fixed by the bosun's pike
The bosun brained with a marlinspike
And cookey's throat was marked belike
It had been gripped by fingers ten;
And there they lay, all good dead men
Like break o'day in a boozing ken
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum."


Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution gives Congress the power

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

Wikipedia describes Letters of Marque and Reprisal thusly:

The United States Constitution (Art. I § 8) authorized only Congress to issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal. Such issuance is not restricted to private actors, however, and such a warrant could potentially be issued to the President, as an authorization for limited offensive warlike operations outside the territory of the United States. However, Douglas Kmiec, then Dean of the Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America, in testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, April 17, 2002, said:

Letters of Marque and Reprisal are grants of authority from Congress to private citizens, not the President. Their purpose is to expressly authorize seizure and forfeiture of goods by such citizens in the context of undeclared hostilities. Without such authorization, the citizen could be treated under international law as a pirate. Occasions where one’s citizens undertake hostile activity can often entangle the larger sovereignty, and therefore, it was sensible for Congress to desire to have a regulatory check upon it. Authorizing Congress to moderate or oversee private action, however, says absolutely nothing about the President’s responsibilities under the Constitution.

The difference between a privateer and a pirate was a subtle (often invisible) one, and the issuance of Letters of Marque and Reprisal to private parties was banned for the signatories of the Declaration of Paris in 1856. The United States was not a signatory and is not bound by that Declaration, but did issue statements during the 1861-65 American Civil War, and during the 1898 Spanish-American War, that it would abide by the principles of the Declaration of Paris for the duration of the hostilities. The Confederate States of America did issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal during the Civil War, however.

<>

[sofa king]

28. Already happening.

Piracy is an insurable event. Until recently, maritime insurance companies were one of the largest and highest paying employers of former elite amphibious troops such as SEALs and SBS. If, say, Philippine pirates grabbed one of your cargo ships, your insurance company would pay you off, then send in the former SEALs to "reacquire" the missing vessel and, hopefully, its cargo, which would partially recoup the insurance company's loss (or, if they had jerked over their clients who didn't have piracy insurance, provide a nice profit). The pirates of course were always caught in international waters (whether they were in international waters or not) and summarily executed and tossed overboard. Ship retaking is still one of the highest paying jobs an ex-military person can have outside of the boardroom of Kellogg, Brown and Root--so long as you don't mind shooting people in the face every six months or so.

More recently, mercenary firms have been getting into the act, like Topcat Marine Security.

[ewoden]

22. How's this sound?

He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy of the Head of a civilized nation.


Declaration of Independence

[NIGHT TRIPPER]

23. Blackwater members shouid be arrested-assests confiscated-Terror for hire

Mercenary corporation=Terrorist organization
The worst of it is that they kill for profit.
"who's going to let us play on their team?"
...
?
This indates they will work for the highest bidder.

very dangerous group to allow to operate.

[maxrandb]

25. If this part don't scare the pi$$ out of you, you're not paying attention

Bold is mine

"Unlike national and multinational armies, which tend to get bogged down by political and logistical limitations, Black said, Blackwater could have a small, nimble, brigade-size force ready to move into a troubled region on short notice"

I'm stuck asking myself what those "political limitations" might be. Could they be...

- Lack of public support for military action?
- Rules of engagement?
- LAWS!!?
- The Geneva Convention?
- The laws of human decency?
- The Constitution?

Things that make you go..."What the Fuck!!!!"

[oneinok]

26. The American Foreign Legion????

We can call it the American Foreign Legion.

[sofa king]

27. Machiavelli would scoff.

When the Italian city-states found themselves too busy making money to defend themselves in late Medieval times, they turned to the Condottieri, mercenary captains who brought their own soldiers to the battlefield.

In his book The Art of War (not to be confused with the much more useful book of the same name by Sun Tzu), Machiavelli pointed out what was then obvious to all. The Condottieri's interests did not coincide with those of the states at all. Mercenary troops weren't fighting to win (or die trying), they were fighting for a living, which meant that if the battlefield got too hot, they ran. The mercenary captains were also fighting for a living, so the easiest (but not cheapest) way to defeat a Condottiere army in the field was to simply buy them off. The entire system had a highly vested interest in constant warfare--that was their bread and butter, after all--so they engaged in countless acts of treachery designed to perpetuate conflicts. The condottieri systematically drew off as much money as they could from the Italian city-states while trying to fight as little as possible, and they certainly wouldn't dream of decisively ending a conflict. Occasionally, they would turn on their employers and loot to make up for unpaid wages. Some overthrew city-state governments and installed themselves--after all, who was going to stop them?

When Machiavelli wrote The Art of War in the 1520s, he claimed that not only could the Italian mercenary armies not stand up to the legions of Rome which had ruled the known (to them) world 1500 years previously, they couldn't stand up to actual enemies such as the French and the Swiss. France, in fact, had rolled through northern Italy in less than a year, 1494-1495, and the Italian city-states were saved from French domination only by the intervention of other European nations, with professional state-run armies.

No matter what their background, mercenary troops are never cheaper or more effective than state-raised soldiers. They are only expedient to use if a nation (or, perhaps, corporate nation?) has failed to fully prepare its own armed force in time for the conflict.

[newspeak]

29. So, let's go back to the attempted

coup of FDR. Gen. Smedley Butler was approached to lead an army that had been created by those wealthy industrialists. So where did this army come from? Mercenaries, maybe? Hmmmm-if our military is expended and weakened by these foreign jaunts, who comes into replace them on our soil? And, some of these mercenaries may not be American citizens, but the dregs of Pinochet's boys, El Salvador death squad members and other thugs. Now that's scary, very scary.

[rucky]

33. But their prices are "sofa king" low! n/t

[Brooklyn Michael]

30. Private.... Military.... Company

Holy Jeebus.....If that doesn't scare the living crap out of you...

....then you're probably ripe for recruitment by a PRIVATE MILITARY COMPANY!

Good to know we've got actual B-movie paramilitary villians out there for real.

[Marie26]

66. Blackwater isn't even the worst

There's lots of different mercenary companies running around Iraq. Blackwater, Dyncorp, Halliburton (that's right), Intercon, etc. etc. They're the second-largest military force in the country right now.

[donkeyotay]

31. Global privatized army. Mercenaries open for bidness to anyone

- well, anyone international, ambitious and with disposable income and a problem population - who'll let them on their "team."

What could go wrong? Who could see a problem with this?

[Bozita]

32. Blackwater USA, owned by BIL of Amway heir Richard DeVos

Wife Betsy DeVos' brother.

Betsy is the former head of the GOP in Michigan.

Richard (Dick) DeVos is currently running for governor of Michigan. His campaign manager is the current CEO of Domino's.

The ONLY candidate for any office in Michigan running TV and radio ads at this time is Dick DeVos. Obviously, money is no problem.

These bastards are really slimy.

[wordpix]

62. re: Domino's CEO, recall this about bldg. a new FL religious town?

with Jebbie's blessing? There was a DU thread on it but can't find.

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/03/dominos-pizza-founder-to-bankroll.html

Thursday, March 02, 2006

Domino's pizza founder to bankroll religious town
by Chris in Paris - 3/02/2006 03:20:00 AM


I knew that this guy was a nut, but c'mon. What country does this guy think he's living in? Bankrolling a new town that will govern according to Catholic principles? So let's hear how the American Taliban is so much different from the religious extremists anywhere else in the world. Ugh.

If Domino's Pizza founder Thomas S. Monaghan has his way, a new town being built in Florida will be governed according to strict Roman Catholic principles, with no place to get an abortion, pornography or birth control.

The pizza magnate is bankrolling the project with at least $250 million and calls it "God's will."

Gov Jeb Bush, at the site's groundbreaking earlier this month, lauded the development as a new kind of town where faith and freedom will merge to create a community of like-minded citizens. Bush, a convert to Catholicism, did not speak specifically to the proposed restrictions.

[Bozita]

75. Tom Monaghan took Domino's public - The current CEO is similar to Monaghan

Meanwhile, Monaghan has been spending the proceeds trying to turn us into a Catholic theocracy.

Check out this creation:
http://www.thomasmore.org/

[sutz12]

34. Not to worry, guys. It's just RoboCop coming true.

:)

[shadowknows69]

35. You suppose someone could hire Blackwater

to do a citizens arrest on the White House criminals? Naa dreaming again.

[aikoaiko]

36. I know its easy to demonize Blackwater as mercenaries, but

I know a few guys who have worked for them. They were former army guys with skills that were needed. They were lured away from avarege paying civilian jobs by some big short-term money. The kind of money that makes for a big downpayment on house or a new minivan for the famiy. They mostly did heavy security work.

[saigon68]

39. THEY ARE THUGS AND MURDERERS ***GRAPHIC VIOLENCE********

And every now and then they get what's coming to them

[aikoaiko]

49. we all have what's coming to us -- even you and me

I'm not so sure that the people who burned those bodies in charcoal wouldn't do the same to you and me if given the chance.

[saigon68]

58. You know what

I wouldn't invade their country illegally, for profit and $2000.00 a day --- to give them a chance

[Marie26]

52. They don't deserve that

No one deserves that.

[saigon68]

57. At $2000.00 a day they "ROLLED THE DICE"

THESE CHILDREN DIDN'T GET 5 CENTS WORTH OF SYMPATHY FROM THE THUGS WHO KILLED THEM

[Marie26]

68. So let's be equally cruel & heartless.

Good policy.

[Trajan]

79. I am with Marie on this ....

You profess to despise these individuals because they cause death and destruction .... and yet you applaud death and destruction when it is applied to them ...

ISNT the death and destruction the PROBLEM ? ...

Is it ONLY who is tortured and killed that matters; NOT the fact of torture and death itself ? ...

Arent YOU selling out your own morality by satiating in yourself a false sense of 'justice' served, while allowing that the very same methods you despise are the instruments of such 'justice' ? ....

Torture is WRONG ...... killing is WRONG .... EVEN against the mercenaries of Blackwater ....

The moral position against torture and killing is UNIVERSAL ....

There is NEVER a moral cause for torture .... EVER ....

There is MINISCULE moral justification for killing: ONLY when directly threatened with imminent death may you kill in your own defense, or in the defense of another who is so threatened ... It is a very narrow window ....

No ... Those men, even if they were acting in an unsavory manner, as they were, were NOT directly threatening anyone, and did not deserve to die in that inhumane manner ....

This is NOT a justification for ANY heinous acts which Blackwater and their ilk may have committed, in fact, it is the same argument AGAINST such acts by them that rejects such acts TO them ....

The moral cause against torture and murder applies to ALL .....

Even you ....

[WinkyDink]

40. Nothing in your post is a refutation of such labeling. So they did

"heavy security work" to get a new mini-van?

I infer "heavy" to be "killing". For pay. For a car.
Good grief.

[aikoaiko]

48. They didn't do anything different than the guard at your local bank.

Except they were at greater risk, got paid better, and were outfitted better.

Sometimes security guards are required to use lethal force to do their jobs. I don't hold it against them.

[Coventina]

59. Excuse me?!?! How about invading a foreign country that never attacked us

You cannot compare the two at all. The comparison is laughable.

[saigon68]

60. At $2000.00 a day THEY AREN'T guarding banks

They are Thugs and Killers

[Marie26]

67. We did that.

The US did that. We'd never argue that US soldiers deserve to be tortured, yet we'll laugh at the deaths of these US contractors? They have families, too.

[Coventina]

73. I laugh at no-one's torture. My complaint was the comparison to bank

security guards.

Yes, thugs and murderers have families as well. Every one of them was carried in someone's womb, which is why I believe that ALL people deserve a certain level of compassion and respect, no matter how horrific their crimes were.

I do not condone what was done to those men. That does not mean that I condone their actions or the actions of their colleagues. They are killers for hire. More comparable to mafia hit men than bank guards.

[Catrina]

56. So how many innocent civilians in some foreign country did they kill to

get that big downpayment??? This is really scary and as far as I know, it is, or was, against the law.

This is the reason why Rumsfeld fought all those generals about sending in more troops. He knew he was going to hire an army of mercenaries.

I read that there are thousands of them in Iraq, and some of the military there, including the British say they are causing havoc, running around shooting civilians, involved in the torture scandal (Caci employees were involved in Abu Ghraib, that's why this crazy administration shut down the hearings and Dick Cheney swore at Sen. Leahy who wanted to keep them going).

I also read that many of this guns for hire are from the worst parts of the world.

Why would ANYONE with any decency, think it's okay to go kill people to get a down payment on a house?? Have we really sunk this low?? And where is Congress? They just gave these thieves billions more dollars to spend on this!!

This is the neocon plan for the future ~ private, brutal armies with no restrictions on them, bound by now law. The American people thought they were paying for the troops, but we know that much of that money went to this over 20,000, maybe more, private army of Negroponte and Rummy. These are truly evil, evil people. Way worse than I had imagined.

Torture too, is business to them ~ this is why they would not condemn it ~ the other thing is they can hide the death toll. Over 800 mercenaries (they hate to be called that, they think they are some kind of heroes) have died in Iraq, the last I heard, but the media never reports their deaths and the war profiteers don't have to pay any benefits once they're dead.

The complicity of the media is evicent when they continue to call them 'contractors'. I don't know how they sleep at night. The military will soon be obsolete, if someone doesn't take this country back ~ we are suffering under a coup d'etat. No wonder nothing we do has had any effect ~ :cry:

[Trajan]

78. Money isnt everything ...

Hell .. one can make 'big money' robbing banks ... couldnt they ?

To sellout one's own morality for a big payday is the very definition of criminality .....

I would never agree that THEY deserved what happened to them that awful day ... but damnit: if you live by the sword, you die by the sword ....

[superconnected]

80. Most people need downpayments on houses and would like

a "new minivan". But they just don't go join a militia to do it.

My, the people you hang with. Very telling.

[Earth_First]

41. "The issue is, who's going to let us play on their team?"

Is it me or does this allude to the idea that it some cases it might not be our "team" that they are going to 'play' with?

[brentspeak]

46. Yeah,are they going to fire on U.S. troops if they're on the other "team"?

[Earth_First]

42. By the way, I love how they are using Darfur as a compassion issue...

They know how passionate some are about the situation in the Sudan, so they throw it out that they would be able to restore order to the region in an attempt to gain support.

Awful.

[newspeak]

44. the other day on the Randi Rhodes show

a man called who has relatives in Mississippi who are Katrina victims--he said that people are afraid and being intimidated by private security--that some of these guys are stealing and the people are afraid to confront them, afraid of being shot. Does anyone know about this? Is there private security working down there, like Blackwell. I don't trust these corporations who can hire the thugs of the world, then could eventually go against the citizens of the US.

[wordpix]

63. gawd, for once I'm starting to agree with the gun nuts and US militias

[Marie26]

72. dyncorp & blackwater are operating in NOLA. nt

[brentspeak]

45. Not on the American people's dime, Charlie

[Jose Diablo]

47. Loss of Citizenship

Consulate General of the United States

Loss of Citizenship

Causes of Citizenship Loss

U.S. citizens are subject to loss of citizenship if they perform certain acts voluntarily and with the intention to relinquish U.S. citizenship. These acts include:

1.Obtaining naturalization in a foreign state;

2.Taking an oath, affirmation or other formal declaration to a foreign state or its political subdivisions;

3.Entering or serving in the armed forces of a foreign state engaged in hostilities against the U.S. or serving as a commissioned or non-commissioned officer in the armed forces of a foreign state;

4.Accepting employment with a foreign government if (a) one has the nationality of that foreign state or (b) a declaration of allegiance is required in accepting the position;

5.Formally renouncing U.S. citizenship before a U.S. consular officer outside the United States;

6.Formally renouncing U.S. citizenship within the U.S. (but only "in time of war");

7.Conviction for an act of treason

Persons Who Wish to Relinquish U.S. Citizenship

If the answer to the question regarding intent to relinquish citizenship is yes, the person concerned will be asked to complete a questionnaire to ascertain his or her intent toward U.S. citizenship. When the questionnaire is completed and the voluntary relinquishment statement is signed by the expatriate, the consular officer will proceed to prepare a certificate of loss of nationality. The certificate will be forwarded to the Department of State for consideration and, if appropriate, approval.

An individual who has performed any of the acts made potentially expatriating by statute who wishes to lose U.S. citizenship may do so by affirming in writing to a U.S. consular officer that the act was performed with an intent to relinquish U.S. citizenship. Of course, a person always has the option of seeking to formally renounce U.S. citizenship in accordance with Section 349 (a) (5) of the Immigration Nationality Act.

Disposition of Cases when Administrative Premise is Inapplicable
The premise that a person intends to retain U.S. citizenship is not applicable when the individual:
formally renounces U.S. citizenship before a consular officer;

takes a policy level position in a foreign state;

is convicted of treason; or

performs an act made potentially expatriating by statute accompanied by conduct which is so inconsistent with retention of U.S. citizenship that it compels a conclusion that the individual intended to relinquish U.S. citizenship. (Such cases are very rare.)

*Cases in categories 2, 3, and 4 will be developed carefully by U.S. consular officers to ascertain the individual's intent toward U.S. citizenship.


Loss of Nationality and Taxation
In general, any person who lost U.S. citizenship within 10 years immediately preceding the close of the taxable year, whose principle purpose in losing citizenship was to avoid taxation, will be subject to continued taxation. For the purposes of this statute, persons are presumed to have a principle purpose of avoiding taxation if 1) their average annual net income tax for a five-year period before the date of loss of citizenship is greater than $100,000, or 2) their net worth on the date of the loss of U.S. nationality is $500,000 or more (subject to cost-of-living adjustments). The effective date of the law is retroactive to February 6, 1995.


If you have any further question regarding loss of citizenship, renunciation and dual nationality issues, please contact the ACS section of our office or go to: U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service.

I would say the mercs are on very thin ice.

[OzarkDem]

51. Isn't this illegal?

The US should renounce this organization and its activities immediately.

[Jack Rabbit]

74. Illegal?

If the unitary executive says "OK," then it isn't illegal.

I'm sure you can find that in the new edition of The Federalist Papers, soon to be published by Neocon Press.

[confludemocrat]

83. you mean like the torture and no-bids and NSA spying and Iraq war?

etc, etc, whats another to the long list?

[BreweryYardRat]

54. One major problem I see right off: Isn't bin Laden a billionare?

Wouldn't that just be a lovely damn surprise for our troops in Afghanistan?

People also brought up the potential domestic problems-while in some cases they might be worrying too much (mercs being used as a corporate army would cause a revolt), there is a risk of say...rich Republicans hiring a squad or two to bust into a political opponent's home at night, shoot him + any witnesses (which would be his family) and make it look like a gang decided to go for armed robbery en masse.

[leesa]

55. So the precious little Republican boys and girls won't have to get their

hands dirty...unless they really LOVE killing. No draft necessary.

[wordpix]

64. you got that right---no draft for Barbara Jr., Jenna & their buds

[yellowcanine]

65. Wait just a damn minute. I thought only Congress could "raise armies"

under our Constitution? Oh my bad, I forgot that Bush doesn't have to actually follow the rules in his role as Commander in Chief.

[arewenotdemo]

69. Wish they would

There's nothing I would enjoy more than reading about an army of mercenaries being wiped out.

[Javaman]

70. Privatized military = no accounting for human right violations.

Not that the U.S. gov't pays much attention to their abusing human rights anyway.

But this would pave the way to ridding moron* and his room full of dopes of those Geneva laws, etc. they are so quaint anyway, right?

:sarcasm:

colossal loser asshole failure*

[Massachusetts]

71. $ure Thing!

"We're low-cost and fast"

[coalition_unwilling]

76. Not "contractors" -- please refer to them from now on as "mercenaries"

[fedsron2us]

81. When you rely on mercenaries

it is usually a pretty sure sign that your Empire is about to become history.

[confludemocrat]

82. a bunch of beefy, white WWF-looking MFers gunning down brown people

That'll go over real well, as it always does. Our good-will ambassadors to the world.
Long live private enterprise!
"Private military company" Right.