U.S. Mercenary Chickens Will Come Home to Roost

[Joanne98]

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

The wholesale privatization of U.S. war-making capabilities continues apace, despite the expected indictment of six Blackwater mercenaries involved in last year's massacre of Iraqi civilians at a Baghdad traffic jam. Domestically, for-profit prisons are popping up like Wal-Mart superstores, while Katrina brought soldiers of fortune to the streets of a major American city. "As the current corrupt order decays, the rulers find that due process and other niceties of law - including armies operating under codes of military justice and civil service police forces - restrict their freedom

U.S. Mercenary Chickens Will Come Home to Roost

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
"There will come a time when no U.S. government will be capable of breaking a contract with their hired killers."

The U.S. Justice Department is going through the preliminary motions of notifying six Blackwater mercenaries that they may be indicted in last September's massacre of 17 Iraqi civilians at a traffic circle in the heart of Baghdad. The proper punishment would be that meted out by the Angolans to four private assassins, including one American, in 1976: execution. But of course, Angola was exercising its rights as a sovereign nation in dealing with hired killers, who are neither soldiers nor partisan fighters under international law - just criminals who murder for wages and the thrill of it. Iraq has no sovereign government - as proven by the fact that Blackwater's thugs are still breathing.

Mercenaries are now an entrenched, institutional factor in U.S. global and domestic "security" strategies. Barack Obama cannot even begin to explain how he will disentangle U.S. mercenaries - euphemistically called "contractors" - from the uniformed occupation force in Iraq. The two forces are nearly equal in size: 144,000 troops and 126,000 highly paid civilians, 30,000 of them armed to the teeth. Washington considers the soldiers of fortune absolutely indispensable to the protection of key installations and personnel.

On the home front, Katrina - that harbinger of what a future urban America in crisis will look like - saw hundreds of thugs from Blackwater and other mercenary outfits patrolling the streets of New Orleans - as if they were the legitimate authorities.

"The specter of mercenary occupation of American cities is no longer farfetched - it has already happened."

http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=746&Itemid=1

[billyoc]

1. Well, I guess we'll just have to kill them ourselves.

[givemebackmycountry]

3. That was my first thought -

They ain't troops - they ain't swore to uphold anything other than the bottom line.
And they are outnumbered, there are 260 millions guns in this country and the American people own most of them.
Once these clowns start shooting at US, their ranks will drop very quickly.
Terminated, if you will.

We're an armed nation - like a very famous stupid monkey once said...

Bring 'em on

[DavidMS]

6. Couple of things to remember...

The modern nation wasn't because the rich needed to protect their money but to end the 30 years war so that each German Principality could decide on its own religion (Protestant or Catholic)

In reality we can divide mercenaries into two groups Camp Followers and Mercenaries. The difference being that camp followers must be treated much like prisioners of war and mercenaries are not protected persons (http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/93.htm) and under the laws of civilized armed conflict can be shot into a mass grave with no penalty.

However most rational parties to a conflict will wait until after the conflict is over because the last thing anyone wants is to make their enemies want to fight to the death.

[FreakinDJ]

2. Make it illegal to deputize them

I don't think they can operate on US soil without being deputized

[Joanne98]

5. That's a great idea

[thunder rising]

4. I have wondered why Iraq allows foreign civilians to carry weapons. It seems the first step to

shutting down Blackwater is to make a law disarming foreign civilians. Then armed foreigners are either soldiers under various military justice or assumed killers to be rounded up and jailed.

[The Traveler]

7. There are horrible implications

to the very concept of privately owned military forces. Again, I urge everyone to read Klein's "Shock Doctrine" and consider the history of privatizatio in Latin America.

And I urge every one I know of liberal persuasion to purchase a weapon and become trained in its use. I know this will be distasteful to many but it is not too far fetched to speculate that one day your lives and liberty may be dependent upon it.

If there is a God, please don't let it come to that ...

Trav