Mission Control – writing a Harvard thesis

A blog I’ve heard about but never really read until now – Mountain Runner (Matt Armstrong) – has a whole bunch of posts on private military contracting. A good one, Holding Security Contractors Accountable, from 2007 discusses the Aegis “trophy video” and has a comment about the company’s winning the bid to run the Reconstruction Operations Center (ROC) in Iraq:

Aegis…the company that left everyone in bewilderment when it was awarded the largest contract ever given by the Pentagon. The investigation into the shooting resulted in a 200-page report. The Pentagon said the report found no wrong-doing but wouldn’t release it because it was the proprietary property of Aegis. Aegis would not release the report because it contained corporate secrets. Both said the men who did the shooting could not be identified despite the fact each man wore an Aegis supplied and monitored blue-force tracker. South Africa apparently find out one of the shooters was one of theirs and hence put him on trial in violation of their anti-mercenary laws.

One of my contacts told me Aegis spent a great deal of money to prove the video was doctored. So is that in the unreleased report?  (This is the same contact who doesn’t get why the public is upset about waterboarding, so I take some of his comments with a large grain of salt).

The “blue-force” tracker comment above raises a good point. The main point of the ROC is to know where Army contractors such as Aegis are when on the road. The unclassified version of the military’s tracking software, Tapestry, would know if that vehicle was Aegis’.

The lawyers for the Blackwater contractors indicted for manslaughter last week have created a website, Raven23 (their response team code name), to boost support, raise money, and influence public opinion about these men.

Hard not to notice that the “photos” page has each man in his military uniform. Let’s be clear, they were not in uniform when they participated in this assault because they were not soldiers. They were wearing the “Blackwater uniform” since they were civilians. But Blackwater and their lawyers want to confuse you into thinking they are decorated soldiers. They were soldiers. They are now civilians. In Nisour Square that day, when 17 Iraqis died, they were hired guns. Not soldiers.

A court, hopefully, will sort this case out. The evidence looks damning. Iraqis deserve their day in court on this episode. If Blackwater was defending itself, let’s hear it. Let’s see the evidence. Nobody who knows something about OIF thinks the environment is easy, safe, predictable. I believe the real, overarching problem is that parallel activities are conducted in a dangerous place: diplomacy and stability ops during an active conflict, esp. since DoS has so little money and manpower, is a poor idea (as the IG report recently stated — no “unity of effort” across federal agencies).  DoS/USAID/humanitarian groups operating in the same space as the military while the country still isn’t completely secure is a sure way to have these kinds of problems, eventually.

But let’s not conflate the private security guards who are civilians with the soldiers. This line should be more clearly demarcated not further blurred. Let the guards defend themselves honestly, as civilians for hire. This was 2007, several years into this security work for the State Dept. They knew the risks. If they did open fire and kill people without justification in that instance (it’s not justified on the basis that other attacks occurred in the days preceding this event), they should be held accountable. Justice matters. Whether they are found guilty or not, a trial is appropriate. There were rules on the use of force in place when this happened. For America’s soul, the rule of law and accountability have to be re-established. This is a good place to start.