War is a racket villa in Dubai

Der Spiegel :
"Billions of dollars are being secreted out of Kabul to help well-connected Afghans buy luxury villas in Dubai. Amid concerns that the money could be the result of corruption, American politicians have temporarily cut off [$3.9-billion in] aid to the Afghan government."

Proud new owners of villas in Dubai:
"a brother and a cousin of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, one of Karzai's former vice presidents and the brother one of the country's two current vice presidents."

Properties are registered under the names of the individuals issuing the loans, such as Sherkhan Farnood, the founder and chairman of Kabul Bank, Afghanistan's largest private bank.
Farnood : "What I'm doing is not proper, not exactly what I should do. But this is Afghanistan."

Kabul Bank's executives helped finance President Hamid Karzai's reelection campaign last year, and the bank is partly owned by Mahmoud Karzai, the Afghan president's older brother, and by Haseen Fahim, the brother of Karzai's vice presidential running mate.
Karzai's brother has "an informal home-loan agreement with Kabul Bank and pays $7,000 a month in interest".

Khalilullah Fruzi, chief executive of the bank, says "Kabul Bank is so flush that it is building a $30 million headquarters, a cluster of shimmering towers of bulletproof glass."
The bank is also spending millions to hire gunmen from a company called Khurasan Security Services, which, according to registration documents, used to be controlled by Fruzi and is now run by his brother.

Meanwhile, a new survey finds that corruption in Afghanistan has doubled since 2007, with one in seven Afghans paying nearly $1 billion in bribes last year, and US contractors are leaving the country without paying Afghan construction companies hundreds of thousands, even millions, of dollars owed, but McCain says winning Kandahar is the key to winning the war.

And so it goes....



Canada's aid in Afghanistan will amount to $1.9B over the ten-year period ending in 2011, making Canada one of Afghanistan's largest donors. In the 2008/2009 fiscal year, Canada disbursed approximately $224M.
And I'll bet you never expected to be part owner of a villa in Dubai.

Mercenaries in Afghanistan : Lord of the Flies

.

ArmorGroup mercenaries in charge of security at the US embassy in Kabul :

"dancing naked around a fire, licking each others nipples and grabbing each others testicles, sex acts, peeing on each other, vodka shots from butt cracks, eating potato chips from clenched buttocks..."

Well, boyz will be boyz, stress of the mission and all that, leading directly to :

"hazing, weekly ritual humiliation, forced by their supervisors to take part in the demeaning sex games. Anyone who refused to take part in the games was ridiculed, humiliated, demoted or even fired. Those who took part were rewarded with better shifts and postings."

and sexual predation and intimidation of Afghan employees :

"An Afghan national who works in the dining hall at Camp Sullivan submitted a signed statement to the POGO [US Project On Government Oversight] in which he described how a guard had grabbed him and said: "You are very good for fucking."
The man was accompanied by four other men and all were only wearing short underwear and carrying bottles of alcohol. The man said he was too afraid of them to say anything."

"The climate of fear and coercion" according to the US Project on Government Oversight, has led to "complete distrust of leadership and a breakdown of the chain of command, compromising security."
As in the "cowboy mission" :

"In May, 18 guards, who are not trained for such missions, dressed up as mujahedin fighters and went out on unauthorised night-time military operations in the Afghan capital. The guards are said to have photographed themselves taking part in the "undercover" operation, later posting the images online.

"They were living out some sort of delusion," one of the whistleblower guards told The Washington Post.

The report reveals that, instead of taking action against the guards involved, ArmorGroup North America gave them a mocked-up citation which improperly bore the seal of the US State Department and praised them for their "intrepidity".

ArmorGroup North America, a division of Wackenhut, has been protecting almost 1,000 US diplomats and Kabul embassy personnel. The 450 security personnel assigned to the embassy, including Canadians, all live at Camp Sullivan, where the sex parties took place.

"At a Senate hearing on waste, fraud and abuse by ArmorGroup in June, senator Claire McCaskill asked in exasperation: "Is this the best we can do?"

"The [POGO] report accuses the State Department of being complicit in the problems, citing numerous letters in which the agency expressed concerns about security deficiencies at the American mission in Kabul and threatened to terminate ArmorGroup’s contract. Yet in sworn testimony to Congress, the report said, department officials said the problems had been fixed."

The State Department renewed the company’s contract, worth $180 million a year, through July 2010.

30 supervisors and guards are alleged to have been the instigators of the sex parties, hazing, and cowboy mission.

The State Department has demanded that the security guards in the photos be fired.

ArmorGroup has fired eight and two have resigned.

.

The Guardian : Guards gone wild :

"As of 30 June, there were nearly 74,000 military contractors – including 5,165 armed private security guards – in Afghanistan, far outnumbering the roughly 58,000 US troops in the country.

Privatised war: It gives those in power an easy way to circumvent traditional democratic processes. They can escalate war under the radar with far less interference from the public.

Hiring additional contractors in Afghanistan – the vast majority of whom are local nationals or citizens from other poor countries – simply doesn't generate the headlines that sending more US troops does. Moreover, contractor deaths are not counted in any official tally of casualties, which ultimately serves to slow the growth of public opposition to the war."

The Star's appallingly etiolated coverage :

U.S. embassy in Afghanistan cuts out booze :

"Private guards accused of wild partying, hazing
Photos were released of guards and supervisors in various stages of nudity at parties flowing with booze."

is the reason for this post.

Afghanistan : 28,000 mercenaries from 73 different companies

Stars and Stripes :

"The shooting death of a Canadian soldier this weekend provides a grim example of how chaotic the security situation can often be in southern Afghanistan.
The soldier [Master Cpl. Joshua Roberts] was mortally wounded Saturday morning in Kandahar province when Afghan private security guards opened fire indiscriminately after Taliban insurgents attacked a nearby group of Canadian troops, according to coalition military officers.

An array of coalition forces are training Afghan army and police as a frontline defense against the Taliban, but they are spread thin. The situation is further complicated by a mishmash of poorly-disciplined, but heavily-armed private security guards that have official Afghan and coalition sanction, but which often operate with little oversight or control. "

"According to coalition military officers, a convoy that included groups from two different security companies — Compass and USPI — was traveling the main highway west of Kandahar when they passed a group of Canadian soldiers engaged in a firefight with Taliban fighters in the Spin Beer district.
Apparently thinking they were under fire as well, the convoy of private security guards also opened fire.

"Their normal contact drill is that as soon as they get hit with something, then it’s 360, open up on anything that moves," said Maj. Corey Frederickson, [part of a Canadian advisory team that trains and mentors the Afghan army]. "We think that’s probably what happened."

Video footage at the Stars and Stripes shows military officers questioning the Afghan mercenaries who : "freely admitted to opening fire on what they thought were Taliban fighters. But when informed that a Canadian soldier had been wounded, their stories began to change, and many never claimed to have fired at all. Some of the security guards blamed the Afghan army for the incident."

Twelve of them are wearing Afghan police uniforms although they aren't police so the uniforms are promptly confiscated. Voiceover from a US soldier explains that personal militia and security guards wearing Afghan police uniforms have driven around heavily armed and stoned and robbed people.

Well, ok, we already knew this.

But am I right in thinking it likely that coalition forces are training Afghan police and soldiers, the poorly and intermittantly paid Afghan police and soldiers, who presumably then quit to join the better paying private security forces which are accountable to no one?

This is the third such incident between coalition forces and Compass although the previous two incidents involved Compass employees being shot.

CBC : "There are as many as 28,000 private soldiers working in Afghanistan for as many as 73 different companies."


Cross-posted at Creekside

War....what is it good for?

BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions
"A BBC investigation estimates that around $23bn (£11.75bn) may have been lost, stolen or just not properly accounted for in Iraq.
For the first time, the extent to which some private contractors have profited from the conflict and rebuilding has been researched by the BBC's Panorama using US and Iraqi government sources.
A US gagging order is preventing discussion of the allegations.
The order applies to 70 court cases against some of the top US companies.

While George Bush remains in the White House, it is unlikely the gagging orders will be lifted.
To date, no major US contractor faces trial for fraud or mismanagement in Iraq."

* * * * * *

Global Dashboard : Audit results of Iraq’s 2007 oil sales and revenue flow conducted by Ernst & Young questioned 13.8 million barrels of oil produced but unaccounted for last year; a continued lack of metering throughout the oil value chain; $849 million deposited the wrong place ....

* * * * * *
File under : bringing democracy to the Middle East, the war on terror, weapons of mass destruction, links to al-Qaeda, defending the national security of the U.S., yellowcake uranium, etc.

"Coalition of the billing"

Just when you thought the situation in Iraq couldn't produce any more surprizes, along comes a set of newly released figures that shows private contractors in Iraq actually outnumber US uniformed troops.

The number of U.S.-paid private contractors in Iraq now exceeds that of American combat troops, newly released figures show, raising fresh questions about the privatization of the war effort and the government's capacity to carry out military and rebuilding campaigns. More than 180,000 civilians — including Americans, foreigners and Iraqis — are working in Iraq under U.S. contracts, according to State and Defense department figures obtained by the Los Angeles Times. Including the recent troop buildup, 160,000 soldiers and a few thousand civilian government employees are stationed in Iraq. The total number of private contractors, far higher than previously reported, shows how heavily the Bush administration has relied on corporations to carry out the occupation of Iraq — a mission criticized as being undermanned.

This is the result of the privatization of military functions which were normally carried out by uniformed elements of the armed forces. It's happened in a number of militaries as a cost-cutting measure and, while it works on paper, in peacetime, it places a burden on the military operation.

"These numbers are big," said Peter Singer, a Brookings Institution scholar who has written on military contracting. "They illustrate better than anything that we went in without enough troops. This is not the coalition of the willing. It's the coalition of the billing."

You can bet that there are more than a few Bush corporate cronies getting rich off this. But there are actually more civilian contractors on the ground in Iraq than the survey captured. The "private security contractors" escaped scrutiny.

Private security contractors, who are hired to protect government officials and buildings, were not fully counted in the survey, according to industry and government officials.

The mercenaries. Blackwater, Olive, Aegis and Erinys all operate in areas that would have, in the past, been the exclusive function of uniformed combat troops. It is estimated they number in the tens of thousands.

Continuing uncertainty over the numbers of armed contractors drew special criticism from military experts. "We don't have control of all the coalition guns in Iraq. That's dangerous for our country," said William Nash, a retired Army general and reconstruction expert. The Pentagon "is hiring guns. You can rationalize it all you want, but that's obscene."

Further, the State Department is also hiring guns. None of these contractors fall within the military command structure and the mercenaries have been granted virtual immunity for any action they carry out which would be subject to inquiry in a military organization.

Logistics being everything in a war, one of the functions of a uniformed service corps is to keep supplies and essential food, ammunition and spare parts moving to the front. Unless it's been contracted out.

At one point in 2004, for example, U.S. forces were put on food rations when drivers balked at taking supplies into a combat zone.

Because they're not soldiers. One would have to ask how much the head office reckoned to save by not carrying out the mission they were contracted for.

It gets worse, particularly from a military theater commander's point of view.

Adding an element of potential confusion, no single agency keeps track of the number or location of contractors.

Potential confusion?! That's a whole new way to run a theater of operations. Rather than maintain a comprehensive accounting of the location and strength of every theater resource, you just ignore the largest portion.... because you don't really know who or where they are.

Of course, that's in respect of the private contractors providing services in support of the armed forces. The mercenaries are totally out of control.

The number of private security contractors in Iraq remains unclear, despite Central Command's latest census. The Times identified 21 security companies in the Central Command database, deploying 10,800 men. However, the Defense Department's Motsek, who monitors contractors, said the Pentagon estimated the total was 6,000. Both figures are far below the private security industry's own estimate of about 30,000 private security contractors working for government agencies, nonprofit organizations, media outlets and businesses.

So, the CENTCOM database says 10,800, the Pentagon estimates 6,000 and the industry itself estimates 30,000.

The reason for such largely skewed figures is the fact that the Pentagon doesn't employ all the hired guns presently in Iraq. The Pentagon's figure probably doesn't include those mercenaries employed by the State Department, USAID and other government departments. It certainly doesn't account for the armed troops hired by outfits like Kellogg, Brown and Root. The hired guns employed by non-government organizations probably don't show on CENTCOM's figures.

A future post will look further into the mercenary armies in Iraq, particularly Blackwater.

One of the figures rarely exposed is the casualty rate among private contractors in Iraq. When the US military releases casualty figures it includes uniformed troops only. They don't count Iraqis, remember, and they don't include the dead and wounded private contractors.

The death toll for private contractors in the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has topped 1,000, a stark reminder of the risks run by civilians working with the military in roles previously held by soldiers.

A further 13,000 contractors have been wounded in the two separate wars led by the United States against enemies who share fundamentalist Islamic beliefs and the hit-and-run tactics that drain conventional armies.

[...]

The department said it had recorded 990 deaths - 917 in Iraq and 73 in Afghanistan - by the end of March. Since then, according to incident logs tallied by Reuters in Baghdad and Kabul, at least 16 contractors have died in Iraq and two in Afghanistan.

Those killed in Iraq between March 31 and today included four contractors from the Philippines killed in a rocket strike on Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone compound, a frequent target of attacks.

The death toll for civilian contractors in Iraq, when compared to US military deaths stands at one-to-four.

And there is a strong indication that any draw-down of US troops in the next year will see a corresponding increase of "private military contractors".

That will make the 1960s mercenary wars of the Belgian Congo look like a playground game.

Update: RezDog in comments pointed me at this article in the NY Times.

Contractors who have worked in Iraq are returning home with the same kinds of combat-related mental health problems that afflict United States military personnel, according to contractors, industry officials and mental health experts.

But, they say, the private workers are largely left on their own to find care, and their problems often go ignored or are inadequately treated.

A vast second army, one of contractors — up to 126,000 Americans, Iraqis and other foreigners — is working for the United States government in Iraq. Many work side-by-side with soldiers and are exposed to the same dangers, but they mostly must fend for themselves in navigating the civilian health care system when they come back to the United States.

Given that the military system is doing less than a stellar job caring for uniformed returning troops, this does not bode well for someone unable to access proper care.