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http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/06/03/1638/
The Philadelphia Inquirer: Sunday, June 3, 2007
What If Our Mercenaries Turn On Us?
by Chris Hedges
Armed units from the private security firm Blackwater USA opened fire in
Baghdad streets twice in two days last week. It triggered a standoff between
the security contractors and Iraqi forces, a reminder that the war in Iraq
may be remembered mostly in our history books for empowering and building
America's first modern mercenary army.There are an estimated 20,000 to
30,000 armed security contractors working in Iraq, although there are no
official figures and some estimates run much higher. Security contractors
are not counted as part of the coalition forces. When the number of private
mercenary fighters is added to other civilian military "contractors" who
carry out logistical support activities such as food preparation, the number
rises to about 126,000.
"We got 126,000 contractors over there, some of them making more than the
secretary of defense," said House defense appropriations subcommittee
Chairman John Murtha (D., Pa.). "How in the hell do you justify that?"
The privatization of war hands an incentive to American corporations, many
with tremendous political clout, to keep us mired down in Iraq. But even
more disturbing is the steady rise of this modern Praetorian Guard. The
Praetorian Guard in ancient Rome was a paramilitary force that defied legal
constraints, made violence part of the political discourse, and eventually
plunged the Roman Republic into tyranny and despotism. Despotic movements
need paramilitary forces that operate outside the law, forces that sow fear
among potential opponents, and are capable of physically silencing those
branded by their leaders as traitors. And in the wrong hands, a Blackwater
could well become that force.
American taxpayers have so far handed a staggering $4 billion to "armed
security" companies in Iraq such as Blackwater, according to House Oversight
and Government Reform Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman (D., Calif.).
Tens of billions more have been paid to companies that provide logistical
support. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D., Ill.) of the House Intelligence Committee
estimates that 40 cents of every dollar spent on the occupation has gone to
war contractors. It is unlikely that any of these corporations will push for
an early withdrawal. The profits are too lucrative.
Mercenary forces like Blackwater operate beyond civilian and military law.
They are covered by a 2004 edict passed by American occupation authorities
in Iraq that immunizes all civilian contractors in Iraq from prosecution.
Blackwater, barely a decade old, has migrated from Iraq to set up operations
in the United States and nine other countries. It trains Afghan security
forces and has established a base a few miles from the Iranian border. The
huge contracts from the war - including $750 million from the State
Department since 2004 - have allowed Blackwater to amass a fleet of more
than 20 aircraft, including helicopter gunships. Jeremy Scahill, the author
of Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army , points
out that Blackwater has also constructed "the world's largest private
military facility - a 7,000-acre compound near the Great Dismal Swamp of
North Carolina." Blackwater also recently opened a facility in Illinois
("Blackwater
North") and, despite local opposition, is moving ahead with plans to build
another huge training base near San Diego. The company recently announced it
was creating a private intelligence branch called "Total Intelligence."
Erik Prince, who founded and runs Blackwater, is a man who appears to have
little time for the niceties of democracy. He has close ties with the
radical Christian Right and the Bush White House. He champions his company
as a patriotic extension of the U.S. military. His employees, in an act as
cynical as it is dishonest, take an oath of loyalty to the Constitution. But
what he and his allies have built is a mercenary army, paid for with
government money, which operates outside the law and without constitutional
constraint.
Mercenary units are a vital instrument in the hands of despotic movements.
Communist and fascist movements during the last century each built rogue
paramilitary forces. And the appearance of Blackwater fighters, heavily
armed and wearing their trademark black uniforms, patrolling the streets of
New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, may be a grim taste of
the future. In New Orleans Blackwater charged the government $240,000 a day.
" 'It cannot happen here' is always wrong," the philosopher Karl Popper
wrote. "A dictatorship can happen anywhere."
The word contractor helps launder the fear and threat out of a more accurate
term: "paramilitary force." We're not supposed to have such forces in the
United States, but we now do. And if we have them, we have a potential
threat to democracy. On U.S. soil, Blackwater so far has shown few signs of
being an out-and-out rogue retainer army, though they looked the part in New
Orleans. But were this country to become even a little less stable, outfits
like Blackwater might see a heyday. If the United States falls into a period
of instability caused by another catastrophic terrorist attack, an economic
meltdown that triggers social unrest, or a series of environmental
disasters, such paramilitary forces, protected and assisted by fellow
ideologues in the police and military, could ruthlessly abolish what is left
of our eroding democracy. War, with the huge profits it hands to
corporations, and to right-wing interests such as the Christian Right, could
become a permanent condition. And the thugs with automatic weapons, black
uniforms and wraparound sunglasses who appeared on the streets in New
Orleans could appear on our streets.
Chris Hedges ( [EMAIL PROTECTED] ) is a graduate of Harvard Divinity
School and won a Pulitzer Prize as a foreign correspondent for the New York
Times. He is author, mostly recently, of " American Fascists: The Christian
Right and the War on America .
***
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
The Independent - Jun 3, 2007
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article2609310.ece
Moqtada al-Sadr: The man America has in its sights
The US wants to talk to Moqtada al-Sadr. He thinks they want to
assassinate him. In this rare interview in Kufa, Iraq, the Shia cleric
tells Nizar Latif why.
by Nizar Latif
Moqtada al-Sadr, the man Washington blames for its failure to gain
control in Iraq, has rejected a call to open direct talks with the US
military and has accused the Americans of plotting to assassinate him.
The Shia cleric told The Independent on Sunday in an exclusive
interview: "The Americans have tried to kill me in the past, but have
failed... It is certain that the Americans still want me dead and are
still trying to assassinate me.
"I am an Iraqi, I am a Muslim, I am free and I reject all forms of
occupation. I want to help the Iraqi people. This is everything the
Americans hate."
Mr Sadr, revered by millions of Iraqi Shias, spoke after leading Friday
prayers in the Grand Mosque at Kufa, just over 100 miles south of
Baghdad. It is one of the four Iraqi cities considered holy in Shia
Islam. He always wears a black turban, the traditional symbol of a Shia
cleric who can trace his ancestry to the Prophet Mohamed. But for the
second time in two weeks, he also wore a white shroud - a symbol of his
willingness to be martyred, and his belief that death is close at hand.
The young cleric inherited the aura of his father, Ayatollah Mohammed
al-Sadr, who was murdered by Saddam Hussein's regime. He has been a
thorn in the side of the Americans since the invasion, with his Mahdi
Army - the military wing of Iraq's largest Arab grassroots political
movement - having clashed with US and British forces. The movement has
been accused of kidnapping five Britons in Baghdad last week, possibly
in retaliation for the death of a senior Mahdi commander in Basra at
the hands of British forces, but the Sadrists deny involvement.
Mr Sadr resurfaced recently after disappearing - possibly over the
border to Iran - when the US began its security "surge" in Baghdad
early this year. He ordered his fighters in Sadr City, the Mahdi Army
stronghold in the capital, not to resist the operation. Last week the
US military said it wanted to open direct, peaceful talks with him, but
the cleric told the IoS he rejected the idea.
"There is nothing to talk about," he said angrily. "The Americans are
occupiers and thieves, and they must set a timetable to leave this
country. We must know that they are leaving, and we must know when." He
has reason to be wary of US offers to negotiate. As revealed by The
Independent last month, respected Iraqi political figures believe the
US army tried to kill or capture Mr Sadr after luring him to peace
talks in Najaf in 2004.
"We are fighting the enemy that is greater in strength, but we are in
the right," he said. "Even if that means our deaths, we will not stand
idly by and suffer from this occupation. Islam exhorts us to die with
dignity rather than live in shame."
Mr Sadr did not say how he thought the US planned to kill him. But it is
clear his decision to stay out of the public eye for months was
prompted by safety fears, amid a crackdown on the Mahdi Army that has
seen key figures arrested and killed.
With US, British and Iraqi government forces still conducting operations
against the Sadr movement and its army, the cleric warned he was
prepared to launch another armed uprising. "The occupiers have tried to
provoke us, but I ordered unarmed resistance for the sake of the
people," he said. "We have been patient, exercising statesmanship, but
if the occupation and oppression continues, we will fight." The Mahdi
Army has been relatively quiet, but it is becoming more active in
Baghdad, responding to a series of devastating suicide bombings by
Sunni extremists.
Mr Sadr, whose rise to become one of the most influential figures in
Iraq coincided with the US overthrow of Saddam, said his movement
sought to follow the example of Hizbollah, the Shia armed resistance
movement in Lebanon. "Hizbollah and the Mahdi Army are two sides of the
same coin," he said. "We are together in the same trench against the
forces of evil."
He also spoke about a spate of recent fighting between his followers and
members of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq
(SCIRI), the other major Shia party which has its own armed Badr
faction. The clashes sparked fears that the power struggle among Shias
will explode into full conflict.
"What happened with the Badr organisation and the Mahdi Army in many
parts of Iraq is the result of a sad misunderstanding," he said. "We
have held discussions to stop this being repeated."
Mr Sadr has always been a fervent nationalist, and has recently held
talks with Sunni tribal leaders in Anbar province who have taken up
arms against al-Qa'ida-affiliated extremists, while still opposing the
US-led occupation. Despite his calls for cross-sectarian unity in Iraq,
the Mahdi Army is widely accused of operating death squads responsible
for the deaths and ethnic cleansing of thousands of Sunnis and Iraqi
Christians.
Mr Sadr also insisted he opposed Iranian influence in Iraqi affairs,
referring to tentative talks between the US and Iran. "We reject such
interference," he said. "Iraq is a matter for the Iraqis."
Additional reporting by Phil Sands in Damascus
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