Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Switchboard >

Bush Campaign Paying ... Paramilitaries

04:08 / 23.03.04

Very scary shit here - how low do you think Bush will stoop?

16:14 / 01.04.04

It's been a while since I read the article, and a few questions came to mind then. What are the paramilitaries used for? I saw the reference to the Pinkertons, but in this day and age, protest-busting is usually reserved for the police services. So I'm curious if anyone knows what this Vance International will/have been used for. Is it just a case of funneling money into Defense Dept. cronies? Or are these people going to be front line at the Florida voter booths?

(as an aside, the mention of "Client choice of uniform style ranging from discreet, non-threatening attire to full riot gear" reminds me a lot of the video game "rainbow 6", where you get to outfit your military response team in any number of stylish murder suits.)

17:08 / 01.04.04

I'm just guessing here, but I'm thinking "Plan Colombia" or whatever the Bush Team has in mind for Venezuela. You know how it is: South America = Out of sight/out of mind for the most part. Sounds like another Wackenhut-type outfit: a strictly hush-hush black ops subcontractor for the oil companies.

22:53 / 01.04.04

NPR just reported that a number of "Corporate Security" companies, or mercinaries to you and I, have been employed in Iraq as a means of extending the U.S. presence further

From npr.org:
The killing of four U.S. civilians working for a private security contractor raise doubts about whether employees of private firms receive adequate training and oversight. The U.S. military is increasingly giving such businesses more responsibility in Iraq -- including jobs that U.S. troops have traditionally done.

This strikes me as a worrysome trend. We can't drum up enough support at home, we've alienated our traditional allies, so we now have to buy our loyal troops frome elsewhere.

01:29 / 02.04.04

Additionally, when they're killed, you can shout "civilians being killed and chopped/strung up!" without mentioning that, really, they were paramilitaries, rather than actual civilians, who are generally considered to be those engaged in non-military occupations. In fact, probably better trained, experienced and equipped than the average teenage grunt.

01:45 / 02.04.04

Slightly off-topic, but their is a Pinkerton Security service here in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I see them outside the local food store all the time.

09:06 / 02.04.04

Hiring paramilitary security in Iraq sort of makes sense. The US military are stretched pretty thin occupying a semi-hostile zone. Soldiers don't make good policemen, yet Iraq is too wild for Officer Friendly. Paramilitaries fit the niche, more or less. Downsizing the US military, begun years ago, has meant offloading duties not specifically related to combat. So companies like Halliburton do pretty much what the SeaBees (Construction Battalions) used to do, and policing would be done by private military contractors. Before the Afghan and Iraq wars you saw plenty of the former but not much of the latter, which was no doubt planned for but not really needed until now.

Meanwhile, at home, I suspect that a company like Vance that's worked for the likes of Nelson Mandela, Bill Gates and Arnold Schwarzenegger would be useful in sniffing out potential threats too vague to justify using Secret Service or the FBI. That money's probably a retainer or a consultancy fee. On the face of it, this doesn't seem very different from hiring private airport screeners or those spooky Wackenhut guards at atomic power plants.

But if you see someone at a peaceful demo who's urging violence, take their picture, especially if you've never seen this guy before. It might come in handy later. A forum like Indymedia.org, well known to demonstrators, would be ideal for determining the person's identity.

If Vance were into stuff like this, it would probably be hard to trace; they've got a reputation to uphold. Agents provocateurs are likely the province of dirtier PMCs. like Wackenhut.

16:38 / 02.04.04

I recall reading somewhere that the US was outsourcing security at embassies in hight-risk countries to such companies, rather than have Marines as embassy guards.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

16:46 / 02.04.04

how low do you think Bush will stoop?

I'm guessing he could eat a peanut off the floor without lifting a heel.

20:48 / 02.04.04

Oh lord, does this mean we'll have a privatised millitary? It hasn't worked for anything else we've tried it with, but hey! Maybe it'll work this time! I've seen figures that suggest that the average G.I. makes McDonalds wages and aren't getting some of the basic equipment they need (somethingawful.com started a fundraiser to get armor for one of their Forum Goons), so is the bloated U.S. Defence budget going to paying private soldiers? And they accuse the protesters of not supporting the troops?

I can see it now: "Congress pushes Military Deregulation"

I feel sick.

The Prince of All Lies

01:52 / 03.04.04

Paramilitaries and Private Security Organizations (basically mercenaries) are a not-so-new trend in international politics. I read an article about it on Le Monde Diplomatique last year, and I just saw a report on CNN about these "private armies" that have been in Africa since 1997 or so, they're employed by governments that can't afford to maintain highly equipped troops. Instead they hire these mercenary armies to fight their little wars or kill political adversaries... really nice..I feel like I'm in the Dark Ages already...

02:37 / 03.04.04

Privatised anything, in terms of " essential services, " ie prisons, hospitals, security, etc = Something the government wants to be one step removed from when the system fucks up, mainly, it seems, so our poor beleagured pols can't be held directly responsible.

In which case:

First of all, whatever happened to " The buck stops here, " all that stentorian post-WW2 rhetoric the likes of B****, B*** and so on, and no doubt their successors, seem to trot out whenever, for example, they feel a war's about right.

While at no point accepting that if they've made, well some tactical errors, however well-intentioned their ideas might have been, they've made a bad call, whatever, coming up to the plate, and so ought to RESIGN.

Secondly, if all this stuff is part of the private sector now, why isn't everyone paying far less taxes ? Otherwise, surely, if we as citizens have to foot the bill, then it isn't really privatised, is it ?

Thirdly, yeah, I feel sick as well.

In a civilised society, there are certain inalienable parts of the public services that cannot be run for profit, which by definition is the inevitable result of involving the private sector - well they wouldn't DO IT otherwise, would they, they've got accountants, shareholders, tax write-offs to think about, if there's not a percentage, why, in all conscience, would they actually bother ?

So with the prison system, for example, the minute you're running that for a profit... well as with a private company building a hotel, you've got a vested interest in keeping it full. Simple business good sense. So as with a meat plant, you keep the pens working - If you can get a bunch of good old boys in there to stir up the hippies, and the niggers, etc. well so much the better. You get to beat them up, jail them, AND make a profit.

How cool is that ?

11:21 / 03.04.04

Yep, the big problem with outsourcing the infrastructure of government is that the new entities answer not to citizens or governments, but to shareholders. Another big problem, as you say, is that every business wants to drum up new business; that's really bad for functions whose scope, like criminal justice, should ideally be reduced. Most of functions being privatized are the very things needed to hold a country together--post, (rail)roads, communications--and now it's the turn of the army and police. I believe "Robocop" had something to say about the problems of that last development.

Finally, except maybe with telecommunications, privatization usually leads to worse service and higher prices for years after the so-called "adjustment" period.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

13:14 / 03.04.04

Yup. I have yet to see a single good thing come out of the privatisation New Labour's been crazy about in the UK.

AND THE PUBLIC ARE STILL SUBSIDISING THE TRAINS!!!

Show me the logic. Please.

01:30 / 04.04.04

Well, in this case, the private firms are still being hired by the government. It's not full privatisation.

The point is that it affords the government a level of detachment - and they are able to bypass a lot of oversight by claiming "commercial confidentiality". It's moving certain military operations to a different, less accountable sphere.

05:59 / 05.04.04

What I've always wondered is how private military forces (mercenaries) are restricted by common rules of law during wartime, such as the Geneva Convention? Particularly with respect to how occupying forces treat captives, locals etc.

Who or what group(s) is responsible when things go wrong?