“For Blackwater It’s Business as Usual”

The New York Times / Truthout.org: Iraq Contractor in Shooting Case Makes Comeback

Last fall, Blackwater Worldwide was in deep peril.

Guards for the security company were involved in a shooting in September that left at least 17 Iraqis dead at a Baghdad intersection. Outrage over the killings prompted the Iraqi government to demand Blackwater’s ouster from the country, and led to a criminal investigation by the F.B.I., a series of internal investigations by the State Department and the Pentagon, and high-profile Congressional hearings.

But after an intense public and private lobbying campaign, Blackwater appears to be back to business as usual. . . .

Gammel, men: «Morsomt» å drepe

Yohan Shanmugaratnam: «Morsomt» å drepe

Det private sikkerhetsselskapet Blackwater Security syns det er morsomt å skyte mennesker, går det fram av internt notat. . . .

Fler Blackwater-artikler på norsk.

Info: BLACKWATER

Jeremy Scahill intervjues av Amy Goodman (fra ca. 09:00). Klikk på bildet for audio og transkript. Fra 26. januar, 2007.

Blackwater-artikler av Jeremy Scahill finnes her og her.

Video: How Erik Prince founded BLACKWATER (lots of great info!!)

How Erik Prince founded BLACKWATER

Jeremy Scahill’s book BLACKWATER

http://www.blackwaterbook.com/news/

“If the Republicans lose in 2008, they will leave office armed and dangerous. Blackwater is the utterly gripping and explosive story of how the Bush Administration has spent hundreds of millions of public dollars building a parallel corporate army, an army so loyal to far right causes it constitutes nothing less than a Republican Guard. The most important and chilling book about the death throes of U.S. democracy you will read in years and a triumph of investigative reporting.”

–Naomi Klein, author No Logo

“Of all the insane Bush privatization efforts, none is more frightening than the corporatizing of military combat forces. Jeremy Scahill admirably exposes a devastating example of this sinister scheme.”

–Michael Moore, Academy Award Winning Director

“This engrossing investigative piece exposing, in shocking detail, a U.S. government-outsourced Frankenstein replete with helicopter gun ships may leave you incredulous. But you better believe it, for it poses a grave and gathering danger to the future of our Republic.”

–Ray McGovern, CIA veteran and former intelligence briefer for George H. W. Bush

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Articles by Jeremy Scahill (The Nation).

Flashpoints: BLACKWATER: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenery Army

Jeremy Scahill spends the hour giving deep background on Blackwater, the largest mercenary operation going on in the world and subject of his most recent book. Federal prosecutors are now investigating Blackwater for smuggling US weapons into Iraq and then selling them to the resistance. It was widely reported that Blackwater killed a dozen or more people in a street incident and have been outlawed from doing security work since thBlackwater Securitye attack.

Meanwhile, the US State Dept has insisted that Blackwater continue its assingnment guarding US military and diplomatic personel inside Iraq. For an in depth look into Blackwater in Iraq we thought we would go back to a recent speech by investigative reporter and author Jeremy Scahill. Schahill spoke recently about the controversial organization, listen to this.

LISTEN

U.S. extends Blackwater’s Baghdad work for one year

Reuters / Raw Story: U.S. extends Blackwater’s Baghdad work for one year

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. private security firm Blackwater’s deal to protect American diplomats in Baghdad will be extended for a year while the FBI investigates a 2007 incident in which the company’s guards are accused of killing 17 Iraqis, the State Department said on Friday.

(…)

Bushs “skyggehær” - leiesoldater utenfor statlig kontroll

The Bush Administration is increasingly dependent on private security forces to do its dirty work, Jeremy Scahill reveals in his new book, Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army.

On September 10, 2001, before most Americans had heard of Al Qaeda or imagined the possibility of a “war on terror,” Donald Rumsfeld stepped to the podium at the Pentagon to deliver one of his first major addresses as Defense Secretary under President George W. Bush. Standing before the former corporate executives he had tapped as his top deputies overseeing the high-stakes business of military contracting — many of them from firms like Enron, General Dynamics and Aerospace Corporation — Rumsfeld issued a declaration of war.

“The topic today is an adversary that poses a threat, a serious threat, to the security of the United States of America,” Rumsfeld thundered. “It disrupts the defense of the United States and places the lives of men and women in uniform at risk.” He told his new staff, “You may think I’m describing one of the last decrepit dictators of the world…. [But] the adversary’s closer to home,” he said. “It’s the Pentagon bureaucracy.” Rumsfeld called for a wholesale shift in the running of the Pentagon, supplanting the old DoD bureaucracy with a new model, one based on the private sector. Announcing this major overhaul, Rumsfeld told his audience, “I have no desire to attack the Pentagon; I want to liberate it. We need to save it from itself.” …

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Se også dokumentaren “Iraq for Sale”.