The Blackwater Incidents

To Americans, it seemed that European nations were always engaged in wars.  England and Spain, England and France, France and Russia and the Franco-Prussian war of the 19^th Century are examples.  Other than wars of aggression against Native Americans and the Civil War – a war about sedition and the  American institution of slavery which sadly even predated its existence as a country – wars, certainly foreign wars, were not on the minds of most Americans.  That changed somewhat in the early 20^th Century when Presidents like Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt wanted the United States to be a mainline player on the world stage. 

Nevertheless once what is now World War I ended, the United States pretty much demobilized the military force it had deployed to Europe in the Great War and didn’t even bother to join the League of Nations, President Wilson’s idea which he described in his Fourteen Points for Peace following World War I.  The U.S. Senate, still highly isolationist, failed to ratify Treaty of Versailles. This tended to preclude U.S. involvement in the League.

World War II complicated matters somewhat further.  For one thing it proved to everyone that the U.S. was a truly abundant land possessing all the resources it possibly needed to engage in a two front war ending with its naval forces making both oceans largely American lakes and its air assets, which were alone in ability to deliver nuclear weapons, were totally without equal.  And, through its ability to out produce the rest of the world combined, the U.S. deployed land armies that were the best on the planet.  It was its continuing economic capability to out produce any potential enemy that gave it the superpower standing – shared at one time but no longer – it continues to have. 

Moreover its status as keeper of peace and defender of the Western World became cultural and political givens.  It must have occurred to the most isolationist factions that holding the founding conference of the United Nations in San Francisco and locating its Headquarters in Manhattan ruled out not being a major player in the world arena impossible.

Yes it was heady stuff, some of it delusionary.  Douglas MacArthur thought he could put the American Army right on the western border of China with impunity and the generals and politicians belief that Vietnam would be a quick American victory proved to be mistaken assumptions.  And these errors in judgement and perception did have consequences, which seemed to have been learned and then forgotten.

Of course the world looked differently to those nations not in the U.S. orbit.  Before the Americans left, North Vietnam, for example, saw their effort as riding their country of foreign domination that had been an ongoing struggle for centuries.

Fast forward to the 21st Century.  In Iraq and Afghanistan, policy blunders were not always apparent beforehand unless one persistently and continually looked hard at the world.  And those who made the critical decisions, the reality isolationists, never bothered.  Thus many issues made the war in Iraq atypical;  since I've written about many of the consequences elsewhere, I'm going to only look at one right now. 

Before Iraq, for better or worse, it has been the norm for the American military to conduct operations and provide security for U.S. forces.  The concept of  “Outsourcing” the most critical part of the conduct was unthinkable:  the military chain of command didn’t expect it or want it. 

Historically, there is nothing new about the military's use of private contractors, but the Iraq war has seen outsourcing on an unprecedented scale. The policy change came after the Cold War when the Pentagon was downsizing under then Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney. Cheney first hired Halliburton as a consultant and later became the company's president. Halliburton subsidiary KBR is now one of the largest recipients of government contracts.

KBR’s role in Halliburton is construction.  In Iraq it has been the largest supplier for the military providing such diverse services as supplying fuel oil and delivering the mail to the troops as well as other Americans.  KBR does not just operate in Iraq but performs these services for the U.S. military at various locations around the world. 

A legitimate question is whether “Outsourcing” saves the U.S. government money.  There are differing opinions on this matter.  For one outsourcer though, known as Blackwater, there are ongoing U.S. government inquiries into its performance. These events are mostly associated with Blackwater’s role in Iraq - my focus - where it has provided security among other high profile and high risk roles. 

However its reach within the U.S. Government is profound; it was, for example, part of the response to Hurricane Katrina in September 2005.  It is stated that its presence in New Orleans was one of being “heavily armed.”  As a matter of fact, the scope of Blackwater’s presence within the U.S. Government worldwide is large, varied and lucrative.  Blackwater has become so entangled with both domestic and foreign operations of the Federal Government that the Obama Administration has had little choice but to sustain the country's involvement. 

There were significant events in Iraq that involved Blackwater.  This was the first:

On March 31, 2004, Iraqi insurgents in Fallujah attacked a convoy containing four American private military contractorsfrom Blackwater USA who were conducting delivery for food caterers ESS.[27] The four armed contractors Scott Helvenston, Jerko Zovko, Wesley Batalona and Michael Teague, were attacked and killed with grenades and small arms fire. Their bodies were hung from a bridge crossing the Euphrates.[3] This event was one of the causes of the US military attack on the city in the First Battle of Fallujah.[28] In the fall of 2007, a congressional report by the House Oversight Committeefound that Blackwater intentionally "delayed and impeded" investigations into the contractors' deaths.

The aftermath of this incident and a description of the others are on the same link.  This is also covered in the videos. 

Blackwater gained further public ascendance when it was selected for security provisions of  L. Paul Bremmer, the Bush Administrations appointed leader of the Coalition Provisional Authority, which effectively governed Iraq during part of its most incendiary post-invasion period.

Blackwater’s founder and owner Erik Prince has frequently been in the news by mid August 2009.  According to Jeremy Scahill writing in The Nation, allegations exist that   

Prince turned a profit by transporting "illegal" or "unlawful" weapons into the country on Prince's private planes. They also charge that Prince and other Blackwater executives destroyed incriminating videos, emails and other documents and have intentionally deceived the US State Department and other federal agencies. The identities of the two individuals were sealed out of concerns for their safety. 

The Iraqi Government is in the process of bringing criminal charges against the contractor for alleged murdering of Iraqi civilians.  Many other issues are present.

Blackwater is now the focus of investigations in both Baghdad and Washington over a Sept. 16 shooting in which at least 11 Iraqis were killed. Beyond that episode, the company has been involved in cases in which its personnel fired weapons while guarding State Department officials in Iraq at least twice as often per convoy mission as security guards working for other American security firms, the officials said. The disclosure came as the Pentagon said Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates had sent a team of officials to Iraq to get answers to questions about the use of American security contractors there.

Blackwater tops the list of shooting incidents instigated by U.S. contractors and the latest developments find Blackwater founder Erik Prince implicated in murder as well as someone who, according to former employees, expressed anti-Islamic sentiments and viewed his work as a “Christian Crusade.” 

At first glance, Blackwater just looks like another right wing led extremist group that has somehow ended up entangled with working for and in some cases representing the U.S. Government all over the world, sourcing American Foreign Policy with little or no oversight.  Most of this information has been revealed from investigative reporting - the videos again - and Inquires in Congress.  Civil lawsuites under the Alien Tort Statute have also been filed against Blackwater and Erik Prince.   Again see the videos on this for more. 

To sum up, in just a few centuries, the United States has gone from an isolationist country plundering the resources of North America, waging war against the native population of the continent and establishing one of the most evil and perverted institutions in all recorded history - Slavery - to a reluctant twice savior of Europe  that eventually determined the outcome of the Cold War to its interests favorably. 

But then there is capitalism and a demand for post-Cold War security maintenance around the world.  Enter Halliburton, KBR and Blackwater.  So how much of what they do remain inconsequential?   To put it differently, how is International Law applied to a Corporation? 

There are established mechanisms for accomplishing this.  More on this can be found in this link Human Rights Obligations of Corporations Under International Law and in Crime Against International Law.  Without question, there is an established process and most nations incorporate the major provisions of International Law into their own legal structure.

Conclusion.

One might conclude that for Blackwater, the process of determning responsibility for its behavior is just beginning.  If this is so, I don't think it should be left to the United States to pursue it alone; Iraq should definitely press its case.  You see, at this point in time the United States cannot even keep its own house in order.  The aftermath of electing the first African American to the office of President clearly has engendered behavior that one thought had been relegated to a historical junk pile.

Barack Obama's election as America's first black president has unleashed a wave of hate crimes across the nation, according to police and monitoring organisations. Far from heralding a new age of tolerance, Mr Obama's victory in the November 4 poll has highlighted the stubborn racism that lingers within some elements of American society as opponents pour their frustration into vandalism, harassment, threats and even physical attacks. Cross burnings, black figures hung from nooses, and schoolchildren chanting "Assassinate Obama" are just some of the incidents that have been documented by police from California to Maine. There have been "hundreds" of cases since the election, many more than usual, said Mark Potok, director of the Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate crimes.

Of course, this is nothing new, the United States has always had numerous right wing hate groups, many of which advocate violence or practice it overtly.  The short list:

Ku Klux Klan

American Nazi Party

Skinheads

Moreover the issues that existed and debated during the 2008 Presidential Campaign are still unsettled.  These were considered critical to those who supported President Obama. To them, many infrastructure projects on the agenda are awaiting completion. This includes health care and education, probably the two most demanding and critical issues the country faces for the future.   In addition the economy is still in recovery mode, the American Automobile industry, to survive in the world economy, needs continued redirection, U.S. dependence on foreign oil needs to be ended within a decade, global warming requires immediate action or there won’t be a planet that will support human life.  And the continued presence of nuclear weapons has the potential to make all of this seem trivial. 

And the country has turned into collective and violent, racist mobs which somehow appear whenever a scheduled public issue-oriented political meeting (Town Hall) is held.   Confusion and ignorance on issues and "grass roots" spontaneity cannot account for all of the disturbances that are springing up at these events.  Clearly the Republican Party and its corporate handlers, controllers, are behind a lot of it.  

So a great deal remains to be done.  And Blackwater?  Well one hopes that Federal Law Enforcement is up to the task and Blackwater security won't receive additional domestic assignments.  In the final analysis though, Blackwater is hardly a drop in an ocean of corruption and violence.  Corruption you see, is simply the vastly more comprehensive means by which the world functions.  To understand that, you may explore what is contained on the link directly above.