Privatizing war

This morning I'm taking another look at War for Profit. There's a lot of money to be made on war if you've got the right investments - own the right companies. The Bush family has had those investments for at least several generations. How about you?

Oh well, no use crying over spilled milk or lost opportunities. Just keep your eye on the ball, and watch the trends.

A few quotes follow, but the entire articles are worth the read if this idea interests you at all.

The World Markets Research Centre offered this gloomy outlook on August 18: "The latest pipeline blast [in Iraq] indicates that the coalition is losing the battle against what has become a guerrilla war. The saboteurs' strikes on power, water and oil facilities are aimed at undermining the coalition's authority and preventing it from exporting the country's crude. Even if the coalition beefs up security, it is unlikely to put a halt to the attacks."

Yet even if attacks on the oil pipelines continue, the private security firms will be one party that is positioned to profit handsomely.

That's from an article at CorpWatch.

That same article provides some other interesting information about a company the U.S. government has hired to help protect its Iraq's oil:

When unidentified saboteurs struck the vital Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline in northern Iraq recently, one in a number of recent attacks on the Middle Eastern nation's oil production and transport, the United States government announced that a company called Erinys would be brought in to train 6,500 Iraqis to guard oil pipelines, wellheads, and refineries, as well as water and electrical facilities.

...But the coalition's relationship with Erinys is not exactly transparent. The coalition apparently contracted the company through an "oil security" solicitation issued on July 17, but the details of this solicitation, and the subsequent award to Erinys, are unavailable from the Coalition Provisional Authority.

...While the company does not appear in international business directories and is only a year old, its website names five managers and directors, but does not identify its ownership structure: most of whom have been affiliated with Armor Holdings, a Florida-based security company and Defence Systems Limited, a British company which merged with Armor in 1997.

Private Security and Oil Protection

Erinys' website touts "management experience" in providing security services for dozens of transnational corporations, such as Ashanti Gold and BP-Amoco. These companies' past security actions hint at what awaits Iraq.

Last month, for example, the Ghanaian NGO, Wassa Association of Communities Affected by Mining (WACAM), released a report detailing alleged human rights abuses at an Ashanti gold mine. It relays eyewitness accounts of Ashanti Gold security personnel torturing, beating, and killing local small-scale miners between 1994 and 2002. WACAM further alleges that corporate security used guard dogs to feed on trespassers.

Private security firms DSL and Armor have also long worked in oil-rich regions for multinational corporations that have been accused of complicity in human rights violations, like the Niger Delta and Angola.

Further, according to the report, a subsidiary of DSL, working for British Petroleum in a security capacity, hired and trained Colombian police who "allegedly kidnapped, tortured and murdered opponents of BP's operations".

Also, from Privatizing War:

Several employees of DynCorp working in the Balkans are alleged to have been involved in running a child prostitution ring. The company fired the whistleblower that brought attention to the problem and took the men back to the United States and out of the hands of local law enforcement authorities. They were never prosecuted.

Do any of us have any knowledge of companies that cut corners for the sake of profit which turn out to compromise the safety of their product? The lawsuits are cheaper than making the product safe some times. And when your bottom line is profit - answering to the shareholder, as they say - then what do you expect a company to do? Well, don't think that isn't going to be happening with the war profiteers. (Want to get to know some of them?)

For example:

The company's ability to provide one-stop shopping options for clients in search of a private army expanded in the late 1990's, when Defence Systems was bought up by Armor Holdings, riot control equipment manufacturers in Jacksonville, Florida.

Armor Holdings was originally known as American Body Armor but changed its name after it was rescued from bankruptcy caused by the failure of the Saudi Arabian government to pay a major bill and lawsuits over the effectiveness of its signature product, bullet-proof vests.

We also already have information on what we can expect from the privatization of war in reports that have come out of our current Iraq experience bemoaning what happens when the private military company (PMC) personnel don't show up.

A major problem in Iraq, Singer said, has been the phenomenon of "no-shows" caused by the inhospitable security environment, including the killing of contract workers, including a Halliburton mail delivery employee earlier this month.

"At the end of the day, neither these companies nor their employees are bound by military justice, and it is up to them whether to show up or not," Singer said. "The result is that there have been delays in setting up showers for soldiers, getting them cooked meals and so on."

Luckily, while that might slow down or otherwise booger up operations, the loss of a shower and a meal might be seen as the least of things that could plague a soldier who depended in some way on a for-profit company's services.

A related concern is the rising cost of hiring contract workers because of skyrocketing insurance premiums. Singer estimates that premiums have increased by 300 percent to 400 percent this year, costs that are passed on to the taxpayer under the cost-plus-award fee system that is the basis for most contracts.

The LOGCAP contract awarded to Brown and Root in 2001 was the third, and potentially most lucrative, super-contract awarded by the Army. Brown and Root won the first five-year contract in 1992, but lost the second to rival DynCorp in 1997 after the GAO criticized the Army for not adequately controlling contracting costs in Bosnia.

Of course, if you are certain American politicos who hold positions and investments in both KBR and DynCorp, it really doesn't matter which one you give the contract to.

I keep a few links on my web site to sources reporting on corporate abuses here and around the world. And also, some links to the BushCo connections to some of those same corporations. If you're ever wondering how they all hook up, check it out.

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.