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Waxman: Blackwater Cost-Cutting to Blame For 2004 Fallujah Ambush
Right on the heels of a Brookings Institution report detailing the problems private military companies create for counterinsurgency efforts in Iraq, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) has released a study finding that Blackwater improperly prepared its contractors for traveling through Fallujah in March 2004 -- a trip that proved to be fatal.
Internal Blackwater reviews and eyewitness accounts obtained by Waxman's oversight committee conclude that the company sent its four employees to Fallujah in what one disgusted Blackwater colleague called "unarmored, underpowered vehicles." The day before the ambush, Blackwater's Baghdad operations manager complained to the company's North Carolina headquarters that he was in dire need of weapons, ammunition, communications equipment and "hard cars." Yet Waxman's report (pdf) cites another employee who says Blackwater opted to go with "soft skin" -- that is, unarmored vehicles -- "due to the cost."
But it wasn't just the cost. Blackwater's reliance on unarmored vehicles was part of a scheme to undercut a competitor, the Kuwaiti company Regency Hotel & Hospital, in order to gain control of a contract Regency held with ESS Support Services Worldwide, which in turn had valuable contracts with Kellogg, Brown & Root and Fluor.
Several reports by Blackwater personnel in Baghdad and Kuwait indicate that Blackwater never intended to armor its vehicles, which included Honda Pilot SUVs, but instead force Regency into purchasing new vehicles or risk losing its role on the ESS contract. ... A second Blackwater employee reported that he was told to "string these guys along and run this Honda thing into the ground" because "if we stalled long enough they (Regency) would have no choice but to buy armored cars, or to default on the contract, and ESS might go directly to Blackwater for security."A Blackwater lawyer told the committee in February the contractors were given an "appropriate" amount of protection for the threat environment in Fallujah.
Comments (17)
EH wrote on September 27, 2007 1:40 PM:The upside to all of this is if we start to get rid of the contractors, our military will have to start taking up the slack. Since our soldiers are there to die for the cause of democracy and freedom, the more soldiers die, the freer and more democratic we become. It's a win-win, really.
CINDY wrote on September 27, 2007 1:55 PM:It's too easy really:
When the US Army stands up, Blackwater will stand down.
oy.
Long Memory wrote on September 27, 2007 1:57 PM:It's the American way, isn't it?
beowulf wrote on September 27, 2007 2:30 PM:I'm sure most everyone here has read Catch 22 (if you haven't, go get it at the library today!). It sure looks like M&M Enterprises has rebranded itself as Blackwater.
TheraP wrote on September 27, 2007 2:37 PM:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milo_Minderbinder
And once Blackwater stands down, just think of all the money that frees up for assisting troops who are wounded or traumatized, following their service.
Win, win, and another win - for the wounded! It's the right thing to do!
NCBlueneck wrote on September 27, 2007 3:16 PM:I can't recall the source, but earlier today I read a piece that really struck a nerve in me. This reporter (or blogger) wrote that the privitization of the military is all about campaign financing. Giving money to the military returns nothing to the politicians. But fund the private security firms and, lo and behold! taxpayer money coming back to the pols in contributions to party, candidate, and issues related donations.
It's creating incentives for perpetual war. There are no laws to control mercinary armies -- apparently. The cost to the taxpayers is higher than what the US military would do the job for. (So much for the efficiencies of the "Free Market", eh?)
I thought war-profiteering was unconscionable, but this is obscene.
Donald Cormac wrote on September 27, 2007 3:29 PM:Well, if DefSec Gates is now asking for another $190B (that's with a "b"), just how much of this money is going/has gone to Blackwater? (:>
moondancer wrote on September 27, 2007 3:35 PM:Blackwater is looking more and more like the GOP militia. Anybody remember when Blackwater showed up in NOLA after Katrina? The official story was they were hired by patricians to guard their booty, but as long as they were there, they might as well be deputized...
These guys are bad news for democracy.
anonymouse wrote on September 27, 2007 5:18 PM:Okay...
We now have two trains of thought about why Blackwater employees kill innocent civilians.
Let's just take a vote:
Choose 1
A. Cost cutting measures
B. Can't get in trouble for murdering innocent civilians
Pretty difficult choice, isn't it
OleHippieChick wrote on September 27, 2007 6:43 PM:BW may have cheaped out, but the taxpayers were spared no expense in the payback. Fallujah residents were incinerated.
jonrysh wrote on September 27, 2007 7:14 PM:The British, French, and other European countries stopped this kind of military contracting in the early 1600s for various excellent reasons. The mercenaries that served with the British in the Revolutionary War were under British command, as the Blackwater troops are not.
When will we ever learn?
moondancer wrote on September 27, 2007 8:33 PM:I think the Roman Empire had a problem or two with mercenaries as well...
regular lurker wrote on September 27, 2007 11:38 PM:Does everyone here know ESS is owned by a parent company, Compass Group? There's a reason there are Burger Kings on bases in Iraq...
merlallen wrote on September 28, 2007 4:03 AM:Even Black Water hates mercenaries.
jhm wrote on September 28, 2007 8:10 AM:While one can almost understand (if not defend) a company's efforts to cuts costs (and undercut competition). The fact that the Fallujah convoy was sent into unfamiliar territory, undermanned, and without maps, elevates the sin from simple avarice to malicious indifference.
rage wrote on September 28, 2007 10:22 AM:Don't we have an armed forces for all this work?
America doesn't need to waste a whole lot of DOD tax dollars enriching the coffers of military contractors when our troops, sailors, airmen, marines, and civilian DOD employees who are trained to be there go underfunded and underresourced in the region.
Had these dimwits in the swamp applied a little bit of diplomacy and some equitable foreign policy to this fiasco, we wouldn't even be in this silly fix.
War on terror. Yeah, right. More like corporate global agression with government complicity!
tbob wrote on October 24, 2007 9:43 AM:Let'see...Blackwater is, obviously, on the skids and losing its Iraqi windfall. Where to go next?
I recall Generalissimo Prince ruminating quite recently about increasing the scope of operations to include battling the drug lords of Latin America. Just a few days ago, President Shortpants announced his plan to slide $500,000,000 in new funding to thwart the drug threat in Mexico. Helps to have friends in high places.
Can you say, "Agua Negro"?