Comments (35)

TheraP wrote on October 3, 2007 11:31 AM:

Isn't this the strangest "war" with a made for tv "war zone" where diplomats are running around and the FBI has to be sent - to investigate renegade mercenary militias employed to protect these diplomats and other dignitaries? And where radio talk show people dump on the troops who are telling the truth about failed strategies, which endanger them and undermine their mission?

In previous wars were there so many non-military people running around needing all sorts of protection? What is the state dept doing in a war zone? If they need protection, they should not be there!

On the one hand you have petraeus, a general, assuring us that violence is down. But on the other hand you have 'blackwater' (an apt name if there ever was one!) telling us they need to be trigger happy due to all the attacks they incur on a daily basis (no wonder!).

This whole thing looks more and more like some kind of burlesque show! Costing nearly a trillion but hopelessly staged and headed for bad reviews till kingdom come! It's the biggest PR failure that ever was!!! A war supposed to prop up a failing presidency - that was sold on lies, puts future generations and the whole economy in hock to other nations.

What a tribute to arrogance, stupidity, and cupidity!

Mike Bakunin wrote on October 3, 2007 11:44 AM:

Well, if I were the FBI, I would demand to be conveyed by the military rather than Blackwater folks who might (1) just let the FBI car "stray" to far away from their guards, (2) let a lone, madman shooter get by, or (3) simply look the other way. I don't think I would want them necessary guarding my back.

Mike Bakunin wrote on October 3, 2007 11:44 AM:

Well, if I were the FBI, I would demand to be conveyed by the military rather than Blackwater folks who might (1) just let the FBI car "stray" to far away from their guards, (2) let a lone, madman shooter get by, or (3) simply look the other way. I don't think I would want them necessarily guarding my back.

Cit92 wrote on October 3, 2007 11:50 AM:

Blackwater appears to be building a Navy.

One of their subsidiaries, Pelagian Maratime LLC, has registered an ex-NOAA 1966 vessel called the McArthur.

Blackwater recently had a guest-only event showing off the ship.

http://content.hamptonroads.com/story.cfm?story=132785&ran=12900

steve duncan wrote on October 3, 2007 11:55 AM:

Kinda reminds me of Junior putting Cheney in charge of searching for a vice president. Fox, henhouse, all that.

anon wrote on October 3, 2007 11:56 AM:

...It's the biggest PR failure that ever was!!!...

Well, yes, but with, say, a half million dead, another half million or so wounded, and upwards of 3 million refugees.

Anonymous wrote on October 3, 2007 12:06 PM:

Blackwater made a huge point that NONE of their protectees have ever been killed. I doubt they'll start that fuse by having an FBI investigator takedown.

Steve5117 wrote on October 3, 2007 12:11 PM:

Erik Prince misspoke yesterday when he said there were no military personnel capable of guarding the VIP's and Embassy personnel. That must come as a surprise to Marine Security Guards:

“MSGs primarily provide internal embassy security under the guide of the Diplomatic Security Agent in charge of the Embassy, otherwise known as the Regional Security Officer (RSO). In addition, MSGs provide security for visiting American dignitaries and may assist the RSO in supervising host country security forces which provide additional security for the exterior of embassies.” Click on link for the Wikipedia entry.

psyopswatcher wrote on October 3, 2007 12:15 PM:

Blackwater's building a navy? ha! That old tub?

"outfitted for disaster response and training."

You know that's what Gtmo was once, a Fleeting Training Center. Methinks BW sees more 'consultant' opportunities in it's future

brodix wrote on October 3, 2007 12:18 PM:

This war is just one more bubble and when it pops, the whole house of cards falls down.

We will be leaving Iraq then the rest of the world stops taking dollars. That might not be that far away.

Anonymous wrote on October 3, 2007 12:19 PM:

The MSG provide U.S. Embassy building, perimeter security and Ambassadors' residence security. In most countries, there is a host government police or military force that operates outside the walls. A typical in country MSG detachment varies in size from 5-30, depending on the size of post.

The Department of State's Diplomatic Security Service (D/S) is responsible for personal security of State personnel outside the walls of the Embassy.

Since most host countries where the US maintains diplomatic buildings have a functioning host government that can maintain a semblance of order, D/S doesn't have to provide armed motorcades and bodyguards. Sometimes the host government will even provide this, if warranted.

You're right, of course that it would be fully appropriate by tradtition for the MSG to handle personnel security in country, but the USG hasn't a soldier to spare.

Hence, Blackwater.

Anonymous wrote on October 3, 2007 12:23 PM:

Blackwater's ex-NOAA vessel is newer than many of the US Coast Guard cutters still in service!

Anonymous wrote on October 3, 2007 12:26 PM:

Oh, and what a coincedence...

The private contractors building the Coast Guard's "deepwater" fleet screwed up and built ships that are unsafe and unusable, putting the CG in a huge bind - and cutter shortage.

Wouldn't it just be great if Blackwater could step in and "help out" the Coast Guard in its time of need?

Cinderella Ferret wrote on October 3, 2007 12:31 PM:

I believe this post is improperly titled. How about:

Things You Can't Make Up

But then again that could be the last six plus years.

Anonymous wrote on October 3, 2007 12:39 PM:

brodix sez........

We will be leaving Iraq then the rest of the world stops taking dollars. That might not be that far away.
********************************

Important point,too often overlooked. Saudi Arabi and Kuwait are abandoning the dollar, other countries threatening to.
In essence, China is paying for the war (s).

sailmaker wrote on October 3, 2007 12:40 PM:

The FBI already has an agency in Baghdad, why do they have to send more? And why don't they have one of the other mercenary companies do the guarding?

TheraP wrote on October 3, 2007 12:49 PM:

How I love you tpm and fellow posters. I could never count the ways!

anon @ 11:56: precisely!

in hock in China: precisely!

What a miserable time to live in! But with such great fellows in our lifeboat here at tpm!

fuzz wrote on October 3, 2007 12:56 PM:

Why can't another security contracting firm in Iraq guard the FBI?

Anonymous Hollywood blacklist dodger wrote on October 3, 2007 2:31 PM:

Did any of you stop to think that if the military hadn't been downsized that there would be NO DEMAND for the services of companies like Blackwater?!

TheraP wrote on October 3, 2007 2:33 PM:

@ 2:31:

The mistake was a misbegotten war, not the downsizing of the military.

nunya wrote on October 3, 2007 2:38 PM:

ambush in Fallujah in 2004. One of the guards killed was Scott Helvenston of Oceanside.

Anonymous wrote on October 3, 2007 2:42 PM:

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20071003/news_1n3black.html

Dee Illuminati wrote on October 3, 2007 2:53 PM:

To Thera P

"Isn't this the strangest "war" with a made for tv "war zone" where diplomats are running around and the FBI has to be sent - to investigate renegade mercenary militias employed to protect these diplomats and other dignitaries?"

You hit the issue right on the head! The logic behind much of this discussion is first predicated on allot of other 'damn fuzzy logic.'

Isn't this the strangest war?

No war bonds, No conscription or draft, A war declared on an emotion 'terror,' and then the really sticky part of liberator/occupier. Yep it is a strange ass war to be sure!

And I see the people trying to reconcile this 'strange war' with arguments that are either epistemological Evel Knievel's, were GREAT JUMPS with spectacular crashes in logic are performed, or there is a simple abandonment of logic altogether... where simple slogans substitute for thought.

As to the people over there, well they have to deal with this 'very strange war' and most of them exhibit behaviours that come out of a mix of PTSD and Viktor Frankl responses and rhetoric that illustrates the full 'strangeness' of this war. And I'm not discussing the latte Viktor Frankl stuff, I'm talking the mass movement ugly responses more akin to Eric Hoffer type study were these 'events' are performed by isolated and alienated people whom are looking to 'provide justification and meaning' to the acts, albeit after the fact~ so much for actually 'planning' a war.

One of the more influental people, one of the very few thatI trust, and GROUP TRUST is allot of this issue.. see my previous post.. at the critical juncture of my life introduced me to Viktor Frankl so as I could make some sense of why groups of people could be so damn stupid, not nefarrious, but just damn stupid people.

You find some irony in that the FBI and DOS are reluctant to prosecute and cripple those whom protect them in this 'strange war?'

There is a reduction of reason, and absence of thought, as the decision to go to conflict is endorsed. Violence is the last desperate act of a limited mind.

But as I was reading WAPO I was surprised to see that it was ARAB MERCS whom were doing most of the IED's in Iraq. So much for the 'noble savage myth' of the indigenous people huh???

Are we singing Kum Ba Ya yet? Where is the damn flowers that were promised in as much that SAIC didn't air-freight em in with Chalabi and crowd?

The best that can be learned from all of this is the decision making that went into this 'war' and the decision making arising from it.

And your looking for logical consistency where it doesn't exist! In a 'war' zone.

I mean looking for an example of Dissociative disorder? Try the example of the contractor walking the greenzone on XMAS eve with a bottle of booze and a gun.

God rest ye merry, gentlemen
Let nothing you dismay
For Jesus Christ our Saviour
Was born on Christmas Day
To save us all from Satan's power
When we were gone astray
O tidings of comfort and joy,
Comfort and joy
O tidings of comfort and joy

Ohh common now ye all....

lets hear some Kum Ba Ya.

Where is the Kum Ba Ya promised folks?

There is no investigation that is going to change the situation in the short run on the ground, and the dissonance between our society, islamic society, and the conditions in the green zone will remain in confrontation with each other for some time to come.

So make damn sure to crucify that contractor!

Mash Note for the 'Girl with the Leash'
Military conscription is alive and well in the dominion of the whip

"Good for you, Lynndie England, you chinless, inbred, runty, androgynous backwoods mutt! When you mimed a crotch-shot at that hooded detainee, you reminded us all of what Imperial service should be like: one long S&M tour of the tropics, where every man, woman and child of the conquered peoples exists solely as an object for your pleasure."
-- John Dolan, columnist for the website, Exile

By Joe Bageant

When I saw the above arrogant, piece of witty horseshit, I wanted to go strangle John Dolan myself. Then I came back to the realization that all writing is masturbation, mine included, and that some of us do it with our eyes closed -- as John Dolan does. If he had even one eye open he would have seen the pathos and national hypocrisy represented by "the girl with the leash."

Lynndie England never had a chance. Abu Ghraib, or maybe something even worse (an RPG up the shorts, for instance) was always her destiny. Nearly half of the 800 Americans killed in Iraq to date came from small towns like hers, like mine. Forty-six percent of the American dead in Iraq came from towns of less than 40,000. Yet these towns make up only 25% of our population. Most of the young soldiers were fleeing economically depressed places, or dead end jobs like Lynndie had at the chicken processing plant. These so-called volunteers are part of this nation's de facto draft -- economic conscription. Money is always the best whip to use on the laboring classes. Thirteen hundred a month, a signing bonus and free room and board sure beats the hell out of yanking guts through a chicken's ass.

And there are those big bucks for college later. Up to $65,000. Lynndie was supposedly going to college after her enlistment to become a "storm chaser," like in the Helen Hunt movie "Twister." Yeah, right. There are millions of openings in the tornado chasing business. And I'm going to be the centerfold in the next Playgirl beefcake issue. I suppose lots of poor kids do go to college on their military benefits. But personally speaking, I can count the number I know who actually did it on one hand. Let's be honest here: graduating from a small town redneck white high school not knowing where Alaska is on a map of the US is not exactly the path to the fountain at Harvard Yard. But I suspect that down inside Lynndie knew her lot in life from the start -- she wore combat boots and camo outfits to high school. Swore she loved it. If you are doomed to eat shit, you may as well bring your own fork.

I grew up poor in Winchester, Virginia -- about as poor as the pinup girl of Abu Gharaib -- in a moreover scabby rundown town about forty miles from Lynndie's ancestral mobile home over there in Fort Ashby, West Virginia. Sometimes I walk the street on which I grew up, across the railroad tracks that have divided the classes here since before the Civil War. And when I look around I see the likes of Lynndie everywhere. girls of the type I dated as a kid. They are all fatter, thanks to the fast food that was unavailable in my youth, but they are the same cigarette-smoking, in-your-face white girls I knew then, the tough daughters of the unwashed. Here in my old neighborhood, over one quarter of adults do not have a high school diploma, and there are lots of yellow ribbons in the windows just like the one on Lynndie England's family trailer, for those serving in Iraq or elsewhere on the far-flung perimeter of our expanding empire of blood and commerce.

Lynndie Rana England was born in 1982. I have a son her age. Like my son, she graduated high school in 2001. Folks in Fort Ashby say she did well in school, which is no great achievement in these places where the academic bar is set so damned low it is buried in the ground in hopes that any student who bothers to even attend school will meander across it. Then, true to local form, she got married at age 19. I'm sure she married mostly out of smalltown boredom. I got married that way once, though I've got sense enough now to be positively embarrased to tell you how young I actually was. Anyway, Lynndie is in a "relationship" with a fellow reserve unit member and is now pregnant at 21 and facing a possible prison term. I wonder if she still thinks much about chasing tornadoes like Helen Hunt.

All hail to the flag people!

To talk about Lynndie's class you have to talk about that other class, her betters. The class that would not piss on her if her shirt was on fire -- the flag people. The kind who smirk at "the mutt girl." I live among them now, on a street where the American flag hangs from nearly every Antebellum or Georgian or Greek Revival front porch, in the part of town where every man is a business man, solidly "patriotic." All went to college and few if any have been in the armed services. The regional tire distribution kingpin across the street (who is also a Republican city councilman with, they tell me, a contract for the city's vehicles) flies his flag. Next door the local office supply hotwire (former mayor and born-again chairman of the city GOP) flies two flags, one American and on of his alma mater. The bigtime landlord up the street, another steel bottomed Republican, flies her colors. She too is on council and her daughter is state GOP chairman to boot. Next house down is the daughter of a mogul hard-right-wing developer. She has never worked a day in her life; Daddy just bought her a half million dollar home. They are all waving a flag. They are all super GOPers and shitting in the tall cotton.

Waving a flag and making a mint. What the folks on the "good streets" understand but never say is that America's class war is over and they, the business class, won. Now they can sit back and be outraged by the pics of an ignorant girl in the testosterone choked air of an American torture chamber. They won on the backs of the other nine tenths in these non-union towns where the annual wage is less than three-quarters of the national average. And they won because god wants it that way. Their families got here first and stole early. Their daddies stole land from farmers during the Depression and they made millions later selling it to Wal-Mart, the new medical center, and all those low wage non-union factories (after conveniently rezoning it to suit their interests while on city council.) Contrary to common belief, the bedrock of this nation's rip-off by the rich is in the small and medium sized towns, where the so-called "small" business associations have a direct phone line to the state capital, where they can stymie any increase in minimum wage or snuff anything even remotely resembling a fair tax structure. And if Lynndie England wants a piece of their American pie, well, she can start in the Army reserves by posing for mock crotch shots in the belly of Abu Ghraib, then claw her way up from there. Just like their great granddaddies did.

My hometown friend and drinking buddy, Richard, is an heir to an old line real estate fortune in the tens of millions (and is a fourth generation city council member, naturally.) He says there is absolutely nothing wrong with this system. I say there is absolutely nothing right with it. And as long as I keep my proper place in the scheme of things, and he continues to be able to hold his liquor (because I sure as hell can't) I suppose we'll go to our graves remaining fairly civil about what we both know is the injustice of it all. You won't ever see any of his privately schooled kids eating MREs in Iraq. Nor any of mine, if I can possible help it. But for opposing reasons. He's raising his kids to rule in the New Republican World Order and I raised mine to be resistance fighters against that same order.

We've seen the shy and pretty blonde Jessica Lynch exploited as a fake hero rescued from the swarthy hand of the godless Muslim. We've seen the coarse, not-so-pretty Lynndie forced to pose for a bondage torture flick, and then be publicly scourged in the name of some corrupt justice understood only by those powerful men whose fancy was tickled by an unlawful military attack and occupation. I simply do not see how even a morally and philosophically bereft country such as ours can come up with another way to exploit graphic images of women at war.

A bass boat for the angel of Abu Ghraib

Whatever the case, in the end, Lynndie will get some bucks out of all this, if she has not already, from her Today Show appearance, or maybe the book deal or the movie that will come along to feed our national lust for pain made visible. What the lawyers do not take from her, she had better save. But I suspect she will not. What do you want to bet that her alleged future hubby, Charles Graner, won't want a $50, 000 truck and a super bass boat, or that she won't waste enough of it by her very own petite self? I've seen it a thousand times. Hell, I've done it. It's a white trash gene. But things could be worse. She could go to prison if our commander-in-chief has his way (the same commander-in-chief who once called Africa a country and he didn't even go to school in West Virginia). Or worse yet, she could find religion and be West-by-god-Virginia "saved," a sure road to zombie trailer trash hell if ever there was one.

But hold there hoss! The Lynndie England show is by no means over yet. As I write a dozen committees are excavating for the truth about Abu Ghraib. And they remind us that we do not yet know the "full facts." We will not know them until they are done being manufactured by the administration and its stacked committees. And they are stacked. Stacked if for no other reason because the lawyers and politicos doing the judging never received orders to pose for war porn on behalf of a savage, pittiless republic, or faced the prospect of a stomach turning chicken plant as their destiny. They do not understand that here on the wrong side of the tracks, in places like Fort Ashby or Winchester, Virginia, here in the dominion of the whip, a homely girl with a leash is relatively speaking, an angel -- albeit the angel of our brutish disregard.

Yeah lets sing some Kum Ba Ya and hang the bastard!

Anonymous wrote on October 3, 2007 3:15 PM:

Anonymous Hollywood blacklist dodger,

Nope, you are COMPLETELY WRONG.

In recent history our military has never played much of a role in VIP protection and the similar services that Blackwater provides.

Blackwater doesn't do combat and they don't do the logistical stuff that's been passed off to Halliburton and friends. Those are the areas that would be affected by a downsized military.

It might be a legitimate argument with regards to contractor corruption, but that's outside the scope of this discussion.

TheraP wrote on October 3, 2007 3:16 PM:

Dee, I sense a lot of hurt behind what you've written. Maybe that things feel like they're spinning out of control as well. I can see you're trying to make sense of all the emotion and the craziness going on. Take care of yourself. Sometimes that needs to be the first priority.

John Patterson wrote on October 3, 2007 3:32 PM:

This may come as a shock to those wh have read me before, but there may actually be "a few good men" in Blackwater who will do the honorable thing and help these investigators, not hunder or intimidate them.

One of the factors that we must always remember, that in every "platoon" whether civilian or military, there are always some Eliases to counter the Barnes'es.

Lets hope some of that trus-blue "hoorah" heroism leaks over into their civilian jobs, and Semper Fi remains fi.

John Patterson wrote on October 3, 2007 3:37 PM:

Who ever decided that our troops allhave to wear uniforms? Why can't they come up with a "civilian" looking uniform, so they can do the job Blackwater's claiming they can't do?

There's some smart folks in the military who know what I mean, this "dignitaries can't have uniformed guards" crap is just a dodge.

Ditch the war duds, put some soldiers in Blackwater gear and give them a decent wage for their work,

And dump this mercenary mess ASAP!

Our own military version of Blackwater would cost less, save lives and promote peace, not chaos. And they would be accountable to the next President, which Blackwater is not.

omeros wrote on October 3, 2007 4:09 PM:

Does anyone else notice the uncanny resemblance of the Blackwater logo to professional/college athletic logos?

Go team!

JEP wrote on October 3, 2007 4:37 PM:

Is that a wolverine pawprint?

Red white and blue dawn?

fuzz wrote on October 3, 2007 9:05 PM:

John,

One, soldiers in a war zone must be in uniform lest they be considered spies per the Geneva Convention.

Two, it isn't a question of uniforms but rather a question of roles. The military has traditionally resisted the bodyguard role because it is not related to combat. They didn't sign up to be security guards. Would it be better to have the military doing this job? Maybe, maybe not. But proper oversight would take care of the Blackwater issue, and that would be more agreeable to the troops.

Better yet, if we would just not occupy foreign countries it wouldn't be an issue at all.

SmallPotatoes wrote on October 4, 2007 6:26 AM:

Dee,
That is the best political commentary of the reason why this country has turned into a piece of crap! You are are great writer!

Nice to see that there is at least one person who still sees!

psyopswatcher wrote on October 4, 2007 10:59 AM:

Simple solution to the FBI's security problem. Take Rice and Prince along as hostages... er, I mean witnesses to the proceedings.

Anonymous wrote on October 14, 2007 4:43 PM:

Um, remember AFOSI? (Air Force Office of Special INvestigations) They have protective service details comprosed of enlisted personnel (and they are all credentialed law enforcemnt officers too-- from the same place that the FBI, DEA, etc get their training from - the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center)

Duh.

Anonymous wrote on October 14, 2007 4:44 PM:

Um, remember AFOSI? (Air Force Office of Special INvestigations) They have protective service details comprosed of enlisted personnel (and they are all credentialed law enforcemnt officers too-- from the same place that the FBI, DEA, etc get their training from - the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center)

Duh.

They don't wear uniforms on the PSD teams and their ranks are protected, so they appear to be joe civilian (carrying a gun and a military ID card) like the blackwater types.

Hmm.. clue bat please

Anonymous wrote on October 14, 2007 4:47 PM:

Um, remember AFOSI? (Air Force Office of Special INvestigations) They have protective service details comprosed of enlisted personnel (and they are all credentialed law enforcemnt officers too-- from the same place that the FBI, DEA, etc get their training from - the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center)

Duh.

They don't wear uniforms on the PSD teams and their ranks are protected, so they appear to be joe civilian (carrying a gun and a military ID card) like the blackwater types.

Hmm.. clue bat please