Blackwater: The World’s Largest Mercenary Army
Long but with a point...
“Blackwater is a company that began in 1996 as a private military training facility in — it was built near the Great Dismal Swamp of North Carolina. And visionary executives, all of them former Navy Seals or other Elite Special Forces people, envisioned it as a project that would take advantage of the anticipated government outsourcing.
Well, here we are a decade later, and it’s the most powerful mercenary firm in the world. It has 20,000 soldiers on the ready, the world’s largest private military base, a fleet of twenty aircraft, including helicopter gunships. It’s become nothing short of the Praetorian Guard for the Bush administration’s so-called global war on terror. And it’s headed by a very right wing Christian activist, ex-Navy Seal named Erik Prince, whose family was one of the major bank rollers of the Republican Revolution of the 1990s. He, himself, is a significant funder of President Bush and his allies.”
Well, here we are a decade later, and it’s the most powerful mercenary firm in the world. It has 20,000 soldiers on the ready, the world’s largest private military base, a fleet of twenty aircraft, including helicopter gunships. It’s become nothing short of the Praetorian Guard for the Bush administration’s so-called global war on terror. And it’s headed by a very right wing Christian activist, ex-Navy Seal named Erik Prince, whose family was one of the major bank rollers of the Republican Revolution of the 1990s. He, himself, is a significant funder of President Bush and his allies.”
“We absolutely want more oversight,” Prince said on 60 Minutes, discussing the September incident in which Blackwater forces killed 17 civilians in Baghdad. “We want a good name for this industry because we think it plays an important role for what the U.S. policies are going forward.”
Denard, no doubt, would never have used the word “industry” to describe his gun-for-hire business. Of course, that’s because Prince casts himself as the polar opposite of the self-styled colonel who called his men “les affreux” (“the terrible ones”). Instead, Prince refers to his “team,” as if they were salesmen hawking a new line of leisurewear.
“I think mercenary is a slanderous term,” Prince told Newsweek. “I’m a businessman,” he told the Detroit Free Press, describing Blackwater as “a temp provider.” The firm’s website is even more drenched in corporate p.r.-speak: “Blackwater Worldwide efficiently and effectively integrates a wide range of resources and core competencies to provide unique and timely solutions that exceed our customers’ stated needs and expectations.”
OK, then. But the juxtaposition of Denard’s colorful obituaries and Prince’s damage-control media blitz makes one thing clear: When it comes to unique and timely solutions that just so happen to involve large quantities of firepower, they don’t make ’em like they used to.
Would you want to read a novel about a person who says things like, “out of 16,000 PSD operations, our guys have resulted in any firearms use less than one percent of the time?” No. You want to read about the mustachioed menace who once invaded a Congolese province by bicycle.
In fact, someone did write a novel about Denard, sort of: He was widely said to be a model for Cat Shannon, the antihero of Frederick Forsyth’s mercenary saga, The Dogs of War.
Born Gilbert Bourgeaud in Bordeaux in 1929, Denard was said to have fought in the French Resistance. Later, he enlisted in the French navy, serving in Indochina during France’s doomed effort to maintain colonial rule. He eventually became a colonial policeman in Morocco, until he was accused in 1956 of plotting to assassinate the French prime minister. He spent a year in jail before being acquitted. On release, he worked as a salesman.
Bored, Denard drifted to the Third World, joining anti-communist efforts in places like Iran and Yemen. It was a good time to be a mercenary: Former colonies across the globe were becoming independent, and there was no shortage of people looking for gunmen to either prop up the frail new states or topple their governments -- or both.
In the Congo, the ultimate strife-torn post colonial republic, he helped separatists in the mineral-rich Katanga province fight a left-leaning central government. Later, he helped pro-Western dictator Mobutu Sese Seko put down a coup attempt by the former leader of those same separatists. (It was the tyrannical Mobutu who made Denard a colonel.) In 1968, he led a group of 100 men in an ill-fated effort to invade the province by bicycle.
In all, Denard was involved in more than 20 coups or civil wars -- almost always with the tacit, or not-so-tacit, approval of France. In Benin he launched a coup. In Gabon he put one down. He also picked up passport stamps in Angola, Guinea, Chad and Rhodesia, which despite the hopes of Denard’s patrons became the independent nation of Zimbabwe. He only faced the music back home once during these years, earning a suspended sentence for the coup in Benin. French officials testified that he had acted as an ally.
Denard’s favorite country, though, was the Comoros, a group of islands off the coast of East Africa. He took part in four coups in the archipelago over two decades. In 1975 he toppled its government. Three years later he restored the man he had overthrown, staying on as presidential security chief. He lived by the beach, wed a local wife (his sixth) and converted to Islam (he took the name Mustapha Mahdjoub). Alas, in 1989, the president was assassinated -- allegedly during a dispute with some of les affreux -- prompting Denard to leave the country in a hurry.
In 1995, he was back, aiming to oust yet another government. But with the Cold War over, Denard’s brand of soldiering proved a lot trickier to pull off. His old pals in Paris and Washington didn’t want to be associated with les affreuxith the Cold War over, Denard’s brand of soldiering proved a lot trickier to pull off. His old pals in Paris and Washington didn’t want to be associated with les affreux. And South Africa was under new management altogether. France quickly dispatched troops and arrested the visibly aged Denard. He stood trial, but never served time. By then, Denard was already showing signs of Alzheimer’s disease, the ailment that finally did him in.
Unlike Blackwater’s Prince, Denard leaves behind no multinational company, no multimillion-dollar contracts, not even a corporate logo. He did, however, feel the same need as Prince to justify his service: According to Denard, he always acted in the name of anticommunism and patriotism. He also mirrored Prince in eschewing the term “mercenary.” Of course, Denard’s favored substitution wasn’t anything so bland as “temp provider.” Rather, he preferred the term he used to title his autobiography, Corsair of the Republic.
“The corsairs in France would receive written permission from the King to attack foreign ships,” he told The New York Times in 1993. “I didn't have such permission, but I had passports given to me by the intelligence services.”
Which, when you think about it, is just a slightly more dashing way of saying what Prince told 60 Minutes the day after Denard died: “I’m an American working for America. Anything we do is to support U.S. policy.”
Reposted from - Michael Currie Schaffer, a writer based in Philadelphia.
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So, whats the point...The point is Col. Bob Denard saw himself as a patriot and a man of principles while the rich man Erik Prince sees his work simply as the CEO of a company that sells death for a profit...Guns for Brains
Not satisfied yet that war is big business...????...Read on...
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The Secretary of Defence for the worlds most powerful military becomes the CEO of a company that later profits from untendered military contracts...
1992
Halliburton subsidiary Brown & Root is paid $9 million by the Pentagon (under Cheney's direction as Secretary of Defense) to produce a classified report detailing how private companies (like itself) could provide logistical support for American troops in potential war zones around the world. Shortly after this report, the Pentagon awards Brown & Root a five-year contract to provide logistics for the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers. The General Accounting Office estimates that through this contract, Brown & Root makes overall $2.2 billion in revenue in the Balkans.2
1995
Without any previous business experience, Cheney leaves the Department of Defense to become the CEO of Halliburton Co., one of the biggest oil-services companies in the world. He will be chairman of the company from 1996 to October 1998 and from February to August 2000. Under Cheney's leadership, Halliburton moves up from 73rd to 18th on the Pentagon's list of top contractors. The company garners $2.3 billion in U.S. government contracts, which almost doubles the $1.2 billion it earned from the government previously. Most of the contracts are granted by the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers.
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Hmmmm, I guess there is big money in war and death....If a CEO is supposed to use his brains to create a profit for a company and that company sells death such as does Blackwater and Haliburton, then I guess that Brains for Guns is also Guns for Brains?
