In addition to the issues mentioned below, when one considers that each private contractor makes much more dough than any of our troops, one can see where a lot of the mismanaged Iraq funds are going. This is the equivalent of a private army, including logistics and support. As the report notes, this doesn’t even include subcontractors.
There are about 100,000 government contractors operating in Iraq, not counting subcontractors, a total that is approaching the size of the U.S. military force there, according to the military’s first census of the growing population of civilians operating in the battlefield.
The survey finding, which includes Americans, Iraqis and third-party nationals hired by companies operating under U.S. government contracts, is significantly higher and wider in scope than the Pentagon’s only previous estimate, which said there were 25,000 security contractors in the country.
The Pentagon’s latest estimate “further demonstrates the need for Congress to finally engage in responsible, serious and aggressive oversight over the questionable and growing U.S. practice of private military contracting,” said Rep. Janice D. Schakowsky (D-Ill.), who has been critical of the military’s reliance on contractors.
About 650 contractors have died in Iraq since 2003, according to Labor Department statistics.
“It takes a great deal of vigilance on the part of the military commander to ensure contractor compliance,” said William L. Nash, a retired Army general and a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “If you’re trying to win hearts and minds and the contractor is driving 90 miles per hour through the streets and running over kids, that’s not helping the image of the American army. The Iraqis aren’t going to distinguish between a contractor and a soldier.”
I agree. At what point do contractors cease to be an aid and start becoming a problem?
Just the same practices endorsed by previous “defenders of the faith”. Whether it’s Swiss Guards for the Pope, mercenary Brits working for the old apartheid government in South Africa — now, we have our own redneck Hessians.
This is great, give all the contractors guns and tell them to shoot anything wearing a towel. Maybe we’ll win this war yet!
Because of force reductions over the past 15+ years, the decision has been made to shift personnel from the supporting establishment to the combat forces. In order for this to happen, contractors are required to fill in the gaps left behind. Hell, the entire non-tactical data network for the Navy and Marine Corps was created and is managed by a contractor. While contractors may be more expensive in the short term, unless Congress starts increasing the end-strength of the services, there isn’t much going to change.
Didn’t Rome try this a couple (thousand) years ago? Does anyone know how it turned out?
3,
A key issue here is that the contractors aren’t only support, they’re bearing arms.
#5, a military cook gets a weapon, why shouldn’t a civilian?
6,
From the article:
DynCorp International has about 1,500 employees in Iraq, including about 700 helping train the police force. Blackwater USA has more than 1,000 employees in the country, most of them providing private security.
According to The Christian Science Monitor, over 20,000 of the contractors are mercenaries.
(BTW, this estimate was made before the recent census.)
A lot of the contractors are security forces, not cooks.
7, and security guards are not necessarily the same thing as combat forces, though the later can be trained to perform the duties of the former. Which gets back to my original point – we are relying more and more on contractors because we don’t have the forces available to provide all of the supporting functions.
i’d like to see that number compared to the number of government contractors working to rebuild the gulf coast.
the current administration doesn’t mind spending billions of dollars rebuilding a country that they didn’t have to destroy, but whines like a little bitch when its own people need help.
#3 is correct. I was active duty Army and a contractor when I left the military. After the drawdown in the 90’s, the military had to shift a lot of the manpower that’s allocated to support necessary non-combat functions (civil engineers, IT, food, laundry, depot level mechanics) to doing core military jobs (infantry, aviation, artillery) in order to keep below mandated caps and still field a combat effective force. Contracting companies were brought in to fill the gap these re-alignments caused.
Contractors provide a lot of expertise that frankly, the military doesn’t possess at the “do-er” level anymore. The officers and senior NCO’s may have degrees in computer science, logistics, or engineering, but the actual military trained people who do the nuts and bolts side of the job have for the most part either been retrained or gotten out. Contractors save the military money in the long run by not having to be trained (they already know the job), and by not having to be given in-kind compensation (free medical, housing and meal allowances, uniforms). Yes, their salary is a lot higher than the enlisted guy who would otherwise be doing the job, but the overall total cost is lower if the contractor is correctly selected and utilized.
As to whether non-military personnel should be used in traditional combat roles, I’m against it. If they need security people, they should be bringing in additional MP’s or SP’s to do it. If contractors have to be armed, give them a 9mm pistol and a basic combat load for personal defense only. Provide contractor convoys with proper military escort. Giving someone with a fuzzy connection to the laws of war a rifle is a bad idea.
8,
We can go back and forth on the definition, beyond the fact that security in a combat zone is combat, a significant percentage of the armed contractors in Iraq are involved in real combat operations of one sort or another.
Here is an informative article on the situation beyond the one posted.
Here’s one in the Air Force Legal Review on the problems.
Everybody is missing the real point. All these contractors are now lobbyists for more spending, more missions, more sub-contracting. The politicians love this. Allocate money to the contractor, the contractor sends some back as a campaign contribution or worse. Cant do that with ordinary grunts.
More wars, more military spending is the result. We are the losers.
I agree with #3 and # 10. I can tell you right now the contractor as indiviuals are not contibuting to any campaigns. My spouce is there working as a contractor and works 12 hour days 7 days a week for an hourly wage of about $15.00 an hour. They work there butts off and not everything is so great in the contractor world. They do get an allowance for being in a war zone just like the active duty do but there jobs can be gone in a second if they say or do the wrong thing. Even if what they are being told to do is wrong or not efficient. We were active duty before and know how things are suppose to be done. The real problem with the contract world is contractor are putting people in jobs there not qualified for.