Iraq War Logs: Military Privatisation Run Amok

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/oct/23/iraq-war-logs-us-military

Iraq war logs: military privatisation run amok

The Wikileaks logs provide ample evidence of private security contractors entirely unaccountable for lethal rogue actions

Pratap Chatterjee
guardian.co.uk, Saturday 23 October 2010


Shortly after 10am on 14 May 2004, a convoy of private security guards from Blackwater riding down "Route Irish" – the Baghdad airport road – shot up a civilian Iraqi vehicle. While they were at it, the Blackwater men fired shots over the heads of a group of soldiers from the 69th Regiment of the US Army before they sped away heading west in their white armoured truck. When the dust cleared, the Iraqi driver was dead and his wife and daughter were injured.

A terse, 57-word dispatch in the Iraq war logs published by Wikileaks is the first public evidence of the shooting, as recorded by the US military.

The incident is one of several dozen "escalation of force" incidents involving private security companies in Iraq – which is military parlance for an unwarranted attack, almost all of which have never been previously reported. Blackwater, the company from Moyock, North Carolina, is responsible for about half of the attacks, closely followed by Erinys, a British private security company registered in the Virgin Islands, which seems to have an unusually high number of vehicle crashes.

On my four visits to Iraq in the last seven years, I learned quickly to steer clear of the fast-moving vehicles belonging to these private security companies. The men – sporting identical reflective wrap-around sunglasses, bullet-proof jackets – would aim their high-powered assault rifles and shout "Imshi" ("Move") at any vehicle that came within a 50m perimeter. Sometimes, they would throw plastic water bottles to shock pedestrians into staying away.

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http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-10-22/wikileaks-iraq-war-files-8-most-shocking-secrets/

8 Most Shocking Secrets From the WikiLeaks Files

by The Daily Beast

The whistleblower has released its much-anticipated Iraq War logs, a massive trove of nearly 400,000 files that constitute the biggest leak of military secrets in U.S. history. From unreported cases of torture to a potential coverup involving the imprisoned American hikers in Iran, see what’s in the controversial files.

1. Misleading Casualties

<snip> (details @ link)


2. Unreported Cases of Torture

<snip>

3. “Frago 242”

<snip>

4. U.S. Helicopter Killed Surrendering Iraqis

<snip>

5. Hikers Were on the Iran Border

<snip>

6. Iran Coordinated Attacks in Iraq

<snip>

7. Democracy Downplayed?

In a telling, if not surprising finding, Der Spiegel reports that, in the 391,832 documents, the word “democracy” appears only eight times—improvised explosive devices are mentioned 146,895 times.

8. Syrian Complicity

<snip>

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