Mercenaries Go Home

A couple of media items came to my attention in the last few days that have put me back on my soapbox about the need to curtail the use of mercenaries in wars.

First, I picked up the free paper in my driveway and saw the headline “N. Africans joining Iraq militants.” Great, more mercenary insurgents join the fray. We like to attribute troubles in the Middle East to Islamic fundamentalism, but I am telling you that most of these young men are just following the money.

Second, I run across this gem: “Easy money lures SA men to war-torn Iraq”. The article reports that most South Africans working in Iraq are providing basic grunt work, but “the highest-earning South African “mercenaries” in Iraq included intelligence officers, counter-insurgency specialists, helicopter pilots and combat surgeons who earned up to $25 000 (about R160 000) a month.”

And these mercenaries are being sought out because “they were far cheaper than their British or US counterparts, and had experience in bush-war counterinsurgency.” Another great moment—even our own, homegrown mercenaries may become displaced workers in the global business world’s race to the bottom.

Back to the issue at hand.

You may prefer the politically correct term “private military forces” (PMFs) to mercenaries, but let’s not obscure the truth. Until and unless an individual who has provided military, security and/or intelligence services for payola in a private or publicly traded corporation and not as a member of the armed services of a legitimate government can convince me that their primary motivation to work in such a capacity was not money and/or international adventure, I will call them mercenaries.

Ever since the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse and torture scandal broke, the role played by mercenaries in Iraq and the dilemma they pose to our armed forces and democratic governance (not to mention the outcome of conflicts and wars) has begun to emerge.

As soon as the sick and humiliating photos of abuse at Abu Ghraib were out, investigations of several low-level members of the U.S. armed forces and four individuals from two mercenary service companies were launched. Today, several of those low-level, “bad apples” from the military have been charged with crimes in the military justice system, but ZERO mercenaries have been prosecuted or punished for a crime in Iraq. There’s no excuse for what some members of the armed forces have done to prisoners in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay–just as there’s no excuse for not taking the investigations up the chain of command–but it looks like some of the rottenest apples of all are wearing three-piece suits and signing contracts at the Washington money trough with no legal culpability at all.

There are so many problems with the current administration’s fondness for outsourcing war that I hardly know where to begin, but let’s list some of the big issues.

Using mercenaries undermines morale of the members of our armed forces.
The vast majority of men and women of the U.S. armed forces serve our country because they are proud to represent our country and protect its citizens and its interests. But they are not blind to the differences between their situation and that of private contractors. Operation Truth, a nonprofit veteran’s organization reports “The average enlisted service member makes roughly $25,000 a year compared to a civilian contractor, who can make up to $200,000 a year.”

The market free-for-all in security work has resulted in poaching of the best-trained armed services personnel. Via CorpWatch: “The Army Times, the military’s weekly newspaper, recently noted a shortage of technicians who can get rid of munitions. In part because people are leaving the military for high-paying private jobs, the U.S. Special Operations Command in Tampa announced a program that will pay bonuses of as much as $150,000 for experienced commandos who re-enlist.”

And guess what, if you don’t like the situation in Baghdad today, and you’re a mercenary, you can just go home. Soldiers cannot. This tension between the armed forces and mercenaries has already erupted and may become worse.

Using mercenaries further reduces civil oversight of foreign policy and fiscal accountability.
Figuring out just what our tax money sent to the Department of Defense gets us is difficult enough. Now it’s even harder when contracts are being written out of numerous federal agencies and mercenary service companies are not forced to answer to Freedom of Information Act requests. See “Outsouring War” by P.W. Singer in Foreign Affairs magazine. Using mercenaries has given the current adminstration more cover to bypass Congressional limits and paint a rosier picture of the situation in Iraq. Singer writes:

“Were it not for the more than 20,000 contractors currently operating in [Iraq], the U.S. government would have to either deploy more of its own troops [which we don’t have and cannot recruit] or persuade other countries to increase their commitments–either of which would require painful political compromises.”

Using mercenaries further breaks down the separation of military forces and civilian populations.
There is no regulatory control over mercenary service companies. No government official licenses mercenaries. Heck, we don’t even prosecute them when they commit crimes. What stops a disgruntled mercenary from firing on the U.S. armed forces? What stops them from blending in with the local population to carry out the contract signed by the latest financier? With “cost plus” arrangements, what stops them from creating their own work? What, in truth, separates mercenaries from the insurgents being financially backed by other political interests?

By using mercenaries, we are playing a very, very dangerous game with the lives of our soldiers and the Iraqi civilians. If we don’t curtail their use in military capacities, it is sure to lead to political and military disaster that will further discredit the United States and will undermine our true national interests.