More on mercenaries

I know I've blogged about this before but the fact that our occupation of Iraq is being accomplished through the use of mercenaries is very disturbing to me. I just found an article entitled "War Privatization is Public Scandal". Here's how it gets started:

They guard U.S. officials. They patrol the Green Zone, the U.S. headquarters in Iraq. They supply the food, the oil, clean the barracks and fix the machines. They aren't U.S. soldiers; they are private contractors. The Bush administration has privatized war. The second-biggest army in Iraq consists of armed security forces supplied by private contractors.

They act above the law -- and with unclear lines of authority. They work abroad, so they are largely beyond the reach of U.S. law. On contract from the U.S. government, they are beyond the reach of Iraqi law, as established in an order issued by the U.S. Authority there before turning power over to the Iraqi government. When the Abu Ghraib prison torture scandals were revealed, private security forces and interrogators were at the center of it. But none was held accountable.

The British have followed suit. The British charity, War on Want, reported last year that there are three British private security guards to every British soldier in Iraq.

Congressional investigators are about to unearth massive abuses and corruption in Iraq, but the mercenaries operate across the world. In 1998, for example, DynCorp security agents in Bosnia were implicated in a sex-slave scandal. The firm quickly recalled at least 13 agents; none faced criminal prosecution.

The modern-day mercenaries also operate largely free of government scrutiny or oversight. Companies, unlike government agencies, are not subject to the Freedom of Information Act and often stonewall congressional inquiry.

Under President Bush, the use of private contractors generally has doubled to about $400 billion a year in 2006, as the administration is driven by a philosophy to privatize everything it can. Finally, with Democrats reviving congressional oversight, questions are being asked.

Contractors claim to provide savings and efficiency because of the benefits of competition. In fact, the GAO suggests, in most areas, the contractors have little competition. Sole-source, no-bid contracts are the rule, not the exception. The contractors -- as we saw in the bribing of Rep. Duke Cunningham and the other scandals of the DeLay Congress -- spend millions wining, dining and rewarding the legislators who provide them with their immensely profitable contracts.

The top 20 service contractors, according to the New York Times, have spent nearly $300 million since 2000 on lobbying and have donated some $23 million to political campaigns.

There are no two ways about it. That is just wrong. It's no wonder we're hated all over the world.