Nation magazine story Jeremy Scahill dated June 19
An excerpt appears below ...
"Blackwater is up for sale and its shadowy owner, Erik Prince, is rumored to be planning to move to the United Arab Emirates as his top deputies face indictment for a range of alleged crimes, yet the company remains a central part of President Obama's Afghanistan war. Now, Blackwater's role is expanding.
On Friday, the US State Department awarded Blackwater another 'diplomatic security' contract to protect US officials in Afghanistan. CBS News reports that the $120 million deal is for "protective services" at the US consulates in Herat and Mazar-e-Sharif. Blackwater has another security contract in Afghanistan worth $200 million and trains Afghan forces. The company also works for the CIA and the US military and provides bodyguards for US Ambassador Karl Eikenberry as well as US lawmakers and other officials who visit the country. The company has four forward operating bases in Afghanistan and Prince has boasted that Blackwater's counter-narcotics forces have called in NATO airstrikes."
Showing posts with label Blackwater/Xe. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blackwater/Xe. Show all posts
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Pentagon Seeks Private Contractor to Move Weapons Through Pakistan/Afghanistan
From Jeremy Scahill May 25 Rebel Reports & The Nation magazine online
It is not, of course, a secret supplies must be delivered to forward operating bases in Afghanistan. What's interesting here is areas where the provisions of the contract being offered--work that apparently can't effectively be done by the U.S. military itself--differs from verbiage in the White House strategy for Afghanistan which contains a draw-down and eventual withdrawal in 2011. The notion that Pakistan and Afghanistan are too dangerous for the U.S. military to negotiate supplies into in coming months is a grim outlook. It's just a proposal of a contract for services, but plans indicate intent to some degree, do they not?
Excerpt taken from Scahill's Rebel Reports appears below ...
"[The United States military is in the process of taking bids from private war contractors to secure and ship massive amounts of US military equipment through sensitive areas of Pakistan into Afghanistan where it will then be distributed to various US Forward Operating Bases and other facilities. According to the contract solicitation, “There will be an average of 5000” import shipments “transiting the Afghanistan and Pakistan ground lines of communication (GLOC) per month,” along with 500 export shipments.” The solicitation states that, “This number may increase or decrease due to US military transportation requirements,” adding, “The contractor must maintain a constant capability to surge to any location within Afghanistan or Pakistan” within a 30-day period. Among the duties the contractor will perform is “intelligence, to include threat assessments throughout Afghanistan and Pakistan.”
And while it seems the US is trying to put a Pakistani or Afghan face on the work, the terms of the contract mandate that US personnel will be involved with inherently risky and potentially lethal operations. Among the firms listed by the Department of Defense as “interested vendors” are an Afghan firm tied to a veteran CIA officer and run by the son of Afghan defense minister, Gen. Abdul Rahim Wardak, and a Pakistani firm with links to Blackwater.]"
It is not, of course, a secret supplies must be delivered to forward operating bases in Afghanistan. What's interesting here is areas where the provisions of the contract being offered--work that apparently can't effectively be done by the U.S. military itself--differs from verbiage in the White House strategy for Afghanistan which contains a draw-down and eventual withdrawal in 2011. The notion that Pakistan and Afghanistan are too dangerous for the U.S. military to negotiate supplies into in coming months is a grim outlook. It's just a proposal of a contract for services, but plans indicate intent to some degree, do they not?
Excerpt taken from Scahill's Rebel Reports appears below ...
"[The United States military is in the process of taking bids from private war contractors to secure and ship massive amounts of US military equipment through sensitive areas of Pakistan into Afghanistan where it will then be distributed to various US Forward Operating Bases and other facilities. According to the contract solicitation, “There will be an average of 5000” import shipments “transiting the Afghanistan and Pakistan ground lines of communication (GLOC) per month,” along with 500 export shipments.” The solicitation states that, “This number may increase or decrease due to US military transportation requirements,” adding, “The contractor must maintain a constant capability to surge to any location within Afghanistan or Pakistan” within a 30-day period. Among the duties the contractor will perform is “intelligence, to include threat assessments throughout Afghanistan and Pakistan.”
And while it seems the US is trying to put a Pakistani or Afghan face on the work, the terms of the contract mandate that US personnel will be involved with inherently risky and potentially lethal operations. Among the firms listed by the Department of Defense as “interested vendors” are an Afghan firm tied to a veteran CIA officer and run by the son of Afghan defense minister, Gen. Abdul Rahim Wardak, and a Pakistani firm with links to Blackwater.]"
Thursday, May 6, 2010
A brief history of the unmanned aerial vehicle
An illuminating article appears on the Nebraskans for Peace web site about drone warfare and the history of UAV's.
StratCom: The Fulcrum for Drone Warfare by Loring Wirbel, Citizens for Peace in Space Colorado Springs, Colorado
Excerpt— "In the early years of the ‘War on Terror,’ missions involving Unpiloted Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) could be divided into those sponsored directly by regional combat commands in the Pentagon, and the more covert missions planned and executed by the CIA—both of which were supported by space and intelligence assets. The Pentagon-conducted missions tended to adhere to stricter rules of military engagement, which meant that if a drone directly targeted an individual al-Qaida suspect, chances were good that the mission was clandestine and run by the CIA.
In recent months, however, a third level of management has emerged, raising even greater questions of responsibility and accountability. According to journalist Jeremy Scahill and several other sources, the Pentagon’s secretive 'Joint Special Operations Command' (JSOC) manages unacknowledged armed UAV missions in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq. These missions are run directly by Blackwater/Xe and several of its subsidiaries. Yet, because the ultimate authority for the missions goes back to JSOC, Strategic Command in Omaha (particularly its ‘Global Strike’ component) plays a more direct role in these even more deeply covert UAV strikes, than it does in CIA missions.
Demonstrators who went to the CIA’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia January 16 to protest the Agency’s drone attacks provided a rare and needed public face to these UAV missions which have become so commonplace in the past several years. Yet the protests only scratch the surface. The passing of armed-UAV authority among official combat commands, quasi-official CIA bases, and deniable JSOC/Blackwater missions allows the Pentagon to play a shell game that keeps activists from understanding who does what. And the central player shuffling the shells is Strategic Command."
StratCom: The Fulcrum for Drone Warfare by Loring Wirbel, Citizens for Peace in Space Colorado Springs, Colorado
Excerpt— "In the early years of the ‘War on Terror,’ missions involving Unpiloted Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) could be divided into those sponsored directly by regional combat commands in the Pentagon, and the more covert missions planned and executed by the CIA—both of which were supported by space and intelligence assets. The Pentagon-conducted missions tended to adhere to stricter rules of military engagement, which meant that if a drone directly targeted an individual al-Qaida suspect, chances were good that the mission was clandestine and run by the CIA.
In recent months, however, a third level of management has emerged, raising even greater questions of responsibility and accountability. According to journalist Jeremy Scahill and several other sources, the Pentagon’s secretive 'Joint Special Operations Command' (JSOC) manages unacknowledged armed UAV missions in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq. These missions are run directly by Blackwater/Xe and several of its subsidiaries. Yet, because the ultimate authority for the missions goes back to JSOC, Strategic Command in Omaha (particularly its ‘Global Strike’ component) plays a more direct role in these even more deeply covert UAV strikes, than it does in CIA missions.
Demonstrators who went to the CIA’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia January 16 to protest the Agency’s drone attacks provided a rare and needed public face to these UAV missions which have become so commonplace in the past several years. Yet the protests only scratch the surface. The passing of armed-UAV authority among official combat commands, quasi-official CIA bases, and deniable JSOC/Blackwater missions allows the Pentagon to play a shell game that keeps activists from understanding who does what. And the central player shuffling the shells is Strategic Command."
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Pakistan, Drones and the Unpopularity of the U.S. War in Afghanistan
Amid the climate of escalation and apparent shuffling of tactics in the Pentagon today, most folks aren't noticing that the U.S. War in Afghanistan is largely run by the CIA, that its frequently being fought in a destabilized Pakistan where the conventions of international conflict (Congressional declaration of war, official status as an ally downgraded to enemy, some kind of responsibility informally but publicly pinned on leader of offending nation, U.S. Military announcements of strategy for achievement of objectives in target region and an outline of those objectives ... ) are being flouted by both invader and invaded, and civilian contractors, namely a U.S. Corporation whose employees and officers under investigation by the FBI for murder and corruption formerly known as Blackwater, appear to be running the operation.
The question I would be asking if I was, say, a proud American parent of a U.S. soldier, "Are our soldiers there just to provide cover for the CIA operation of drone strikes into Pakistan?" Is the CIA running intelligence missions under the rifle sights of U.S. sentries in crowded markets in southern Afghanistan so that Blackwater can fly remote controlled missle drones in violation of international law and the conventions of combat to murder four to six civilians--mostly women and children--for each military target, probably Al Qaeda, probably not Osama Bin Laden?
Furthermore, with embedded media present under strict agreements with the Pentagon, can U.S. and other major media outlets even begin to address let alone answer this question?
The question I would be asking if I was, say, a proud American parent of a U.S. soldier, "Are our soldiers there just to provide cover for the CIA operation of drone strikes into Pakistan?" Is the CIA running intelligence missions under the rifle sights of U.S. sentries in crowded markets in southern Afghanistan so that Blackwater can fly remote controlled missle drones in violation of international law and the conventions of combat to murder four to six civilians--mostly women and children--for each military target, probably Al Qaeda, probably not Osama Bin Laden?
Furthermore, with embedded media present under strict agreements with the Pentagon, can U.S. and other major media outlets even begin to address let alone answer this question?
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