Blackwater (now Xi)

[Jan Klimkowski]

Blackwater does not intend to take any pirates into
custody, but will use lethal force against pirates if necessary; it
is developing an SOP that is currently under legal review and will
be shared with the USG.

Silly me for thinking that extra-judicial killing was internationally illegal...

Precisely the quote that caught my eye.

I wonder who defines when it's "necessary" for Blackwater mercenaries to use lethal force?

Also, what happens if Blackwater seriously wounds a pirate without killing him? Do the dogs of war have to finish him off, as their contract permits lethal force but no taking of prisoners?

[David Guyatt]

If the SOP is under legal review, then we can all rest secure in the comfy knowledge that Uncle strictly adheres to international law (it calls itself the "international community", right) and wouldn't ever, ever, legally sanction torture or some other abhorrent activity like assassination.

Now I can sleep easy. The world is in safe hands.

[David Guyatt]

Never underestimate symbology and mythology in the name of things and entities connected to the military-spook complex.

Google search Question: “what is the colour of the water in the river Styx?”

Answers.com, answer: “black with the bones of dead men”.

[Magda Hassan]

Blackwater Founder Is Said to Back African Mercenaries

By MARK MAZZETTI and ERIC SCHMITT

Published: January 20, 2011

WASHINGTON Erik Prince, the founder of the international security giant Blackwater Worldwide, is backing an effort by a controversial South African mercenary firm to insert itself into Somalia's bloody civil war by protecting government leaders, training Somali troops, and battling pirates and Islamic militants there, according to American and Western officials.




The disclosure comes as Mr. Prince sells off his interest in the company he built into a behemoth with billions of dollars in American government contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan, work that mired him in lawsuits and investigations amid reports of reckless behavior by his operatives, including causing the deaths of civilians in Iraq. His efforts to wade into the chaos of Somalia appear to be Mr. Prince's latest endeavor to remain at the center of a campaign against Islamic radicalism in some of the world's most war-ravaged corners. Mr. Prince moved to the United Arab Emirates late last year.
With its barely functional government and a fierce hostility to foreign armies since the hasty American withdrawal from Mogadishu in the early 1990s, Somalia is a country where Western militaries have long feared to tread. The Somali government has been cornered in a small patch of Mogadishu by the Shabab, a Somali militant group with ties to Al Qaeda.
This, along with the growing menace of piracy off Somalia's shores, has created an opportunity for private security companies like the South African firm Saracen International to fill the security vacuum created by years of civil war. It is another illustration of how private security firms are playing a bigger role in wars around the world, with some governments seeing them as a way to supplement overtaxed armies, while others complain that they are unaccountable.
Mr. Prince's precise role remains unclear. Some Western officials said that it was possible Mr. Prince was using his international contacts to help broker a deal between Saracen executives and officials from the United Arab Emirates, which have been financing Saracen in Somalia because Emirates business operations have been threatened by Somali pirates.
According to a report by the African Union, an organization of African states, Mr. Prince provided initial financing for a project by Saracen to win contracts with Somalia's embattled government.
A spokesman for Mr. Prince challenged this report, saying that Mr. Prince had "no financial role of any kind in this matter," and that he was primarily involved in humanitarian efforts and fighting pirates in Somalia.
"It is well known that he has long been interested in helping Somalia overcome the scourge of piracy," said the spokesman, Mark Corallo. "To that end, he has at times provided advice to many different anti-piracy efforts."
Saracen International is based in South Africa, with corporate offshoots in Uganda and other countries. The company, which declined to comment, was formed with the remnants of Executive Outcomes, a private mercenary firm composed largely of former South African special operations troops who worked throughout Africa in the 1990s.
The company makes little public about its operations and personnel, but it appears to be run by Lafras Luitingh, a former officer in South Africa's Civil Cooperation Bureau, an apartheid-era internal security force notorious for killing opponents of the government.
American officials have said little about Saracen since news reports about the company's planned operations in Somalia emerged last month. Philip J. Crowley, a State Department spokesman, said in December that the American government was "concerned about the lack of transparency" of Saracen's financing and plans.
For now, the Obama administration remains committed to bolstering Somalia's government with about 8,000 peacekeeping troops from Burundi and Uganda operating under a United Nations banner.
Indigenous Somali forces are also being trained in Uganda.
Saracen has yet to formally announce its plans in Somalia, and there appear to be bitter disagreements within Somalia's fractious government about whether to hire the South African firm. Somali officials have said that Saracen's operations which would also include training an antipiracy army in the semiautonomous region of Puntland are being financed by an anonymous Middle Eastern country.
Several people with knowledge of Saracen's operations confirmed that that was the United Arab Emirates.
A spokesman for the Emirates's Embassy in Washington declined to comment on Saracen or on Mr. Prince's involvement in the company.
One person involved in the project, speaking on condition of anonymity because Saracen's plans were not yet public, said that new ideas for combating piracy and battling the Shabab are needed because "to date, other missions have not been successful."
At least one of Saracen's past forays into training militias drew an international rebuke. Saracen's Uganda subsidiary was implicated in a 2002 United Nations Security Council report for training rebel paramilitary forces in Congo.
That reported identified one of Saracen Uganda's owners as Lt. Gen Salim Saleh, the retired half-brother of Uganda's president, Yoweri Museveni. The report also accused General Saleh and other Ugandan officers of using their ties to paramilitaries to plunder Congolese diamonds, gold and timber.

According to a Jan. 12 confidential report by the African Union, Mr. Prince "is at the top of the management chain of Saracen and provided seed money for the Saracen contract." A Western official working in Somalia said he believed that it was Mr. Prince who first raised the idea of the Saracen contract with members of the Emirates's ruling families, with whom he has a close relationship.



Two former American officials are helping broker the delicate negotiations between the Somali government, Saracen and the Emirates.
Pierre-Richard Prosper, a former United States ambassador at large for war crimes, and Michael Shanklin, a former Central Intelligence Agency station chief in Mogadishu, are both serving as advisers to the Somali government, according to people involved in the project. Both Mr. Prosper and Mr. Shanklin are apparently being paid by the United Arab Emirates.
Saracen is now training a 1,000-member antipiracy militia in Puntland, in northern Somalia, and plans a separate militia in Mogadishu. The company has trained a first group of 150 militia members and is drilling a second group of equal size, an official familiar with the company's operations said.
In December, Somalia's Ministry of Information issued a news release saying that Saracen was contracted to train security personnel and to carry out humanitarian work. That statement said the contract "is a limited engagement that is clearly defined and geared towards filling a need that is not met by other sources at this time."
For years, Mr. Prince, a multimillionaire former Navy SEAL, has tried to spot new business opportunities in the security world. In 2008, he sought to capitalize on the growing rash of piracy off the Horn of Africa to win Blackwater contracts from companies that that frequent the shipping lanes there. He even reconfigured a 183-foot oceanographic research vessel into a pirate-hunting ship for hire, complete with drone aircraft and .50-caliber machine guns.
In the spring of 2005, he met with Central Intelligence Agency officials about his proposal for a "quick reaction force" a special cadre of Blackwater personnel who could handle paramilitary assignments for the agency anywhere in the world.
Mr. Prince began his pitch at C.I.A. headquarters by stating "from the early days of the American republic, the nation has relied on mercenaries for its defense," according to a former government official who attended the meeting.
The pitch was not particularly well received, said the former official, because Mr. Prince was, in essence, proposing to replace the spy agency's own in-house paramilitary force, the Special Activities Division.
Despite all of Blackwater's legal troubles, Mr. Prince has never been charged with any criminal activity.
In an interview in the November issue of Men's Journal, Mr. Prince expressed frustration with the wave of lawsuits filed against Blackwater.
Mr. Prince, who said that moving to Abu Dhabi would "make it harder for the jackals to get my money," said he intended to find business opportunities in "the energy field."

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/21/world/...ted=2&_r=1

[Becky Williams]

Eric Prince the founder of Blackwater is a member of the Council on National Policy, an extreme secret society of evangelical/fundamentalists whose aim is to run the world for their god. Remember the crusades and inquisitions? Other members include Tim and Beverly LaHaye, Pat Robertson, John Hagee, Billy Graham, Franklin Graham, Sun Yung Moon, James Robinson, Oliver North, James Dobson, the late ungreat Jerry Falwell, Ralph Reed, Tom DeLay, John Ashcroft, Sarah Palin etc. You can find a more complete membership online but this little list should give a good idea of what kind of lunatics belong to this frightful organization. They stayed under the radar for years but thanks to the internet few things remain hidden for long. These are among the most repulsive parasites on the planet. If someone is a filthy rich religious nutjob and con artist, most likely they belong to the Family. They are quite powerful and have the support of the masses of brainwashed congregations.

They meet in secret and still receive a tax exempt status. They were behind Bush and will be ready to foist their new candidate in 2012. Heaven help us. Amen

[David Guyatt]

Welcome Becky.

In view of what you said above, and following Seymour Hersh's recent report that many senior military and intelligence community types are part of SMOM and the more odious Opus Dei, I decided to check to see Prince is associated with any of these organizations.

And there are some indications that he may. One website names him as a confimed member of SMOM, but I doubt their accuracy.

However, there is a .pdf piece that suggests he sent employees to the Gulf who used Templar Knight "call signs", which if true certainly would be interesting.

Another website has an article on Prince and in the comments section below it, a poster notes that Prince is close to Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, and that he and "his wife Karen Garver and Domino's Pizza magnate Thomas Monaghan are also members of the SMOM-they are Knights of Malta and Karen is a Dame of Malta".

There is also a third article that states that Blackwater's "former Pentagon Inspector General Joseph Edward Schmitz, Blackwater's operations chief, is a member of both SMOM and Opus Dei".

All in all, this tends to support the theory that Prince may be a member of one, or indeed, all of these organizations.

[Keith Millea]

Hi Becky

Council For National Policy:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?tit...nal_Policy

I wonder if these groups are related?

http://www.deeppoliticsforum.com/forums/...%20fascism

[Becky Williams]

Thanks Keith and David and I have interesting articles on this subject when I get more time to find where I filed them. Right now our family has been hit by the flu. I am recovering but my husband and kids are now sick and my hands are full. When I get them all nursed back to health I will get those posted. I didn't want you all to think I was being rude.

[Ed Jewett]

Go Inside a Mercenary Company in Iraq in Unflinching Comic Blackwater Chronicles

• By David Axe
  
• Email Author
  
• July 18, 2012 |
  
• 6:15 am |
  
• Categories: Books and Comics
  

Billy Tucci, co-creator of The Blackwater Chronicles, works the booth at Comic-Con International.
Photos: Jon Snyder/Wired

SAN DIEGO War correspondent Robert Young Pelton approached Erik Prince, founder of the notorious mercenary company Blackwater, with a bold proposal in late 2004. Pelton, a veteran who's covered more than a dozen conflicts, wanted to ride along for a month with the toughest for-profit soldiers in Prince's outfit, in what was then the most dangerous place in the world: Route Irish, the 12-mile stretch of highway connecting Baghdad's airport to the Green Zone, the fortified neighborhood surrounding the U.S. embassy.

In exchange for unprecedented access, Pelton would tell the real story of Blackwater's security contractors, men that Pelton and his co-writerBilly Tucci later described as being "attacked by terrorists, hated by the media [and] loved by the troops and the men they protected."
Pelton's upcoming graphic novel The Blackwater Chronicles is the result. Based on Pelton's book Licensed to Kill and co-written by Pelton and Tucci, with pencils by Tucci and colors by Brian Miller, The Blackwater Chronicles is a gritty, unflinching portrait of hard men in a hard place at a moment in history that most Americans would probably prefer to forget. Wired met up with Tucci at Comic-Con International for a preview of the graphic novel, slated for a 2013 release.
Page 1 of The Blackwater Chronicles announces itself in no-bullshit terms. A man with piercing blue eyes scowls from underneath a military-style helmet. He's sitting in the cupola of an armored vehicle with one gloved hand resting on a pintle-mounted machine gun.
The Blackwater Chronicles paints a gritty portrait of military contractors.
Art courtesy Billy Tucci

The sun is hot and high over his shoulder. He's kitted up for combat but his facial hair and civilian clothes hint that he's no typical soldier, rather a contractor hired at great expense to reinforce an overwhelmed U.S. military. The man's scowl, powerfully rendered in Tucci's expert pencils and Miller's subtle colors, speaks to terrible, unspoken experiences.
Two panels down, something reflects in the goggles attached to the man's helmet: mutilated bodies dangling from a highway overpass an obvious reference to the 2004 killing of four Blackwater employees by insurgents in Fallujah, Iraq. Their burned corpses were hung from an overpass as a statement of terror.
What follows these striking panels is like combat documentary in comics form. It begins with Pelton, who narrates and appears as a character, meeting the Blackwater team tasked with escorting American personnel along the deadly Route Irish, the target of 17 bombings per week in 2004. The hellish vision in the contractor's goggles tell us where the story will end.
The Blackwater squad at the heart of Pelton's comic book is typical of the tens of thousands of private military contractors who have fought alongside U.S. troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and other conflict zones since 9/11.
"What a rogue's gallery," Tucci tells Wired. "You got some real great guys, some not-so-great guys and some real bad guys."
But they're all complicated human beings caught up in a complicated war, says Tucci, who interviewed many of the men he drew in The Blackwater Chronicles. Tucci, whom Pelton describes as a "major researcher," manages to capture the mercenaries' complex motives in his detailed art and naturalistic dialog.
They rib each other over botched haircuts and their Rambo-style combat gear. They bitch about the military's strict rules. They talk big before a mission but, once they're driving down Route Irish facing the statistical likelihood of an attack, their tones change.
"I hate this fucking road," one contractor mutters, cigarette burning itself to the filter between his lips.
Tucci says he was surprised how willing the contractors were to talk about even their worst experiences. "Some have been blown up, seen guys get killed, been shot up a lot have been shot … what struck me is how open they are about it," he says.
But many Americans, soured on the seemingly endless reports of atrocities committed by U.S. troops and contractors, don't want to hear about mercenaries' humanity. The Blackwater Chronicles is still months away from publication, and already Tucci is drawing flak: He's been accused of creating pro-Blackwater propaganda.
"A lot of people don't want to put a human face on Blackwater."
"A lot of people don't want to put a human face on Blackwater," Tucci says. "A lot of people don't want to know what their government does."
For his part, Pelton welcomes the pushback. "Artists should challenge people's perceptions," he tells Wired by e-mail.
By that standard and others, The Blackwater Chronicles excels. At a time when comics are still dominated by busty babes, zombies and superheroes wearing tights, Pelton and Tucci's gritty, journalistic portrayal of America's fighters-for-hire is a profound departure.
Which is not to say it's not also exciting, funny and simply gorgeous to look at. Buy this book. Learn something about America's wars that might make you a little uncomfortable. Way less uncomfortable, however, than a man encased in armor, riding along a highway primed to explode, doing his country's dirty work for a paycheck.
Billy Tucci makes his mark at Comic-Con.

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[Ed Jewett]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Young_Pelton