In This Article
30-Second Summary
Headline Links: Iraqi accounts vs. the State Dept.’s early findings
Background: A timeline of key events and coverage since the Sept. 16 shooting
Reaction: Responses in the Senate and House
Analysis: Do contractors hurt U.S. military efforts? And under what judicial body are contractors governed?
Opinion: Is Blackwater culprit or victim?
Related Links: Mitt Romney’s Blackwater connection
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Blackwater Iraq Incident, Details Begin to Emerge
by
findingDulcinea Staff
As lawmakers prepare for the Oct. 2 hearing into the Blackwater shooting incident, a preliminary State Dept. report adds complexity to an episode clouded by contradictions.
30-Second Summary
Sept. 28—A preliminary report by the State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security offers a glimpse into the chaotic events of Sept. 16 that led to the deaths of 11 Iraqi civilians. The Washington Post obtained the document, the findings of which contradict the accounts of at least five Iraqi eyewitnesses.
According to the report, there were three Blackwater units involved, one of which was ambushed near the traffic circle where the shooting took place.
Thus far, the State Department findings substantiate Blackwater’s claim that their personnel came under attack. However, a separate statement from an unnamed official close to the investigation said that guards involved in the shooting reported that at least one employee drew down on one or more of his colleagues and called for a cease fire.
A day after this information was revealed, The Washington Post reported that five Iraqi witnesses maintain that the Blackwater guards were not attacked before they opened fire. The eyewitnesses—three traffic policemen and two maintenance workers—insist that the guards’ actions were unprovoked and directly led to the civilian deaths.
In Washington, reactions to the shooting have grown more urgent as both the House and the Senate consider bills that would expand the legal regulations governing private military contractors.
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chair of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, is heading an official investigation. Blackwater founder Erik Prince will testify at an Oct. 2 hearing. Waxman’s committee is also investigating charges of widespread contractor corruption in Iraq.
In addition, the U.S. District Attorney’s office in North Carolina is investigating allegations that former Blackwater employees illegally smuggled weapons into Iraq.
According to the report, there were three Blackwater units involved, one of which was ambushed near the traffic circle where the shooting took place.
Thus far, the State Department findings substantiate Blackwater’s claim that their personnel came under attack. However, a separate statement from an unnamed official close to the investigation said that guards involved in the shooting reported that at least one employee drew down on one or more of his colleagues and called for a cease fire.
A day after this information was revealed, The Washington Post reported that five Iraqi witnesses maintain that the Blackwater guards were not attacked before they opened fire. The eyewitnesses—three traffic policemen and two maintenance workers—insist that the guards’ actions were unprovoked and directly led to the civilian deaths.
In Washington, reactions to the shooting have grown more urgent as both the House and the Senate consider bills that would expand the legal regulations governing private military contractors.
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chair of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, is heading an official investigation. Blackwater founder Erik Prince will testify at an Oct. 2 hearing. Waxman’s committee is also investigating charges of widespread contractor corruption in Iraq.
In addition, the U.S. District Attorney’s office in North Carolina is investigating allegations that former Blackwater employees illegally smuggled weapons into Iraq.
Headline Links: Iraqi accounts vs. the State Dept.’s early findings
Eyewitnesses Ali Khalaf and Hussam Abdul Rahman, Iraqi traffic policemen, both refuted the Blackwater guards’ account that civilians had opened fire on them from a red bus. Rahman said that passengers were trying to escape the bus by kicking out the windows. Khalaf said, "There were many on this bus. They were hardly able to walk and they were screaming." In addition, the senior Iraqi police official argued that ambushing a convoy in Nisour Square—the location of the incident—seemed unlikely. He said the square’s proximity to the National Police headquarters would make it difficult for insurgents to find ambush positions without encountering security forces.
Source: The Washington Post
Both The New York Times and The Washington Post reported on the State Department’s preliminary findings, yet the papers’ sources differ on a few important details. The Post reported that the car bomb that went off before the shooting incident was 25 yards away from the compound where diplomats were meeting, whereas the Times writes that the bomb went off “a few hundred yards away.” Additionally, the Post reports that one of the Blackwater units was ambushed, while the Times reports that the guards “believed that they were being fired on.”
The Washington Post article is titled “Blackwater Faced Bedlam, Embassy Finds.”
Source: The Washington Post
The New York Times article is titled “Blackwater Shooting Scene Was Chaotic”
Source: The New York Times
Background: A timeline of key events and coverage since the Sept. 16 shooting
Sept. 16—Our initial Beyond the Headlines story titled "Baghdad Firefight Raises Questions About Contractors," provides all the context for the incident.
Source: findingDulcinea
Sept. 17—Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform announced his committee would be opening an investigation into the previous day’s shooting incident involving Blackwater.
Source: The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Web site
Sept. 20—Talking Points Memo reported that Waxman scheduled a Blackwater hearing for Oct. 2 at which the company’s founder was asked to appear. Waxman wrote in a letter to founder Erik Prince that “the hearing will focus on the mission and performance of Blackwater USA and its affiliated companies in Iraq and Afghanistan. One question that will be examined is whether the government’s heavy reliance on private security contractors is serving U.S. interests in Iraq. Another question will be whether the specific conduct of your company has advanced or impeded U.S. efforts.”
Source: Talking Points Memo
Sept. 21—American convoys under the protection of Blackwater resumed, despite early threats from the Iraqi government to revoke Blackwater’s operating license and expel it from the country. U.S. Embassy spokesperson Mirembe Nantongo said the convoys would be restricted to essential missions.
Source: USA Today
Sept. 21—Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced the she had ordered the State Department to conduct a full review of “how we are providing security to our diplomats.” State Department spokesperson Sean McCormack said that the review will include the rules of engagement for security guards and consider under what jurisdiction they should be covered. Patrick Kennedy, a senior management official and veteran diplomat is reportedly leading the review.
Source: Newsvine.com
Sept. 23—Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said in an interview with the Associated Press that the Blackwater shooting incident amounted to a challenge to Iraq’s sovereignty: “The Iraqi government is responsible for its citizens, and it cannot be accepted for a security company to carry out a killing. There are serious challenges to the sovereignty of Iraq.”
Source: The New York Times
Sept. 23—The Washington Post reported that Iraqi officials had lodged prior complaints about Blackwater’s activities with U.S. officials, but little action was taken. According to Lt. Gen. Hussein Kamal, the deputy interior minister overseeing private security contractors on behalf of the Iraqi government, U.S. officials had been made aware of six violent incidents this year, allegedly involving Blackwater, that left a total of 10 Iraqis dead.
Source: The Washington Post
Sept. 26—Waxman accused the State Department of impeding his investigation by ordering Blackwater to seek authorization before providing his committee with information. According to a letter sent by the State Department’s Security Contracting Officer Kizian Moneypenny, Blackwater’s contractual obligations compel the company to make “no disclosure of documents or information generated under [the contract] unless such disclosure has been authorized in writing by the Contract Officer." Waxman responded with his own letter telling Condoleezza Rice that her department “was wrong to interfere with the committee’s inquiry.” After that, the State Department appeared to soften its stance by allowing Blackwater to release unclassified documents, but reserving the right to review everything deemed classified.
Source: The Los Angeles Times
The letter goes on to inform Blackwater that its contract stipulates that, “all documents and records (including photographs) generated during the performance of work under this contract shall be for the sole use of and become the exclusive property of the U.S. government.” The letter to Blackwater appears in full online, courtesy of Talking Points Memo.
Source: Talking Points Memo
In his letter to Rice, Waxman points out that the State Department doesn’t have the authority to obstruct a congressional investigation unless President Bush is prepared to say that the terms of Blackwater’s contracts or its operational doctrine is covered under executive privilege. Waxman’s full letter is available as a PDF file from the Oversight Committee Web site.
Source: The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Web site
Sept. 27—In March 2004, four Blackwater employees were killed, and then their bodies mutilated by insurgents in the city of Fallujah. According to a report released by Waxman, Blackwater was guilty of negligence. Using internal company reviews and eyewitness accounts of the incident, Waxman’s oversight committee found that the company had failed to prepare its employees fully for travel in the insurgent stronghold. However, Blackwater spokesperson Anne Tyrell called the report a “one-sided version” of the incident, going on to say that the committee possessed documents proving the Blackwater team was “betrayed” and led into a “well-planned ambush.”
Source: The Washington Post
Waxman’s report also contains one employee’s disparaging assessment of the company’s Baghdad operations. The employee describes them as “flat-out sloppy,” and goes on to say that “the caliber of most of the people here is not what it needs to be. More training, more discipline, and a more selective screening process are needed … I suggest if you continue to employ that kind of trash, that you develop a way to use ‘their money’ as a way to get them to do some … work.” The full text of the report is available as a PDF file from the Oversight Committee Web site.
Source: The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Web site
Weapons smuggling charges?
There seems to be little that is known for sure about the weapons smuggling charges allegedly involving Blackwater. So far, the facts are as follows: the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Raleigh, N.C. is handling the investigation with assistance from Pentagon and State Department auditors, who say there is enough evidence to file charges; two former Blackwater employees are cooperating with investigators as part of an agreement reached after both pleaded guilty earlier this year to possession of stolen firearms; The News & Observer, a Raleigh newspaper, reported that investigators were looking at whether Blackwater had shipped unlicensed military goods to Iraq, citing an unnamed source, but the Associated Press was unable to confirm those reports.
Source: The News and Observer
Reaction: Responses in the Senate and House
Senate Democrats have begun pushing for tougher regulations for security contractors overseas with three possible amendments to the fiscal 2008 defense authorization bill (HR 1585). The most comprehensive of the three amendments is based on a bill (S 674) by Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL). It would place contractors under the jurisdiction of U.S. law and charge the FBI with investigating their crimes. The amendment would also require the State Department to reveal the size and scope of operations for all security contractors in Iraq.
Source: Congressional Quarterly Daily
House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-MD) said that the House is considering a bill (HR 2740) by Rep. David E. Price (D-N.C.) that would place all U.S. contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan under the jurisdiction of U.S. criminal court system. The bill would also create a “theater investigative unit” within the FBI to investigate allegations of criminal activity by contractors.
Source: Congressional Quarterly Daily
Analysis: Do contractors hurt U.S. military efforts? And under what judicial body are contractors governed?
Security contractor researcher at the Brookings Institute, Peter W. Singer released a report stating that the activities of private security companies are hurting U.S. counterinsurgency efforts. Singer writes that the presence of contractors has inflamed “popular opinion against, rather than for, the American mission … undermined efforts at winning ‘hearts and minds’ of the Iraqi people … [and] weakened American efforts in the ‘war of ideas’ both inside Iraq and beyond.” Singer concludes that the only way to combat the negative impact contractors have on U.S. military efforts is to return “inherently governmental functions back into governmental hands."
Source: The Brookings Institute
A former private security director in Iraq, Malcom Nance, writes that security firms fill a necessary role in combating the Iraqi insurgency. Nance writes that U.S. “military forces are a mammoth and designed to crush conventional forces and limit unconventional ones. Presently, it cannot adequately man the force protection or gendarmerie role as when it had millions of men in World War II. If manpower continues to limit the army’s ability to protect the rear, then contracted force protection should have a bright future.”
Source: Small Wars Journal blog
Under what judicial body are contractors governed?
Mark Hemingway of National Review Online examines the laws governing military contractors, pointing out that “as of last fall, contractors are subject to the same Uniform Code of Military Justice that governs U.S. soldiers. In theory, Blackwater contractors could be court–martialed for wrong doing, a prospect that should satisfy all critics who insist that private military companies remain unaccountable ... The truth is that contractors are not above the law, but rather well within the reach of several different codes and regulations and nobody’s exactly sure how one would go about exacting legal remedies against them should they be needed.”
Source: National Review Online
In July of 2007, the Congressional Research Service released a report examining contractor legal status under U.S. Law titled “Private Security Contractors in Iraq, Background Legal Status, and Other Issues.” The CRS found that not only is it “possible that some contractors may remain outside the jurisdiction of U.S. courts, civil or military, for improper conduct in Iraq,” but even referred to “the U.S. government’s practical inability to discipline errant contract employees.” The full text of the report is available as a PDF file on the Web site of the Federation of American Scientists.
Source: The Federation of American Scientists Web site
Although subject to U.S. law, security contractors remain immune to judicial redress in Iraq because of L. Paul Bremer’s Order 17. Nation writer Tom Engelhardt offers a scathing critique of the order, writing that “it essentially granted to every foreigner in the country connected to the occupation enterprise the full freedom of the land, not to be interfered with in any way by Iraqis or any Iraqi political or legal institution. Foreigners—unless, of course, they were jihadis or Iranians—were to be ‘immune from any form of arrest or detention other than by persons acting on behalf of their Sending States,’ even though American and coalition forces were to be allowed the freedom to arrest and detain in prisons and detention camps of their own any Iraqis they designated worthy of that honor.”
Source: The Nation
In June 2004, then head of the Coalition Provisional Authority L. Paul Bremer, issued an order granting immunity from Iraqi laws to all contractors working for coalition governments. The order is titled CPA Order 17, and makes it highly unlikely that any contractor will be tried in an Iraqi court. The official Web site of the CPA offers the full text of Order 17 as a PDF file.
Source: The official Web site of the Coalition Provisional Authority
On January 23, 2006 the International Law Society at Duke Law School held a panel discussion “the role of private firms in American endeavors, paying particular attention to implications for thelaws of war, human rights and contemporary concerns about abuses.” Jurist offers a video recording of the panel formatted for RealPlayer.
Source: Jurist
Talking Points Memo looks at the State Department’s culpability in the Mansour incident. According to military contracting researcher Richard Young Pelton, Blackwater’s rules of engagement “are set by State [the State Department] and are different than other security contractors who use the Military Rules of Engagement and Rules of Force … State went from a kinder, gentler Rules of Force (they [Blackwater] were told to shoot flares, throw water bottles or wave a flag to warn off motorists) to shoot if a threat is imminent with no warning shots required … It’s incorrect to portray Blackwater as a lone actor in all this.”
Source: Talking Points Memo
Opinion: Is Blackwater culprit or victim?
In defense of Blackwater and private military contractors
American Spectator writer George H. Wittman is suspicious of the motivations behind the Iraqi government’s attacks on Blackwater: “Iraqi politicians are well aware that the United States is in the midst of a national debate on our military presence in their country. There really is no question that the majority of current Iraqi leaders want to work the American ‘occupation’ to as much of their economic and political advantage as possible. And they want to gain control of that advantage in whatever manner they can. Taking over the lucrative private contracting of security operations is the first step in that plan. This is a story that hearkens back to the old American West. The Iraqi power brokers want to get the Pinkertons out of Dodge City -- and perhaps the U.S. Marshal, too.”
Source: The American Spectator
Writing in The Wall Street Journal, Ben Ryan condemns what he sees as the media’s pre-emptive judgment of military contractors: “As a former employee of a major Blackwater competitor, I find this categorical smearing of contractors to be starkly at odds with my experience. I served as an officer in the Navy SEALs for six years. After I left, I joined a private security firm and was promptly sent to Iraq … Contrary to the popular belief that Blackwater contractors are ‘thugs for hire,’ most are highly professional and well trained … With conflicting reports, condemnations should not be made until the joint Iraqi-U.S. investigation is completed. The media, however, has accepted the Ministry of Interior's version of events, all but writing off the accounts of both Blackwater and the State Department.”
Source: The Wall Street Journal
In a guest column for Accuracy in Media, Mark R. Taylor—a civilian convoy commander who served in Iraq from January 2004 to May 2005—decries the media’s portrayal of Blackwater: “As a former mercenary, a title I claim proudly, these attempts by the media to portray Blackwater as the evil force in this war, while ignoring the enemy who launched this attack, were not surprising. Claims of civilian deaths had the media screaming for “justice”. May I ask … justice for whom? Contractors fight this war too, where it is impossible to distinguish civilians and insurgents from each other. Hiding behind women and children, these common thugs launch deadly attacks against contractors, then use shrill cries from the likes of CNN to spread enemy propaganda – using our own government and networks to turn the American people against our military and civilian contractors. Is that what we call justice nowadays?”
Source: Accuracy in Media
Criticizing Blackwater and private military contractors
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer calls for the Pentagon and Congress to ensure that Blackwater and other private security contractors are more thoroughly regulated in the future: “The singular ray of hope comes via Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who said on Wednesday that he's not impressed with the Pentagon's oversight of military contractors and plans to send a fact-finding team to Iraq to investigate the contractors. That said, Congress should realize that it holds the power of the purse, and if it's unhappy with how things progress, it can withhold funds spent on contractors until proper oversight is applied.”
Source: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer
USA Today makes a general call for regulation, drawing attention to a past shooting incident involving another Blackwater employee: “Last Christmas Eve, an American working for the private Blackwater security company in Iraq allegedly got into a drunken argument—and shot the guard of the Iraqi vice president dead. The American was hustled out of the country. No charges were filed … Like U.S. soldiers, the contractors operate in a brutal, hair-trigger atmosphere where any car could hold a suicide bomber. Some incidents may be unavoidable. But also like U.S. soldiers, the contractors must be held accountable for their actions.”
Source: USA Today
Paul Krugman of The New York Times argues that the reason private security contractors continue to play such a large role in Iraq and Afghanistan has less to do with shortfalls in military personnel, and more to do with the Bush administration’s penchant for privatization: “the Bush administration has tried to privatize every aspect of the U.S. government it can, using taxpayers’ money to give lucrative contracts to its friends—people like Erik Prince, the owner of Blackwater, who has strong Republican connections. You might think that national security would take precedence over the fetish for privatization—but remember, President Bush tried to keep airport security in private hands, even after 9/11. So the privatization of war—no matter how badly it works—is just part of the pattern.”
Source: The New York Times
Related Links: Mitt Romney’s Blackwater connection
Media Matters for America reports on Mitt Romney’s connection to Blackwater and how little media attention it has received. On Sept. 22 Politico––a political news blog––reported that Romney’s top counterterrorism and national security adviser, Cofer Black, is also the vice chairman of Blackwater USA. It also noted that Romney has yet to comment publicly on the Baghdad shooting incident. According to Media Matters, despite the deluge of media coverage, none of the five largest newspapers or three major news television networks has commented on the connection.
Source: Media Matters for America
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