Brookings: On Private Military Companies and Contractors

Posted By Grim

Peter Singer of the Brookings' Foreign Policy institute wrote to ask us at BlackFive for a review of his new paper, "Can't Win With 'Em, Can't Go To War Without 'Em:  Private Military Contractors."  We're happy to oblige.

Singer has collected an impressive number of citations of Iraqi opinions on PMCs, and especially Blackwater.  The general impression of the Iraqis cited is deeply negative; Singer himself feels that the effect of Blackwater and company on COIN operations is so negative that the entire COIN strategy is broken by it.  In addition, he thinks that the use of PMCs allows the US government to enter into wars without sufficient popular support, as would be required were they (say) to have to call up some majority of the National Guard.  This violates a key understanding of the volunteer military, the Abrams' Doctrine.  Singer describes it using a drug-addiction metaphor (sections are titled "the enablers," "the pushers").

I have a few minor complaints with it, but they fade away beside the overarching one.  Every single complaint directed at Blackwater and company takes this form:

1)  Blackwater offers the government a power that can be misused;

2)  The government has misused it;

3)  Therefore, Blackwater should be banned.

To use Singers' own preferred drug-addiction metaphor, this places the blame for drunk driving squarely on the existence of beer.  The blame really belongs to the man who chose to drive drunk.

The government of the United States of America is entrusted with far greater powers than Blackwater -- nuclear weapons, for example.  The responsibility is on them to use those powers properly, to insist on proper safeguards, and to be the authority that ensures that all aspects of American power are brought to bear in a coherent fashion.  Blackwater was not hired to win the COIN.  Blackwater was hired to guard convoys.  They've done so with remarkable success.  Most of their members are US military veterans, who are both capable of understanding the UCMJ and American ROE, and willing to participate in an overarching American strategy.  The fact that they haven't been so engaged is in no way the fault of Blackwater as corporation.  It is wholly the fault of the American government.

It is, for example, the fault of those parts of the American government who want to maintain a force protection capacity without being reliant on DOD.  That's understandable, to a degree, although in my opinion the failure of Interagency to be willing to cooperate is right behind a clean majority of the problems we have had in Iraq.  Nevertheless, the US government had the capability of braiding Blackwater into DOD's ROE and overall strategy.  It chose to prefer to allow turf battles, whereby State and others can maintain autonomy from DOD's leadership -- at the cost of their actions not being part of the COIN strategy, and possibly working against it.

None of that is Blackwater's fault.  It was hired to do a job, by lawful agencies in a proper fashion.  They have fulfilled the points of their contracts with efficiency -- ruthless efficiency, by some reports, but that's what they were hired to do.  If you want more ruth, put it in the contract.  Specify that they have to abide by military commanders assessment of appropriate ROE.  Blackwater can adjust their rates accordingly.

If the American government won't or can't use these powers properly, the right solution is not to punish Blackwater, any more than it is to dismantle our nukes or ban beer.  The right response is at the ballot box.  The right response is in electing a President who will force Interagency to work together, and fire whoever necessary to make them do so.  The right response is to write your Congressmen, and vote them out if they don't listen.

The problem isn't Blackwater.  Blackwater is just a collection of talent, which the government can use however it likes.  The problem is the Federal government.  Here as elsewhere, they have failed to live up to their duties.  They have failed to use the powers they enjoy with the responsibility that those powers demand.

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Comments

[The Wolf]

Grim-
I'll get even more specific- its the DoS. BW does a hell of a job protecting these guys (and the 'Top 5' or so of the Iraqi gov't) and they are following their protected's guidance on these missions. It would be interesting to note who they were protecting on that fateful assignment last week. Given the backgrounds of all those guys, the effects could have been far, far worse; I think they just did ONLY what they needed to do and got out, which is what they are SUPPOSED to do.

Now, if they did otherwise, those questions need to be asked at DoS...

-W

[Ray Kimball]

Grim,

Absolutely concur that there's been a failure of government oversight here. Nor should it be confined to Blackwater, who's not even the largest PSC in country (DynCorp appears to have that honor). This is part of a larger issue on unresolved issues of contractors on the battlefield.

And yet...Blackwater and other PSCs have gone out of their way to lobby against any kind of oversight when proposed, even after it became clear (Fallujah 2004) that greater coordination and linkage WAS needed. So, like it or not, they are partially reaping what they've sown here.

Who loses? Everybody. The PSC employee who has to go out and cover his own ass, 'cause he knows his company won't. The squad leader who has to deal with a pissed off neighborhood after these guys blow through. And the local who can't understand why somebody ran him off the road because he wasn't paying attention, and is now that much more receptive to insurgent propaganda.

[Jeffrey Carr]

In case anyone is interested, here's the latest CRS report on PMC's in Iraq - "Background, Legal Status, and Other Issues":

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL32419.pdf

[Francis Marion]

I have some very reliable sources here within Blackwater. The principle being escorted on that Sunday was not one of the top tier but does support the Blackwater side of the story. The more I find out about the situation here, the more it looks like another “wedding party” (Afganistan, 2002) incident; nothing more than false claims of innocent dead made by insurgents in an effort to use the media to remove an effective tool from the battlefield.

[Cannoneer No4]

Blackwater was selected to be the next victim of non-kinetic kill through IO, like the MARSOC in Afghanistan and the Haditha Marines. Blackwater is the most notorious of the PMC's and there is a willing cohort standing by in the West to pounce on any opportunity to slime them. They don't get much benefit of the doubt.

Indigs lie.

This is a brutal truth that cannot be spoken by those who must maintain rapport with them. They must maintain the polite fiction that the "eye witness testimony" of such people is worthy of consideration.

[JGsez]

Grimm... "in my opinion the failure of Interagency to be willing to cooperate is right behind a clean majority of the problems we have had in Iraq."

Could not agree more! The US Military has embraced "Jointness" but it seems no other part of the government has even made an attempt. I believe that is what Tom Ridge was looking for after 9/11 and not a new bloated agency with its own moat and draw bridge.

And then there is applying lessons learned. It seems everyone except the military is still stuck in the 60s - especially the MSM!

[Mr.Sparkle]

Francis Marion weren't the claims made by the Iraqi government? If you have come so far as to start referring to the government as the insurgency then we're in deep shit!