From Reuters. What the Associated Press may not tell you: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/08/08/us-afghanistan-attack-idUSKCN0QC1U920150808
Some of us would appreciate it if you would at least post one stinking paragraph with the "Five W's" (who, what, when, why and where) or some kind of comment. BTW: I'm not going to the link if I don't know what the topic is but if it's about the former private military security company Blackwater, they changed their name back in 2009 to Xe Services LLC.
The name's apparently been changed again, to Academi. As Shakespeare penned, "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet."
So 50 people killed and hundreds wounded and this thread is about Blackwater simply because they are mentioned in the article as running Integrity? Kind of like talking about Pete Rose in every single story about a Reds game.
Now, some DynCorp International employees contracted by NATO have been killed. Who even knew that DynCorp has been part of the US Military-Industrial complex for 60 years? You're not going to find these things out from reading US news supplied by the Associated Press. This is from Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/08/23/us-afghanistan-blast-idUSKCN0QS03V20150823
There's a better source of who's part of the U.S. military industrial complex. Like Big Bobs Porta Pottys Inc, http://government-contractors.insidegov.com/l/491311/Big-Bobs-Porta-Pottys-Inc-in-Lawton-OK The U.S. Air Force can't deploy over seas until the porta potties are in place. I (*)(*)(*)(*) you not.
We have lots of civilians working security for contractors, especially former military and police. We had a local guy dropped by a sniper when doing it. Can you really blame them? Come on, a guy needs some place private to tickle his pickle from time to time.
The main thing is, this is what the vast majority of "military contracts" are. Not huge multi-billion dollar agreements with "Evil Weapon Makers", but the routine services that are needed that the military can not do for itself. Whenever we go on a major operation, we always end up leasing a number of 15 passenger vans for various needs, generally 1 per 150-200 people in the unit. And they are leased from a local rental company, on yet another "Government contract". Or do people think it is more cost-effective for the unit to buy such vehicles, when it may only use them 2-3 times a year? There are thousands of such jobs and tasks needed on every military base, I guess these people think it should be done better by expanding the military by tens of thousands of people, and purchasing the equipment needed to perform these tasks, no matter what the cost of doing that actually would be. One of the bigger contracts overseas (and inside the US) has been for laundry services. So to them we should train thousands of military personnel to do laundry, and spend the hundreds of millions of dollars for laundry equipment, instead of just contracting such a service out. http://government-contractors.insidegov.com/l/272404/Crown-Preferred-Laundry-Servic-in-Honolulu-HI Or for a 50+ year long contract, to replace the crumbling sewer lines on Fort Hood, one of the largest military bases in the country. http://government-contracts.insidegov.com/l/4471897/SP060008C8250 These are the kinds of jobs that the military simply can not do for many reasons. Yet the idiots who do not understand the system scream every time it is done.
The reason why I picked Big Bobs Porta Potty's was that I remember when we first went into Afghanistan in 2001, the Marines came in from the sea on CH-46 and CH-53 helicopters and secured an air base for the Air Force. But the Air Force was delayed for three days of taking over the air base because the civilian contractors hadn't constructed the latrines yet for the airmen. So back in 2001 or 2002 when this story made the rounds in the military community, many of the Marines and soldiers active and vets were giving airmen on military blogs and forums a bad time. "What, they don't teach you airmen in basic how to dig a slit trench with an entrenching tool" ?
I doubt people have a problem with contracting for portable toilets, vans, and other equipment. I certainly don't, it makes perfect sense. I think the criticism when it comes to military contracts are when the military contracts soldiers that aren't under it's control. Or perhaps it's contractors working for the government who contract soldiers. Either way, whatever the chain is, that's what people have a problem with because they are essentially private armies. And since they aren't part of the military, the UCMJ doesn't apply to them, even if their jobs take them into combat on behalf of the United States in whatever capacity they are operating.
