The US government spent a staggering $US687 billion on “defense” last year. Think what could be done with that money if it were put into hospitals, schools or to pay off foreclosed mortgages. The US, under George W. Bush, decided to privatize the invasion of Iraq by employing “contractors” such as the Blackwater company, now […]
Posts Tagged ‘contractors’
The staggering billion dollar defense industry
December 10, 2011US Military contracting swindles
September 7, 2011After three years, the bipartisan Commission on Wartime Contracting completed its business this week. In its final report to Congress (PDF), it estimates that the federal government has lost between $31 and $60 billion to contractor fraud and waste since the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq started. Its “greatest-hits list” of expensive bloopers make that […]
Apathy the greatest enabler of the military industrial complex
April 23, 2011The latest and greatest $8.3- million-a-day war for peace, Libya — is your single greatest expense as a citizen. Indeed, over half of federal discretionary spending — what Americans will pay for with their incomes taxes — goes to the armed forces and their legion of private contractors. Now imagine what that money could do […]
Increased number of contractors – heirs to the Blackwater mercenaries
December 23, 2010The Obama administration is hiring military contractors at a rate that would make Bush blush. Both Afghnaistan and Iraq wars have been fought with the help of private military and intelligence contractors. But despite the troubles of Blackwater in particular – charges of corruption and killing of civilians—and continuing controversy over military outsourcing in general, […]
Why George W. Bush and cohorts should worry
November 12, 2010In his memoir George W. Bush admitted that he authorized that detainees be waterboarded, tortured, a crime under US and international law. Where is the accountability for these crimes? Bush and other criminals will be brought to justice if the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR) […]
Blackwater founder Erik Prince moves to Abu Dhabi
August 25, 2010Erik Prince, whose company, Blackwater Worldwide, is for sale has left the United States and moved to Abu Dhabi, according to court documents. With scrutiny of Blackwater’s activities, Mr. Prince had changed the company’s name yo Xe Services and overhauled the management. He sold the company’s aviation arm early this year, and finally placed the […]
Blackwater violations smoothed over by friends in high places
August 24, 2010The company formerly known as Blackwater violated U.S. export control laws nearly 300 times, the State Department said Monday. The alleged violations were spelled out in documents released by the State Department as part of a $42 million settlement with Blackwater. The company and its currently serving officers have avoided criminal prosecution. Blackwater, now known as […]
Why would anyone want to cut the U.S. military budget?
August 19, 2010With $549 billion requested for basic military expenditures, and another $159 billion requested for U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—the record $708 billion military spending called for by the Obama administration for fiscal 2011 will be nearly equivalent to the military spending of all other nations in the world combined. And when it comes to […]
The U.S. shadow war: contractors, commando teams and robotic drones
August 16, 2010The Obama administration’s shadow war against Al Qaeda and its allies is fought in roughly a dozen countries — from the deserts of North Africa, to the mountains of Pakistan, to former Soviet republics crippled by ethnic and religious strife. The United States has significantly increased intelligence operations, pursuing the enemy using robotic drone missile […]
