Mercenaries

What is the world coming to? A few weeks ago the we all found out about the incident involving some Iraqis killed by Blackwater contractors, and then came to find out that things like this have been taking place since the beginning of the war. Today, the AP reported that the Afghans are shutting down some security contractors there. And even the UN is stepping in and investigating concerns over contractor killings in Iraq.

There are serious moral ramifications when a country uses mercenaries to fight its war. Sure, we have troops on the ground, but it seems to me that what we are seeing is contractors being employed to do the dirty work.

Americans watch bombing campaigns on the television--bombing campaigns with names like Shock and Awe--and experience just that--Shock and Awe. Americans watching television have no idea in the world what it is like to be a first-hand whiteness to those bombing campaigns. We have never had bombs dropped on us here. We watch those scenes like they are clips from an action movie, but we never think about the janitor working the graveyard shift at Saddam's party headquarters. So we rationalize it and say to ourselves that its better to drop bombs than to send our boys to the field. And our rationality serve the monsters that create war well because they know that in order to achieve their goals, the civilian population of those places must become scared shitless. Now, several year later with troops on the ground, the population isn't as scared as the warmongers would like, but Americans would be outraged if their troops were caught indiscriminately killing civilians. The warmongers learned their lesson after My Lai. But to get around this unfortunate technicality, they hire mercenaries to do the indiscriminate killing today.

All war requires civilian mass murder, and whichever side can stomach it usually wins. The goal of the war-planners today is to keep the mass-murder off the front pages--to keep their civilian population inundated with football games and glorified karaoke singers--anything but the war. They cut taxes and tell Americans to go shopping. When we ask about the war they say, "Don't worry, let the experts handle it." After all, you do like driving your SUV don't you?

They hire mercenaries to do the indiscriminate killing. How convenient. Their twisted view of the free market involves privatizing all branches of the government that actually have a purpose, and creating bureaucracy where none is needed. The constitution explicitly states that it is the responsibility of the government to raise an army. They wish to privatize the army, and when this private, corporate army commits war crimes, they laugh when we explain it away as the evils of the free market. What the hell is that?