The Best Army Money Can Buy

The Ivy Bush today takes note of misleading news reports on the "civilian" casualties in Iraq yesterday. Although they have been variously described as "contractors" Juan Cole suspects that

Although we are calling them security, the four American civilians killed were very likely ex-US military, most probably from special operations units like the Navy Seals. The special ops units have been losing men to the private security firms, who pay between $100,000 a year and $200,000 a year, rather more than do the US armed services. And, it seems to me likely that the people in Fallujah knew that they had hold of US military men.

I first learned of the "outsourcing" of military operations via some stories I heard on NPR last year. You can catch up on the stories here, here, and here. Each of the stories references Peter Singer's book Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry. I haven't read it but I'd like to.

I remember sitting on the front porch with wyvern and discussing the privatizing of America's military capabilities. I was surprised to learn that America has quietly outsourced different elements national security elements for many years. Seems to me there are some valid reasons for outsourcing some functions that support our fighting forces. Putting "a layer between political bosses and events on the ground" and preserving appearances are not among those reasons.