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fied and violated deadly-force rules in effect for security contractors in Iraq.64 The
case has supposedly focused on one Blackwater turret gunner.
Iraqi officials subsequently canceled Blackwater s operating license, even
though the license was no longer valid. Blackwater technically did not need it to
operate; the State Department position has long been that Blackwater does not
need a license from the Iraqi government to protect American officials because its
contract is directly with U.S. authorities to provide diplomatic security.
Specifically, Blackwater shares with DynCorp and Triple Canopy the World-
wide Personal Protective Services contract awarded by the U.S. State Department
80 SHADOW FORCE
in 2004. The contractors doing this work are considered State Department
employees and thus enjoy the same immunity from prosecution as any other State
Department employee in a foreign country. They do not require a license.
This fact was confirmed by a September 1, 2007, report from the Iraqi
Ministry of Interior that listed all the licensed foreign and Iraqi private security
companies operating in the country. There was no mention of either Blackwater
or DynCorp, though Triple Canopy was included.
This omission reflected a deliberate business strategy by Blackwater and
DynCorp to put all their contract eggs into the single State Department basket.
Triple Canopy, however, chose to be more diversified and sought out other com-
mercial work, such as protecting logistics contractors, and thus took the time and
effort to get a license.
It bears remembering that Blackwater gets far more work from the State
Department than does any other U.S. government client. According to federal
spending data compiled by the independent Web site FedSpending.org, the State
Department s Blackwater contracts vastly exceed those of the Pentagon. From
2004 through September 2007, the State Department paid Blackwater
$833,673,316, compared with Defense Department contracts of $101,219,261.65
In any event, any ouster of the company from Iraq likely would require the
support of the State Department, which depends on Blackwater for security.
Indeed, some say that the State Department was partly to blame for the Nisoor
Square shootings, given that Blackwater operated under State Department author-
ity that exempted the company from U.S. military regulations governing other
security firms.66
A document entitled Diplomatic Security Use of Contractors for Protec-
tive Security, obtained by The Spy Who Billed Me blog, outlines the total annual
costs of the State Department s outsourced security. According to the document,
the approximate current annual costs under the Worldwide Personal Protective
Services II contracts for all areas of operation worldwide are as follows:
Blackwater $339,573,391
DynCorp $47,145,172
Triple Canopy $15,550,133
[Total] $402,268,696
The approximate total costs for Iraq only, inclusive of all contractors, is
$350,119,545.11.
Blackwater USA provides 7 times the services in terms of dollar amounts
than DynCorp and nearly 22 times the amount of Triple Canopy. The contract
amount as provided by Blackwater indicates that it is highly unlikely that one of
the other two contractors could fill the void if Blackwater were expelled from
Iraq. No other U.S. firms are positioned to provide specialized services on such a
large scale.67
THE PLAYERS 81
Some in the industry believe, for instance, that the immunity Blackwater gets
from its State Department contract encourages it to emphasize its mission the
protection of its clients to the exclusion of all other considerations: a sort of
shoot first, ask questions later attitude.
Such an attitude has been criticized even by other parts of the government.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said in a news conference that the mission of
many contractors in Iraq to protect their U.S. government employers regard-
less of other consequences was at cross-purposes to our larger mission in
Iraq. As I see it, right now those missions are in conflict, because in the objec-
tive of completing the mission of delivering a principal safely to a destination,
just based on everything I ve read and what our own team has reported, there
have been instances where, to put it mildly, the Iraqis have been offended and
not treated properly. 68
The State Department reportedly overlooked repeated warnings from U.S.
diplomats in the field that guards were endangering Iraqi civilians and undermin-
ing U.S. efforts to win support from the population.69
ABC News obtained internal State Department e-mails showing that top offi-
cials were extensively briefed in 2005 about repeated incidents of Blackwater
security guards killing innocent civilians, and complained about a lack of a com-
pensation program for civilian victims.70
In fact, Blackwater s contract with the State Department contains a clause
not to engage with the media, as noted in a congressional hearing:
MR. PRINCE: By contract, we are not allowed to engage with the press.
REP. CUMMINGS: All right. And why is that?
MR. PRINCE: That s part of the stipulations of the WPPS contract.71
That would help explain why Blackwater withdrew from the International
Peace Operations Association (IPOA), run by Doug Brooks, on October 10, 2007,
even though Blackwater was a founding member. IPOA provides legitimacy
because of its commendable but unenforceable code of conduct, which empha-
sizes respect for human rights, ethics, transparency, and corporate accountability.
However, Blackwater s withdrawal called into question IPOA s ability to police
its membership.
According to Robert Young Pelton, author of Licensed to Kill, the company s
departure from IPOA may be the result of pressure from the State Department to
keep a lower profile following the September 16 shootings. Doug Brooks is
pretty vocal in the media. State is usually the one that smacks Blackwater in the
back of the head to say, Shut the fuck up! You re not supposed to talk while
there s a pending investigation. So, my guess is that this is a State-mandated deci-
sion, which is why Doug is saying nothing about it. 72
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