Matt Armstrong of the extremely well written MountainRunner blog has this to say about the use of PMCs and accountability. I would say a very well reasoned summary of where responsibility lies.....
Talking about PMCs (Updated) - MountainRunner
Posted using ShareThis
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Sen. Obama and Blackwater
A Democracy Now! report asks the question; if Senator Obama is elected president, what will he do with the nearly 140,000 Private Military Contractors (PMCs) currently in Iraq. Sen. Obama is known as having an aggresive stance against the use of Private Security Contractors (PSC) from such companies as Blackwater, Dyncorp, and a host of others who provide on the ground personal security details for workers and dignitaries, saying that they are not being held accountable for thier actions. However, according to the DN! news piece, Sen. Obama has not ruled out thier use to prevent a vacuum of power in Iraq. Should Sen. Obama have a stance at this point? With the time table of withdrawal still in the back of everyones mind and Iran looming in the back ground, what choices will be the wisest at this point?
Monday, September 1, 2008
What has the U.S. involvment in Georgia been?
'What was the gentleman’s purpose of being among the special forces and what he is doing today, I so far cannot answer,” General Nogovitsyn said, holding up what he said was a color copy of the passport. He said members of the Georgian unit had been killed, and the building destroyed.'
This is a quote from General Nogovitsyn, senior Russian military figure after describing what they said was a US passport allegedly discovered by Russain forces in a ruined building near Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia. Putin himself spoke on the issue of American involvement, claiming that the US election has come into play with US involvement. Is such a discovery possible? First let's look at the name of the man on the Passport, Michael Lee White. Apparently, White lost his passport in 2005 while flying between Moscow and the United States. White is a world traveler who has taught English in Japan, China, and Kazakhstan, according to a resume recovered from a Chinese/English Teaching site. White also has former military experience as a graduate of US Army air assault school in Fort Campbell, Kentucky. So could White be involved in some contracting capacity? The resume found on Wikipedia is flimsy evidence at best. Additionally nobody knows where White is right at the moment. This could mean any number of things. That he actually was involved somehow in an advisory capacity ( world traveler, military record) or that it was placed there after the end of combat operations in an attempt to implicate America in fomenting Georgian military action against South Ossetia. The possibility is there, as US government officials would never officially recognize a US contractor as an American military advisor in war zone.
A couple of things are for certain. Since the end of the Cold War, the US has been advising and equipping the Georgian army, stomping around former Soviet allied states, granting admission into NATO, and generally disregarding the notion of Russian state power.
This of course doen't excuse the several steps that the Russians have taken to encourage the South Ossetians to declare thier independance including giving Russian passports to citizens in South Ossetia and the recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia as indepedent states.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
