Sending mercenaries to kill Iraqis is outlawed by the Geneva Conventions

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.niagarafallsreporter.com/hanchette170.html

MOUNTAIN VIEWS: MERCENARIES MOUNT IRAQ OFFENSIVE

<snip>Using mercenaries to fight your wars was basically outlawed by the Geneva Conventions of 1949, and pretty much ended after centuries of use in the 1700s, when sovereign nations came to the fore and better weapons required less professional skill. Nations found it easier to train any simple clod to fight and become cannon fodder rather than pay big sums to hire professionals. (We all were taught in grade school how dastardly and conniving King George III was in hiring 30,000 Hessians to spare British lives in fighting our brave boys in the American Revolution.)

But after 9/11 and even before we invaded Iraq, the Bush administration hired about 40 private gunmen from the U.S. company DynCorp to guard new president Hamid Karzai once we took over Afghanistan. Once we invaded Iraq in 2003, the commanding general, now retired, Jay Garner, immediately hired Nepalese Gurkhas and South Africans from a British security company to protect himself and his staff. It was off to the races.

No one has raised much of a fuss. Almost a year ago, Congress asked the Pentagon to provide a detailed plan for listing, managing, accounting for, and overseeing private contractors, but despite repeated promises, the Defense Department has yet to provide it.

One obvious reason the Pentagon and Bush administration warriors like the idea of mercenaries who don't draw much attention is that it allows them to pretend we have far fewer war fighters on the ground in Iraq than we really do. If any mode of operation makes it easy to fudge the figures or cloud the costs, the Bush White House and Pentagon like it.

Army chief of staff Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker said in a Kansas City speech over the weekend there are now 138,000 American troops on the ground in Iraq, and that plans to keep such a force there until 2009, if need be, are already drawn up. That number swells when you consider all the private armed gunmen.

There are a couple of dire conclusions here.

[bryant69]

1. I'm not sure about this

For one thing, while it is true that United States hiring mercenaries may have ended, obviously there were still plenty of people making a living as mercenaries.

Secondly, I don't even know if we really stopped using them. Presumably we did hire "security consultants" from time to time - particularly, I would guess, the CIA or NSA for jobs they didn't want publicized or they didn't want to involve the regualr army in.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[NNN0LHI]

3. It should be fairly easy to disprove if what you think is correct n/t

[bryant69]

4. Oh? I look forward to said proof.

If and when it becomes available.

Bryant

[tanyev]

2. No worries. They can fix that, too.

NYT: White House Asks Congress to Define War Crimes

White House Asks Congress to Define War Crimes
By KATE ZERNIKE
Published: August 3, 2006

WASHINGTON, Aug. 2 — Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales pressed Congress on Wednesday to refine the definition of war crimes prohibited under the Geneva Conventions, as the Bush administration and lawmakers continued to debate the rules for treatment and trials of terror suspects.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2432391

[annabanana]

5. How's about those mercenaries who showed up at Katrina?

(Not just the security firms hired by rich individuals to guard their abandoned homes) Were there not legions of Blackwater employees toting big guns around the streets?

[enigma000]

6. Are these mercenaries just body guards?

Are they just protecting civilians and property? If so, it saves professional soldiers from doing the job. How wrong is this?

But mercenaries going on the offense is inappropriate. That is the job of soldiers.

[NNN0LHI]

7. They are being used to support the same people who invaded Iraq

That is who hired these thugs. And they are in the middle of a war zone where combatants are still dying every day in large numbers.

Isn't invading Iraq an offensive act? Or was invading Iraq defensive?

Don

[enigma000]

8. I see the issue as the occupation of Iraq

Private sector mercenaries do free up soldiers to go on the offensive. But the problem isn't them, it's the whole occupation.

[NNN0LHI]

10. Aren't the occupiers the same people who invaded Iraq?

Or has the place changed hands recently?

Don

[enigma000]

11. I see Iraq in a state of anarchy

Yes, the mercenaries control part of it. The Multinational Force (the invaders/occupiers) run part of it. The Iraqi federal government controls the Green Zone and some other territories. The Kurdish Regional government, the insurgents, etc. have a piece too.

Its a free for all.

[genie_weenie]

9. In Ramadi 2004 & 2005

the mercs were under a corparate name as Triple Canopy. And boy did those fuckers make life miserable for US Marines. Those cocksuckers loved to ride about shooting the shit out of the fucking city, they didn't have to worry about RoE since their job was protection of Iraqi Governmental Figures in Ramadi (and Anbar).

Fucking Mercs...