I don't know if I am putting this in the right section but the MODS will help me with that

My question is what are some of the biggest merc armies/private armies and how do they operate???

I would think Blackwater would be near the top. There used to be one in the 80's called Executive Outcomes I think.

hmm, where is black water from any way?

Aegis Defence Services.

I think the French Foreign Legion qualifies has a merc army?

Nope. Its a regular french Armée de terre unit, only with an unorthodox personnel policy.

I understand that EO was disbanded, but that most of their assets were absorbed by Sandline International.

On a related note, wasn't one of Sandline's founders indicted for attempting a coup d'etat in Equatorial Guinea a few years ago?

Triple Canopy is a good outfit.

A bit higher requirements than of the former Blackwater outfit, although both did some difficult things under difficult conditions.

Most of the larger American black private security firms working official programs with backhanders from unofficial sources within a government should, indeed, be classed as mercenary outfits.

The idiots employed by Blackwater illustrate just what can go wrong when you give security contracts to cowboys.

By and large, the reputable companies like G4S, Pheonix, JemSec, KMS, Aegis, Triple Canopy, Saladin and FRS work directly for and are held accountable to the sovereign nation, in whatever country they are working.

Tiger Top Rent Security and Orel Antiterror are both Russian PMC's. Sure they don't pay their operators as much and they are not very well known (at least I had never heard of them). But they have es Spetsnaz so they must be pretty good.

By the way does anyone know if Triple Canopy would consider the 2e REP (2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment) as SF. Maybe I could get a job there.

I respectfully suggest that everybody interested in this subject, should read a book entitled "The Circuit".

It was written by Bob Shepherd. He spent 20 odd years in the SAS and has been regularly employed by CNN as a 'Security Advisor'.

It makes for alarming reading but Bob tells it like it really is. No BS, no flannel. Nothing but the hard facts.