DISGUSTING: Blackwater Wins Out in $10 Billion Contract

Everyone who pays attention to current affairs in more details knows about the disturbing activities of the private military contractor which was formally known as Blackwater (now going under the name Xe Services). Never mind the missing guns, the fraud, forget about the murder arrests and don't even mention the wild parties with coc aine and steroids. Blackwater (Xe Services) has "won a piece of a five-year State Department contract worth up to $10 billion, Danger Room has learned."

Date: 01 October, 2010
Despite US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's campaign promise to no longer award military contracts to Blackwater - the now renamed notorious security contractor - the US state department has recently awarded the company another lucrative contract.
english.aljazeera.net...

Spencer Ackerman reports that Blackwater, now known as Xe Services, has used a "blandly named cut-out," International Development Solutions, to grab a piece of the State Department's $10 billion, five-year Worldwide Protective Services contract.
www.aolnews.com...

Blackwater has rebranded itself but it is the same criminal military organization which was from the start, run by the infamous Erik Prince of the Prince family dynasty. Wired's Spencer Ackerman broke the news in a fantastic piece of investigate journalism.

8 private security firms won out in the new Worldwide Protective Services State Department contract which in reality is meant to protect embassies and those within them. Let's look at those that are listed:

DynCorp
Triple Canopy
EOD Technology
SOC
Aegis Defense Services
Global Strategies Group
Torres International Services

AND

International Development Services LLC

There's a clear reason why there is no Blackwater or Xe named up there, once again this is just SMOKE AND MIRRORS. Blackwater IS International Development Services, and they've just managed to grab a large chunk of this $10 billion dollar contract, even after their long history of corruption and illegal activities. In fact, even looking at the contract online would not help you make the connection with Blackwater and IDS LLC.

International Development Services is a JOINT VENTURE between Blackwater (Xe) and Kasemen. Apparently this was enough to make Blackwater eligible for the award.

From Kasemen's website:

Headquartered in Virginia, Kaseman is a leading provider of professional engineering and technical security solutions to the Federal Government, enhancing national security and assisting in the mission of Global Security for US Interests worldwide. Through innovation and continuous improvement, Kaseman’s management teams have developed strategic knowledge in all realms of physical and technical security, assisting its client’s security efforts against internal and external threats.

Kasemen just last week announced the former head of DynCorp, Thomas Campbell on its International Board of Directors. The connection with DynCorp goes even further. But what's necessary to understand is the connection between DynCorp and Blackwater, because it is DynCorp which is helping Erik Prince's Blackwater continually win out in these massive government contracts. A while back, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates revealed that Blackwater and DynCorp were cooperatively conducting operations within Pakistan. And then just last week this news came out:

NEW YORK: (WMR) — WMR has learned from a deep background source that Xe Services, the company formerly known as Blackwater, has been conducting false flag terrorist attacks in Pakistan that are later blamed on the entity called “Pakistani Taliban.”
XE/Blackwater conducting false flag terrorism in Pakistan–blamed on TTP

As well as totally rebranding its name to Xe Services (and now to IDS, LLC), Blackwater has already renamed its subsidiaries.

Blackwater Lodge and Training Center, the subsidiary that conducts much of the company’s overseas operations and domestic training, has been renamed U.S. Training Center Inc., the company said Friday.

Senators blasted the actions of Blackwater, who continually rebrand themselves and despite their infamy keep cashing in on MASSIVE contracts.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/bf9da9757a7b.jpg[/atsimg]

In his exclusive report, Ackerman makes clear:

It’s not yet clear what the U.S. Training Center–International Development Solutions–Kaseman “joint venture” will do for the State Department. Worldwide Protective Services is actually a bundle of contracts in one, each governing specific duties for a firm to handle in a given country. Only two of those component contracts have been awarded so far.

Remember a while back when Blackwater was banned from operating in Iraq? Still think this new 'COMBINED VENTURE' will be ineligible to operate? I wouldn't bet on it, according to the State Department its fine as long as they have a new name, as if all their history goes away with it.

Blackwater/Xe clearly has ties within and this is the reason why it keeps receiving such lucrative deals.

End Blackwater

End the corruption. Absolutely disgusting, murderous thugs with a license to kill.

Salon has just posted their piece on the news:

The company won the contract under one of its many alternate names, "International Development Solutions." The contract is to protect embassies around the world.

It's worth repeating that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in her presidential campaign, promised to ban Blackwater from Iraq, going so far as to say:

For five years their behavior and lack of supervision and accountability have often eroded our credibility, endangered U.S. and Iraqi lives and undermined our mission.

Obama never made a similar promise.

Obama hires Blackwater, again

Interesting putting the blame on Obama and clearing Clinton, if she were in office I think things would still be in a similar situation.

This is a good vid for anyone who wants good background info on Erik Prince and Blackwater:



Highly recommended.

What is most disturbing to me is that member of the legitimate military forces of the U.S. and it's allies will be subjected to the same type of brutality and torture that is being administered to those that that are being tortured by these corporate religious zealots.... Equally upsetting is the black flag operations. It makes me wonder how many of the U.S. military casualties are a result of black flag ops as a means of acquiring more uncontested no bid contracts.

Edit #2 to add: Star & Flag serbsta!



I served more than 3 years worth of deployments to warzones in my military career that lasted more than a decade.

My AFPC was fire protection, as well as emergency medical technician. Fighting wasn't my thing, but due to fire fighting requirements I was/am a physically fit individual. I do not care for fighting, but once had the pleasure of communicating via full contact sign language with a black water merc who I had a slight disagreement with

Americans are/were at war with Al-Qaeda, who American tax payers spent billions training and arming to fight as freedom fighters during the Afghan-Soviet Union war.


Here are some of my concerns:
1 -What happened to the freedom fighters after America was done training and arming them?
They waged war on America.

What will happen when we are done training, arming, and funding mercinaries formally known as Black Water?

2 - What is our justification for keeping "enemy combatants" in prison in Cuba?
They do not wear any identifying clothing that associates them with a nations armed forces.

3 - The Geneva Convention LOAC, Laws Of Armed Conflict are abided by or punished when broken by Americans' armed forces members. But ... not seem illusively distributed when applied to Corporate Entities' mercenaries.

So, if there are not enough "volunteers" for multinational wars .... we simply pay more money per head for those willing to do what the military cannot do under the international LOAC Geneva Convention Laws?

4Their casualties are not included in the "official" statistics of dead and wounded.

5...

What the hell does a corporation that benefits from war have with employing lobbyists to lobby for their agenda$, and why are they getting paid more than congressmen or senators?

America has issues...

This planet has issues, too.

These are some of my thoughts concerning this particular issue,
ET

reply to post by hypervigilant


That's exactly right, imagine how many of those deaths were actually the result of operations conducted by companies such as Blackwater.

Originally posted by Esoteric Teacher

So, if there are not enough "volunteers" for multinational wars .... we simply pay more money per head for those willing to do what the military cannot do under the international LOAC Geneva Convention Laws?

Bingo, hit the nail on the head!

reply to post by serbsta


Sorry, I posted this same article, same story hours ago before your thread was created.

For those that would like to continue this discussion, you all can continue on in an earlier post.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

You should have done a search before posting.

Originally posted by serbsta

Bingo, hit the nail on the head!

Let me share some personal experiences and knowledge I garnered during my deployments....

Subsidiaries of Halliburton and other "no bid contract" winners pay TCNs (Third Country Nationals) who are not indigenous to the host nation (ie: Iraq & Afghanistan) the equvelent of less than $100 dollars a month to train and employ more expendable assets in warzones under hazardous conditions and exploiting under dubious measures less fortunate and developed nations, ie "Third World Nationals" aka "Third Country Nationals".

SOURCE:HalliburtonWatch.org

For decades, the U.S. tax code has encouraged companies like Halliburton to transfer the location of its subsidiaries from the United States to foreign countries. This is one reason why only thirty-six of Halliburton's 143 subsidiaries are incorporated in the United States and 107 subsidiaries (or 75 percent) are incorporated in 30 different countries.

There are two methods by which Halliburton lowers its tax liability on foreign income: (1) By establishing a "controlled foreign corporation" and (2) By establishing a subsidiary inside a low tax, or no tax, country known as a "tax haven."
Halliburton Watch

I have personally witnessed stupid beyond any measure my wildest imagination and critical thinking skills can permit me to process in any perceivable way.

What has been going on over there is a kin to the wild west, lawlessness. And furthermore, there is a reason why the M.S.M. (Mind System Manipulators) Have been covering it less than 2% of their total air coverage time for the past few+ years!!

I witnessed firsthand KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton, not honoring a government contract at Balad Air Base, Iraq (Camp Anaconda for the Army) to service and replace all portable fire extinguishers.

My position was NCOIC of Fire Alarm Communication Center. It was during a four month tour. I sat in on Staff meetings, and saw first hand the contract. It was a contract for more than 2 million dollars annually, yet the KBR representatives at the base were sending everyone who needed service to or new portable fire extinguishers to the fire department, where we did not have the equipment necessary to provide such a service and were purchasing new fire extinguishers from ... you guessed it... a subsidiary of Halliburton. This was mid 2006. They had been doing this for three years, and pocketed what looks like nearly 7 million dollars profit from just a portable fire extinguisher deal, not to mention we were buying new ones because we did not have the proper equipment to service existing extinguishers. And how much money is unaccounted for in Iraq?


Later that tour, oh yes we firefighters were pissed already after 9-11, anyways... later that tour a very real hazardous materials spill took place with real green smoke coming from a trailer. Our (military firefighters) average annual salary was less than $40,000. Now, the KBR shipping yard in which this incident occurred was under the Civilian contractors; HAZMAT guru getting paid mucho money to do a job he physically and mentally was unable to do. We got ... scratch that, he got his own dumb ass fired, but he was just a pawn. He was making in ecxess of $130,000 annually, tax free, easily. He kept no records, could not tell us what was in the containers, and this is the funny part...
When he tried to take command and tell our fire chief (a chief master sergeant) what was what and who was who, our fire chief threw a HAZMAT suit at him (the guy was 300 lbs+ and did not fit into a HAZMAT suit, which was part of his job description to be able to do so) and told him to go into the hot zone and not come out until he could report on what substance it was we were actually dealing with. The man tried to intimidate our chief, he tried to scare a career military firefighter with less than a two months left. Our chief was not there for a paycheck, nor did he seem intimidated in the least. Our response was professional, and we ended up finding out it was some of the worst stuff that we could have been dealing with. I'll (out of respect for the chief) refrain from sharing details of how the incident concluded with that certain individual losing his job that day and ending up needing medical attention and being arrested

Example of pay for a similiar position:

Immediate Job Openings
Salary: $129,000 all inclusive ($43,000 July 1st, August 10th, and September 15th)

Requirements:

•Must have Fire Officer I, II & III, Fire Inspector I & II, Fire Instructor I & II, Hazardous Material Incident Commander & Hazardous Material-Train-the-Trainer. All Certification must be IFSAC or Pro Board approved.

My personal feelings towards the civilian contractors stem not from their blatent disregard for the rules and their exploitation for monetary gain in this nations time of need, but rather from their adverse and detrimental affects on national and international relations and best interests, they are threat to national and international security, unless there are fundamental variables to the equasion I am ignorant of which justify such measures. It is my personal and professional opinion that their presence in warzones have adversely had direct influences on our image and put our troops further in harms way, and also had a drastic and devastating effect on troops morals in ways people cannot fathom.

The ONLY way this thing that makes sense to me .... is if we are under some measure of martial law, not just as a nation, maybe global, perhaps even more than global.

I've shared enough with this post, and think I'll wrap it up for now.

Good Thread,
ET

reply to post by Esoteric Teacher


Fantastic post and great insight, thankyou.

I find that I agree with you for the most part, it is these mercenaries which operate under no law and have no boundaries which give the rest of the 'legal' operators in the zone a bad name. Just look at Blackwater troops in the last month, with the drug busts and weapons trades, they are crooks. I think Pakistan is a great example right now in examining the disastrous effects of unaccountable private military contractors.

www.thenation.com...

At a covert forward operating base run by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, members of an elite division of Blackwater are at the center of a secret program in which they plan targeted assassinations of suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives, "snatch and grabs" of high-value targets and other sensitive action inside and outside Pakistan, an investigation by The Nation has found. The Blackwater operatives also assist in gathering intelligence and help direct a secret US military drone bombing campaign that runs parallel to the well-documented CIA predator strikes, according to a well-placed source within the US military intelligence apparatus.

reply to post by impressme


different forum, it may be permitted by the mods to stand, but I will star & flag and paste the responses I have efforted to type out about this issue in your thread as well. (just in case, I don't want to have to research links and retype these responses)

peace,
ET