Mercenary companies eye Haiti
, author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, reports on U.S. mercenary firms that are offering their services for Haiti.
THE ORWELLIAN-named mercenary trade group, the International Peace Operations Association (IPOA), didn't waste much time in offering the "services" of its member companies to swoop down on Haiti for some old-fashioned "humanitarian assistance" (disaster profiteering).
Within hours of the massive earthquake in Haiti, the IPOA created a special web page for prospective clients, saying: "In the wake of the tragic events in Haiti, a number of IPOA's member companies are available and prepared to provide a wide variety of critical relief services to the earthquake's victims."
While some of the companies specialize in rapid housing construction, emergency relief shelters and transportation, others are private security companies that operate in Iraq and Afghanistan like Triple Canopy, the company that took over Blackwater's massive State Department contract in Iraq. For years, Blackwater played a major role in IPOA, until it left the group following the 2007 Nisour Square massacre.
In 2005, while still a leading member of IPOA, Blackwater's owner Erik Prince deployed his forces in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Far from some sort of generous gift to the suffering people of the U.S. Gulf, Blackwater raked in some $70 million in Homeland Security contracts that began with a massive no-bid contract to provide protective services for FEMA. Blackwater billed U.S. taxpayers $950 per man per day.
The current U.S. program under which armed security companies work for the State Department in Iraq--the Worldwide Personal Protection Program--has its roots in Haiti during the Clinton administration. In 1994, private U.S. forces, such as DynCorp, became a staple of U.S. operations in the country following the overthrow of Jean-Bertrand Aristide by CIA-backed death squads.
When President Bush invaded Iraq, his administration radically expanded that program and turned it into the privatized paramilitary force it is today. At the time of his overthrow in 2004, Aristide was being protected by a San Francisco-based private security firm, the Steele Foundation.
What is unfolding in Haiti seems to be part of what Naomi Klein has labeled the "Shock Doctrine." Indeed, on the Heritage Foundation blog, opportunity was being found in the crisis with a post titled: "Amidst the Suffering, Crisis in Haiti Offers Opportunities to the U.S."
"In addition to providing immediate humanitarian assistance, the U.S. response to the tragic earthquake in Haiti earthquake offers opportunities to re-shape Haiti's long-dysfunctional government and economy as well as to improve the public image of the United States in the region," wrote Heritage fellow Jim Roberts in a post that was subsequently altered to tone down the shock doctrine language. The title was later changed to: "Things to Remember While Helping Haiti."
First published at Rebel Reports.
