Obama is Increasing the Use of Mercenaries

[GhostOfCaptSpaulding]

[offsite:3ok87yf9]Obama Has 250,000 'Contractors' Deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan and is Increasing the Use of Mercenaries

Newly released Pentagon statistics show that in both Iraq and Afghanistan the number of armed contractors is rising.

A couple of years ago, Blackwater executive Joseph Schmitz seemed to see a silver lining for mercenary companies with the prospect of US forces being withdrawn or reduced in Iraq. “There is a scenario where we could as a government, the United States, could pull back the military footprint,” Schmitz said. “And there would then be more of a need for private contractors to go in.”

When it comes to armed contractors, it seems that Schmitz was right.

According to new statistics released by the Pentagon, with Barack Obama as commander in chief, there has been a 23% increase in the number of “Private Security Contractors” working for the Department of Defense in Iraq in the second quarter of 2009 and a 29% increase in Afghanistan, which “correlates to the build up of forces” in the country. These numbers relate explicitly to DoD security contractors. Companies like Blackwater and its successor Triple Canopy work on State Department contracts and it is unclear if these contractors are included in the over-all statistics. This means, the number of individual “security” contractors could be quite higher, as could the scope of their expansion.

Overall, contractors (armed and unarmed) now make up approximately 50% of the “total force in Centcom AOR [Area of Responsibility].” This means there are a whopping 242,657 contractors working on these two U.S. wars. These statistics come from two reports just released by Gary J. Motsek, the Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Program Support): “Contractor Support of U.S. Operations in USCENTCOM AOR, IRAQ, and Afghanistan and “Operational Contract Support, ‘State of the Union.’”

“We expect similar dependence on contractors in future contingency operations,” according to the contractor “State of the Union.” It notes that the deployment size of both military personnel and DoD civilians are “fixed by law,” but points out that the number of contractors is “size unfixed,” meaning there is virtually no limit (other than funds) to the number of contractors that can be deployed in the war zone.

At present there are 132,610 in Iraq and 68,197 in Afghanistan. The report notes that while the deployment of security contractors in Iraq is increasing, there was an 11% decrease in overall contractors in Iraq from the first quarter of 2009 due to the “ongoing efforts to reduce the contractor footprint in Iraq.”

AltNet | Obama Has 250,000 'Contractors' Deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan and is Increasing the Use of Mercenaries (http://www.alternet.org/blogs/world/140378/obama_has_250%2C000_%27contractors%27_deployed_in_ iraq_and_afghanistan_and_is_increasing_the_use_of_ mercenaries/)[/offsite:3ok87yf9]

Well, he said he was for change, right?

[pack3tg0st]

You mean besides puppet states like Israel? oh wait...

Amazing thing about contractors... It puts the whole Geneva Conventions thing into a "Grey area", and offers a wide berth for plausable deniability.

Wonder if the plan is to allocate the troops from Iraq over to Pakistan/Iran...

Look at what countries border Iran...

Strategic eh?

[Cogburn]

b]kCvIw7DMHXcb]

Chaos. Military outsourcing increases the potential for military usurpation of the government.

We are fighting a holding action where we are losing ground, inch by painful inch. We cannot turn the tide. We cannot mend what has been torn asunder.

There is no choice left but to tear down our institutions and try again, learning from our mistakes of the past 200 years.

Every increase in chaos increases that probability. We are buying time to prepare for what is to come, even though it still may be three to four more generations.

Are you thinking that far ahead?

[pack3tg0st]

I don't think we've got that long cog...

You call in the Mercs for jobs too dirty and immoral for the professional soldiery.

We're looking at something that started a few years ago...

Ever stopped to think that the Department of Homeland Security could become a paramilitary force in and of itself? Has it already?

[Cogburn]

We've been outsourcing combat operations for a long, long time. Back to the Prussians during the Revolution, if I remember correctly.

It is only the extent to which we have done so that has ever really changed.

Go look at conspiracy theory from 93-97. Ignore all the Y2K hysteria and you are left with nothing but... well... failed doom. Go back even further into the prevailing conspiracy theory gestalt of the 80s... 70s... 60s... and you'll see a trail littered in the artifacts of failed prophecy for our end.

We should be in the police state right now by all accounts. However, we are not.

This leads me to believe that the future is not a fixed point, however it is progressing down a road that would appear inevitable in it's conclusion.

You want it to happen in your life time?

Work to increase the police state. :)

[pack3tg0st]

We are living in a police state of sorts...

They've just convinced everyone its not...

[Cogburn]

Oh poo poo.

I bought a Springfield rifle and 1000 rounds of ammunition not 2 months ago.

Last week I bought 20oz of silver and 5gm of gold, converting fiat currency into solid wealth.

Who lives in a police state?

EDIT: That was two months ago... not two weeks ago...

[pack3tg0st]

The term police state describes a state in which the government exercises rigid and repressive controls over the social, economic and political life of the population.

from wiki...

now with that said... Rigid, repressive social, economic and political control sounds exactly like what we're dealing with...

Its just not as "in-your-face" as other countries.

[Cogburn]

My point is that for every fact you may bring forth to support the idea that we are living in a police state, I can bring forth one to refute it.

The only thing we can then be sure of is that the game is still afoot.

[GhostOfCaptSpaulding]

[offsite:9dnsaech]Of course the game is rigged. Don't let that stop you--if you don't play, you can't win.

Robert Heinlein (1907 - 1988)[/offsite:9dnsaech]

[pack3tg0st]

We're only allowed to vote for corporate sponsored, Special interest group endorsed financially elite candidates, who once in office, dedicate a large portion of their time to putting the proper "spin" and propaganda on every piece of information that comes out of Washington DC...

We're told what to think, we're told how to vote, we're told what to buy... we're led to believe that we are pretty powerless in the grand scheme of things... We're taught from a young age a collectivist "socially acceptable" version of history to instill a false sense of nationalistic pride...

Hell, we're told we a democracy... which is now just a synonym for the American Way... we're led to believe that Democracy is a good thing... when for centuries, the idea of democracy was frowned upon in this country... we're a friggan republic... That means we can't be trusted to run a democracy...

We have to appoint rich fuckheads to baby sit us, tell us when to get chemo, make us wage slaves...

The best part is... If they skew the information we're allowed to recieve enough, we become the "police".

Any person who vocalizes ideas that aren't approved by the ministry of truth are first ignored... but eventually if they become too loud, they are marginalized, and written off as a lunatic.

There are only 9 people in the entire U.S. who shape the media... anything that these 9 corporate entities disagree with, doesn't get attention... Its mass brainwashing... nothing more...

The best trick is... they have you convinced otherwise...

Welcome to 1984

[Cogburn]

[offsite:sm1qpk0p]Why do you give a flying fuck that the other guy cheats? He doesn't even realize we can destroy the game at any time! Enjoy it!

Robert Anton Wilson (1932-2007)[/offsite:sm1qpk0p]
You are told for whom to vote, but the final choice is yours.

You are told what to think, but no one as of yet controls the input but you.

We do not live in a democracy. We live in a republic.

We elect our neighbors to temporary positions of authority. We hold them accountable for their actions ever election thereafter.

The worst part is, alternative media is so controlled you've been compelled to think that you are counter the popular culture when you, in fact, are the popular culture.

If an insane world brands me a lunatic, then crazy I will be... but I will be happier and wiser than anyone I meet.

The media is man-made weather. Oliver Stone never wrote a truer statement.

The silliest thing about it is that people still believe that the rabbit still comes out of the magician's hat.

Welcome to 2009.

We live in different worlds.

[pack3tg0st]

Sigh... I won't pick that apart cog lol we'll get nowhere fast lol

I do find it a little disheartening that you think you have a choice in who you vote for...

Two candidates... both will further the same interests and the same agenda...

The only difference is which half of america they "pander" to while doing it... the right... or the left...

on a side note: ever read Chomsky?

[GhostOfCaptSpaulding]

Eh, we're nothing but a product to be sold and consumed...

[Cogburn]

Sigh... I won't pick that apart cog lol we'll get nowhere fast lol

I do find it a little disheartening that you think you have a choice in who you vote for...

Two candidates... both will further the same interests and the same agenda...

The only difference is which half of america they "pander" to while doing it... the right... or the left...

on a side note: ever read Chomsky?
Of course I've read Chomsky. He needs to smoke a joint and loosen up a little, but that might be a little too radical for him.

Ever read Burroughs?

... and in the past four presidential elections in which I've participated, I voted for Frank Zappa in two of them and myself in one of them. I voted Obama in the last election because I wanted a black man in the White House. I still find the ever increasing levels of irony to be simply delicious.

The only people prone to pandering are those of weak enough will to be concerned for the opinions of others.

That's why you draw the curtain closed behind you. However that is also, in my opinion, why it should be considered bad taste to ask for or otherwise discuss for whom one voted.

I tell people because I know that I still make my own decisions.

[theeindiee]

He knows he still makes his own decisions...

If only the rest of reality were painted so definitely.

Wait... if the universe is just a mathematical/geometric parade of patterns, then maybe nobody actually makes their own decisions. Maybe thoughts are just patterns behind patterns which we witness more subtly, so we are fooled into "thinking" and therefore "think" that we're deciding... when actually we are NEVER in control of it at all. We just "do" on different planes of "doing", and simply observe the outcome. If I told you that this decision to type was mine, I would negate the fact that the pattern of lights, colors, sounds, thoughts, and feelings which I am witnessing in front of me directly influenced "my" decision.... and therefore, the only reason I believe I am deciding is because I subconsciously fail to make the connection that basically my decision is just the pattern being mirrored back at itself.

So did you vote? Did you decide? Did you think? Or did a pattern just bounce off of a mirror of itself, inducing a point of view, and no decision was necessary?

Maybe we should never ever get that deep about any topic whatsoever... lol.

[Cogburn]

Does a dog have the Buddha nature?

Mu.

[theeindiee]

Gosh.... dogs chase their tails a bunch.