Blackwater Incident: A (Spineless) Taxpayer’s Rant

This is not a political blog. And I am not trying to make a political statement. But the Blackwater incident in Iraq from last weekend just doesn’t sit well with me. So, here is my rant. Do with it what you wish.

Here is what bothers me – Blackwater employees who are just regular citizens of America like you and me, shot and killed the citizens of another sovereign country Iraq, on their own soil. Now, since Blackwater is not part of the military, those responsible cannot be court martialled under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Since they are not on US soil, the US laws do not apply to them. They cannot be tried by the Iraqi legal system due to the provisions of the Coalition Provisional Authority Order 17 in 2004. [source1, source2] And who paid for this mercenary operation that is above and beyond the reach of any law? You and me – the clueless, hapless, (spineless) taxpayers!

Blackwater was founded in 1997 by an ex Navy Seal with a keen entrepreneurial bent of mind. As a for-profit private organization that trains and provides security to diplomats, Blackwater has supposedly increased its profit by over 300% during the past few years. Finding its profit statements on the Internet is not very easy, but according to the wikipedia entry, during the past few years, Blackwater has received over 500 million dollars in government contracts (many of them being no-bid contracts)! While I was reading about Blackwater and its founder and trying to wrap my brain around the number of zeros in the financial figures involved, I couldn't help but visualize the smug face of Nicholas Cage from the movie Lord of War.

Frankly, I don’t know whether companies like Blackwater do a great service to the country (as their website claims) or they are mercenaries without a conscience. In the words of U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker [told to the U.S. Senate]: "There is simply no way at all that the State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security could ever have enough full-time personnel to staff the security function in Iraq. There is no alternative except through contracts." [source]. The Blackwater employees do put their lives in harms way every single day and have suffered the chilling consequences more than once [Fallujah Ambush, Other Incidents]. In matters of war and conflict, the facts are so hazy and every story has so many sides that it becomes hard to make any judgment. That said I wish my hard earned money did not go into funding hazy operations flirting with the boundary between good an evil. I work hard for every penny and wish my tax dollars would go into projects where the benefits are clearly observable like improving the schools or the health care system or the public transport system.

I know I ought to be more involved and more active in the political decision making process, and yet I am not. I know I ought to question and hold the politicians who use my tax contributions accountable for their action and yet I don’t. I live my comfortable suburban life with my cushy job socializing with my equally clueless friends. Until the day the war is brought home by someone who straps on a dozen bombs (or flies an airplane) in a desperate and deliberate attempt to kill people who are near and dear to me. He is on a suicide mission because he does not have anything to live for. His father / mother / brother / sister / wife / child was “collateral damage” in a war funded by my money and he just could not find any other way to snap me out of my idyllic apathy and make me take notice.

And so, just this once when my conscience is pricked and I have decided to at least rant things out, let me come out and say - Please, stop using my tax dollars for funding your meaningless wars. And don’t tell me it is for freedom and democracy – I may be spineless, but I am not dumb.