Comments on: Blackwater spies – with immunity…!

By: Scholars and Rogues » Cacophony

Scholars and Rogues » Cacophony — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 21:23:05 +0000

[...] government seeks toÂ outsource all its functions, including those necessarily secret, to people who’d make it a theocracy. Corporations seek nothing less than monopoly while they [...]

By: Dr. Slammy

Dr. Slammy — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 16:57:44 +0000

I see what you’re saying, JSO, and maybe a 60,000-foot piece of this sort is called for. It’s true that the coverage here has been on the bottom-up side.

By: JS O'Brien

JS O'Brien — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 15:14:01 +0000

Well, then, I probably didn’t read all that closely. Surely, I know that Jim has been criticizing Blackwater and making it clear that Blackwater is dangerous. I entirely agree. But (and as I say, I may just have missed it), I don’t recall feeling that these attacks on Blackwater reflected the bigger picture which is the dangerous rise of the mercenary in our society, both in private legions and in the US military.

By: Dr. Slammy

Dr. Slammy — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 19:33:30 +0000

I don’t know that I think that theme is being missed, JSO – I’d say that’s been the point of Jim’s whole series on Blackwater. Now, it’s sure as hell being missed by a lot of the country….

By: World War III under way; America hasn’t noticed? « Black Dog Strategic

Tue, 06 Nov 2007 19:09:49 +0000

[...] for example – and now the news that Blackwater is augmenting its army, navy and air force with its own CIA. While I’m routinely bemused by the conclusions we seem to reach (we’re about to [...]

By: Scholars and Rogues » World War III under way; America hasn’t noticed?

Tue, 06 Nov 2007 18:53:50 +0000

By: JS O'Brien

JS O'Brien — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 16:43:32 +0000

I believe a meta-theme that’s being missed here is the rise of private, military organizations. Throughout history, this has never worked out very well. Oh, militias were OK and feudal and quasi-feudal arrangements sometimes worked and sometimes didn’t. But the pure, private army with its allegiance to the person who pays the soldiers is a recipe for extreme trouble.

Couple this trend with the rise of a professional army that often gets its officers from officer-class families, and I’d give the Republic maybe another 50 to 100 years, depending on how you measure the final demise.

By: Dr. Slammy

Dr. Slammy — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 15:03:09 +0000

I can actually make a case for a company doing some of this work – emphasis on “some” and “a.” Not THIS company, for sure. The area I’d like to know more about is the “business-friendly” part. It’s not a well-known fact but US companies are routinely pillaged by corp espionage operations run by foreign competitors, many of which have the full support of their own governments. If this activity is aimed at that – and it’s impossible to know for sure – it could actually do some good.

Except that I wouldn’t trust Prince to babysit my goldfish….