American hegemony incorporated: the importance and implications of military contractors in Iraq

Abstract

The article contends that private military contractors supporting American military operations in Iraq will come under intense international scrutiny. Various factors have led to the substantial private presence and the Iraq case reveals shifts in international dynamics from state to private actors. However, the private presence raises concerns that will have to be considered due to the fishbowl qualities of the Iraq case. How the state-contractor relationship is managed will likely have a significant impact upon American policy in Iraq and upon how American military might is perceived, produced, and applied in the future.

Indeed, there are many problems and it is not entirely clear that the United States is prepared to handle the effects stemming from its heavy reliance upon military contractors.

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Donald Spearin and the anonymous reviewers of Contemporary Security Policy for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. The author would also like to acknowledge gratefully the assistance provided by the Centre for International and Security Studies at York University, Toronto, Canada, and the Canadian Department of National Defence's Security and Defence Forum. The views expressed in the article are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect those of the Canadian Department of National Defence or the Government of Canada.

Notes

For analysts like Charles Krauthammer, the world is in the midst of what will likely be a long unipolar moment. Other analysts, such as Paul Kennedy, who predicted before the end of the Cold War that the United States was in decline as historical cycles suggest, now assert that the end of American dominance is hard to perceive. See Charles Krauthammer, ‘The Unipolar Moment Revisited’, The National Interest, No. 70 (Winter 2002–2003), p. 5; Paul Kennedy, ‘The Eagle has Landed’, Financial Times, 2 February 2002, available from ⟨http://www.ft.com⟩. Kennedy's initial appraisals of American power are made in Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500 to 2000 (New York: Vintage Books, 1987).

Krauthammer, p. 7.

See Joseph Nye Jr., ‘Soft Power’, Foreign Policy, No. 80 (Fall 1990), pp. 153–71.

See Michael Mousseau, ‘Market Civilization and its Clash with Terror’, International Security, Vol. 27, No. 3 (Winter 2002–2003), pp. 5–29; Stephen M. Walt, ‘Beyond bin Laden: Reshaping U.S. Foreign Policy’, International Security, Vol. 26, No. 3 (Winter 2001–2002), pp. 56–78.

The policy of pre‐emption is outlined in United States, Office of the President, The National Security Strategy of the United States (Washington, DC: USGPO, 2002). See also Michael Scott Doran, ‘Palestine, Iraq, and American Strategy’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 82, No. 1 (January–February 2003), p. 23.

James Traub, ‘The Next Resolution’, New York Times Magazine, 13 April 2003, p. 51.

The argument of the domino effect can be found in ‘Remarks by the President of the United States at the 20th Anniversary of the National Endowment for Democracy’, United States Chamber of Congress, Washington DC, 6 November 2003, available from ⟨http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/11/20031106-3.html⟩. See also Marcus Gee, ‘Time for Washington to drop useful despots’, Globe and Mail, 14 November 2003, available from ⟨http://www.globeandmail.com⟩.

See, for instance, David Isenberg, Soldiers of Fortune Ltd.: A Profile of Today's Private Sector Corporate Mercenary Firms, Center for Defense Information Monograph (Washington, DC: Center for Defense Information, 1997); Robert Mandel, Armies without States: The Privatization of Security (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2002); David Shearer, Private Armies and Military Intervention, Adelphi Paper 316 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1998); James Larry Taulbee, ‘Mercenaries, Private Armies and Security Companies in Contemporary Policy’, International Politics, Vol. 37, No. 4 (December 2000), pp. 433–56; Peter W. Singer, Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003).

The author recognizes that, at the time of writing, a wide variety of companies are employed by the United States government to help rebuild and manage the physical infrastructure and institutions of Iraq. For the sake of focus, this analysis will be limited to military contractors. Further information on contractors involved in the rebuilding of Iraq can be found at the Iraq contracts internet site ⟨http://www.export.gov/iraq/contracts/index.html⟩.

Michael Dobbs, ‘U.S. Facing Bigger Bill For Iraq War’, Washington Post, 1 December 2002, p. A01; For a history of the longstanding private presence, see Martin Van Creveld, Supplying War: Logistics from Wallenstein to Patton (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1977).

Similar observations are made in Steven J. Zamparelli, ‘Contractors on the Battlefield: What Have We Signed Up For?’ Research Report, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, March 1999, p. 1, available from ⟨http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA395505⟩.

The numbers are taken from George A. Cahlink, ‘Send In The Contractors’, Air Force Magazine, 1 January 2003, available from ⟨http://www.afa.org/magazine/⟩; Ron Martz, ‘Civilians Aid Army, But Raise Concern’, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 2 February 2003, available from ⟨http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/⟩. Some analysts suggest that the ratio may have been as high as 6:1 in Vietnam, a ratio that deals with individuals such as those employed by the CIA or working in military recreation centres. This ratio, however, refers to publicly employed civilians rather than contracted civilians performing military-type roles. The author wishes to thank Peter Singer for making this distinction.

‘Remarks by General Henry H. Shelton, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, at the Mid-America Committee Leadership Luncheon’, Chicago, Illinois, 26 March 2001, available from ⟨http://www.dtic.mil/jcs/⟩.

Statistics are taken from Nelson D. Schwartz, ‘The Pentagon's Private Army’, Fortune, 3 March 2003, available from ⟨http://www.fortune.com/fortune⟩.

‘Business on the Battlefield: the Role of Private Military Companies’, Corporate Research E-Letter No. 30, December 2002, available from ⟨http://www.corp-research.org⟩.

Seth Stern, ‘Pentagon may Trade more Fatigues for Civvies’, Christian Science Monitor, 18 June 2003, available from ⟨http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0618/p02s01-usmi.html⟩.

Many analysts have also noted that the lure of the civilian economy and the increasingly utilitarian approach towards the use of force has a negative effect upon recruitment rates. See Christopher Coker, ‘Outsourcing War’, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Autumn–Winter 1999), pp. 95–113; Stephen E. Ambrose, ‘The End of the Draft, and More: A Common Identity is Lost’, National Review, 9 August 1999, pp. 35–6; Andrew J. Bacevich, ‘Losing Private Ryan: Why the Citizen-Soldier is MIA’, National Review, 9 August 1999, pp. 32–4.

Statistic taken from online discussion, ‘Military & The Private Sector’, with Peter Singer, 7 February 2003, available from ⟨http://www.washingtonpost.com⟩.

Tony Perry, ‘Hated Navy Task Is Being Shipped Out’, Los Angeles Times, 5 February 2001, available from ⟨http://www.latimes.com⟩.

See, for instance, United States, Department of Defense, Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Technology, ‘Report of the Defense Science Task Force on Quality of Life’, October 1995; United States, Department of Defense, Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, ‘Directions for Defense: Roles and Missions Commission of the Armed Forces Report to Congress’, 24 May 1995.

United States, Department of Defense, ‘Quadrennial Defense Review Report’, 30 September 2001, p. 53.

Ann Scott Tyson, ‘Wider Mission Stretches Military’, Christian Science Monitor, 2 May 2002, p. 1; James E. Althouse, ‘Contractors on the Battlefield: What Doctrine Says, and Doesn't Say’, available from ⟨http://www.almc.army.mil/ALOG/issues/NovDec98/MS323.htm⟩.

James R. Davis, Fortune's Warriors: Private Armies and the New World Order (Vancouver, BC: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd., 2000), p. 23.

David Phinney, ‘Pentagon Can't Track Civilians’, Defense News, 24 February 2003, p. 30.

Keith Hayward, ‘The Globalisation of Defence Industries’, Survival, Vol. 42, No. 2 (Summer 2000), p. 122.

The number of firms is taken from Mark Fineman, ‘Privatized Army In Harm's Way’, Los Angeles Times, 24 January 2003, p. 1.

Barry Yeoman, ‘Soldiers of Good Fortune’, Independent, 23 July 2003, available from ⟨http://www.indyweek.com/durham/2003-07-23/cover.html⟩.

The hybrid reference is appropriate in light of the environments in which these firms are frequently employed, (conflict/violence prone weak states in the developing world), the lack of distinction between criminal, policing and military elements, and the actual effects the firms may have in these environments.

Cited in David Phinney, ‘Contractors Fill Combat Niche’, Defense News, 24 February 2003, p. 30.

Gordon L. Campbell, ‘Contractors on the Battlefield: The Ethics of Paying Civilians to Enter Harm's Way and Requiring Soldiers to Depend Upon Them’, paper presented to the Joint Services Conference on Professional Ethics, Springfield, Virginia, United States, January 2000, available from ⟨http://www.usafa.af.mil/jscope/JSCOPE00/Campbell00.html⟩.

Michael Dobbs, ‘Halliburton's Deals Greater Than Thought’, Washington Post, 28 August 2003, available from ⟨http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp‐dyn/articles/A56429‐2003Aug27.html⟩.

Civilian firms that are reconstructing the infrastructure and social systems of Iraq damaged during the fighting and sanctions of the past 12 years are required to provide their own security, thus forming another lucrative opportunity for other firms.

See Brian Finlay and Michael O'Hanlon, ‘NATO's Underachieving Middle Powers: From Burdenshedding to Burdensharing’, in Adekeye Adebajo and Chandra Lekha Sriram (eds), Managing Armed Conflicts in the 21st Century (London: Frank Cass, 2001), pp. 145–60.

See G. John Ikenberry, ‘America's Imperial Ambition’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 81, No. 5 (September–October 2002), pp. 44–60; Elke Krahmann, ‘The Emergence of Security Governance in Post-Cold War Europe’, ERC ‘One Europe or Several?’ Programme Working Paper 36/01, University of Sussex, 2001.

See Richard K. Betts, ‘Compromised Command: Inside NATO's First War’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 80, No. 4 (July–August 2001), pp. 126–32; Michael Mandelbaum, ‘A Perfect Failure – NATO's War Against Yugoslavia’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 78, No. 5 (September–October 1999), pp. 2–8; Peter W. Rodman, ‘The Fallout From Kosovo’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 78, No. 4 (July–August 1999), pp. 45–51.

David King, ‘We Need A Romanow Commission For Defence and Foreign Policy’, Policy Options, 7–14 April 2002, p. 8.

Noted in Krauthammer, p. 10.

The general point of all states from the developed world now being able to rely upon firms instead of other states is noted in Elke Krahmann, ‘Private Firms and the New Security Governance’, paper presented at the International Studies Association 43rd Annual Convention, New Orleans, Louisiana, United States, 23–27 March 2002, available from ⟨http://www.isanet.org/noarchive/krahmann.html⟩.

Note that for many of the 31 countries operating in Iraq, the United States is covering their deployment costs. Moreover, the approximately 20,000 military personnel from these countries are highly reliant upon the American military, and by extension, the approximately 20,000 contracted personnel in Iraq that work for the American military. Only six of these countries have over 500 personnel in Iraq, an amount that makes most countries' contributions ‘penny packets’ that lack the necessary resources. In contrast, the number of personnel of military contractors is second only to those uniformed personnel of the American armed forces. See Scott Taylor, ‘Colin Powell has Tough Task in Adding Muscle to Iraq Effort’, Halifax Herald, 2 September 2003, available from ⟨http://www.herald.ns.ca/stories/2003/09/02/fOpinion107.raw.html⟩; Ian Traynor, ‘The Privatization of War’, The Guardian, 10 December 2003, available from ⟨http://politics.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4815701-110481,00.html⟩.

James N. Rosenau, Turbulence in World Politics: A Theory of Change and Continuity. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990); James N. Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel (eds), Governance Without Government: Order and Change in World Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992); Rodney Bruce Hall and Thomas J. Biersteker (eds), The Emergence of Private Authority in Global Governance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002).

David Osborne and Ted Gaebler, Reinventing Government: How the Entrepreneurial Spirit is Transforming the Public Sector (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1992), p. 20.

Ray Salvatore Jennings, ‘After Saddam Hussein – Winning a Peace If It Comes to War’, available from ⟨http://www.usip.org/pubs/specialreports/sr102.html⟩.

Dobbs, ‘U.S. Facing Bigger Bill’.

David Isenberg, ‘Jostling in the Rebuilding Queue’, Asia Times, 16 April 2003, available from ⟨http://www.atimes.com⟩; Joshua Kurlantzick, ‘Outsourcing the Dirty Work’, The American Prospect, May 2003, available from ⟨http://www.prospect.org⟩.

Deborah Avant, ‘Beyond Regulation: Institutional Lessons and Trade-offs of Private Security’, paper presented at In Search of Security: An International Conference on Policing & Security, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, February 2003, pp. 10–12.

Jackie Spinner, ‘Contracts to Rebuild Iraq Go to Chosen Few’, Washington Post, 28 March 2003, p. E01.

Elizabeth Becker, ‘Details Given on Contract Halliburton Was Awarded’, New York Times, 11 April 2003, available from ⟨http://www.nytimes.com⟩; Mark Fineman, ‘U.S. Firms Secretly Bid to Uphold Law in Iraq’, Los Angeles Times, 18 April 2003, available from ⟨http://www.latimes.com⟩.

United States, General Accounting Office, ‘Contingency Operations: Army Should Do More to Control Contract Cost in the Balkans’, Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on Readiness and Support, Committee on Armed Services, United States Senate, September 2000, p. 5.

Nick Mathiason, ‘The First Privatised War’, The Observer, 2 March 2003, available from ⟨http://www.observer.co.uk/⟩; ‘Business on the Battlefield’.

United States, General Accounting Office, ‘Defense Budget: Need to Strengthen Guidance and Oversight of Contingency Operations Costs’, Report to the Chairman and Ranking Minority Member, Subcommittee on Defense, Committee on Appropriations, United States Senate, May 2002, p. 21.

Zamparelli, pp. 24–6.

DynCorp has provided personnel for other policing missions in Haiti, East Timor, and Kosovo.

Colum Lynch, ‘Misconduct, Corruption by U.S. Police Mar Bosnia Mission’, Washington Post, 29 May 2001, p. A01.

This assertion is made in Jonathan D. Tepperman, ‘Out of Service’, The New Republic, 25 November 2002, available from ⟨http://www.tnr.com⟩.

As a reflection of the larger international regimen for the promotion of human rights, American law allows foreign citizens to sue American firms for activities committed abroad. The pertinent legislation includes the Alien Tort Claims Act and the United States Torture Victim Protection Act. This recourse, however, has its limitations because the aggrieved must have the necessary financial resources to bring successfully an accusation to American courts. Furthermore, a positive result is not assured because in the past, judicial rulings on similar matters have been conservative. There must be a contract, agreement or conspiracy to intentionally violate human rights on a large scale. See Eric W. Orts, ‘War and the Business Corporation’, Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, Vol. 35, No. 2 (March 2002), pp. 570–74.

While the act is somewhat redundant, DynCorp should be credited for requesting its Iraq-bound employees to sign a document acknowledging that human trafficking and involvement with prostitution ‘are considered illegal by the international community and are immoral, unethical and strictly prohibited’. John Crewdson, ‘Contractor Tries To Avert Repeat Of Bosnia Woes’, Chicago Tribune, 19 April 2003, available from ⟨http://www.chicagotribune.com⟩.

Cited in Antony Barnett, ‘Scandal-hit US firm wins key contracts’, The Guardian, 13 April 2003, available from ⟨http://www.guardian.co.uk⟩.

Avant, p. 12.

Rhys Dogan and Michael Pugh, From Military to Market Imperatives: Peacekeeping and the New Public Policy, Plymouth International Papers No. 8 (Plymouth: International Studies Centre, University of Plymouth, 1997), p. 18.

The author wishes to thank one of the anonymous reviewers for Contemporary Security Policy for raising this point.

Martz; International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, ‘Privatizing Combat, the New World Order’, 28 October 2002, available from ⟨http://www.icij.org/dtaweb/icij_bow.asp⟩.

Joseph Giordono, ‘Contractors Do More Than Sling Troops' Chow’, European Stars and Stripes, 10 March 2003, available from ⟨http://www.estripes.com/⟩.

The author wishes to thank one of the anonymous reviewers for Contemporary Security Policy for raising this point.

Schwartz.

‘Business on the Battlefield’.

This number was calculated on the basis that the contractors had the appropriate equipment and training to return to the contaminated areas. Noted in Kim M. Nelson, ‘Contractors on the Battlefield: Force Multipliers or Force Dividers?’, Air Command and Staff College, Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, April 2000, p. 13, available from ⟨http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA393965⟩.

Kenneth Bredemeier, ‘Thousands of Private Contractors Support U.S. Forces in Persian Gulf’, Washington Post, 3 March 2003, p. E01.

Dobbs, ‘Halliburton's Deals Greater Than Thought’; Anthony Bianco and Stephanie Anderson Forest, ‘Outsourcing War – An Inside Look at Brown & Root’, Business Week, 15 September 2003, available from ⟨http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/ article4659.htm⟩; David Wood, ‘Some of Army's Civilian Contractors Are No-Shows In Iraq’, Newhouse News Service, 1 August 2003, available from ⟨http://www.newhouse.com⟩. To a certain extent, this problem can be limited by relying upon contractors to protect other contractors. Nevertheless, it does not overcome the issue regarding unlimited liability.

Fouad Ajami, ‘Iraq and the Arabs' Future’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 82, No. 1 (January–February 2003), p. 10.

Cited in Jason Vest, ‘The Army's Empire Skeptics’, The Nation, 3 March 2003, available from ⟨http://www.thenation.com⟩.

Yeoman, ‘Soldiers of Good Fortune’.

Thomas Carothers, ‘Promoting Democracy and Fighting Terror’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 82, No. 1 (January/February 2003), pp. 92–3.

Cited in Schwartz.