What's it really worth?

Some don't want to be there, some want to come home, other's wonder why their there in the first place, yet you have a very lucrative business going on right under their noses.

Why not just hire a Mercenary Army and let them handle the Iraqi problems...

There are currently 20,000 private security types, it's a quick way to make a lot of money for some, but is it right?

And in light of what just happened, who's doing what to whom?

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As I understand it companies like Blackwater are employed to do jobs the US forces don't want to be seen to be doing (like killing civis).

I dare say they absolute haemorrhage cash from the US Government too.

Frankly it's all a sh!tty mess.

 

Not a good way to operate. Even to American standards of personal discipline, these hired guns seem to do very much what they want, the way they want to do it. I doubt your average Iraqi will know the difference between them and Regulars. Even if one is attempting to win "hearts and minds", this sort of thing is unlikely to achieve it.

The US needs to grasp this and fast. Making these individuals appear to be beyond the law is no doubt hindering the overall objective.