Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2000 12:26:15 -0800
From: Ron Rowe <•••@••.•••>
Organization: Rowe Communication Services
To: Ron Rowe <•••@••.•••>
Subject: SPECIAL ALERT: U.S. "military" companies in Colombia, Kosovo, ...
[If you are concerned about the interlinked issues of corporatization,
militarization, globalization and privatization, I urge you to read the
material below. Please forward to anyone you think would be
interested. (Apologies for cross-posting!)]
THE PRIVATIZATION OF WAR --
U.S. "military specialty" contractors in Colombia have also been
involved in Kosovo, Bosnia, Croatia, ...
-- "Generals for Hire" and the New World Order's private police force
*** ALERT ***
* The information below may give you additional cause
* to call your congressional representative AT ONCE to
* oppose the massive aid package for Colombia, which is
* scheduled for a vote on March 16th. After that the
* Senate will vote, probably before the end of March.
*
* Most of the package is military aid. The Clinton
* Administration had requested $1.3 billion. The House
* Appropriations Committee increased the amount to
* $1.7 billion. This aid package is part of the
* Omnibus Supplemental Appropriations Bill for Fiscal
* Year 2000.
*
* The toll-free number for the Congressional
* Switchboard in Washington DC is 1-888-449-3511.
Included below is a very interesting article from the Dallas Morning
News on U.S. "military specialty companies" looking to profit from the
U.S. military "aid" package to Colombia, and additional information
discovered in the course of looking further into the companies mentioned
in the article.
Pay particular note to this little revelation: "Two Virginia-based
companies, DynCorp Inc. and Military Professional Resources Inc., or
MPRI, are completing contracts related to logistical support and
training of Colombian police and counterinsurgency forces ... [MPRI]
should be well-placed for a contract, since it also helped the Colombian
government devise the official, three-phase "action plan" that was
presented to Congress last month outlining how the $1.6 billion would be
allocated."
Which is made all the MORE interesting by some of MPRI's and DynCorp's
other recent involvements in areas of U.S. military activity...
An article in this week's London Sunday Times reported that American
"diplomatic observers" in the Kosovo Verification Mission of the OSCE
(Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe) prior to last
year's bombing campaign were in fact "a CIA front, gathering
intelligence on the KLA's arms and leadership." The article concluded
by stating: "Agim Ceku, the KLA commander in the latter stages of the
[Kosovo] conflict, had established American contacts through his work in
the Croatian army, which had been modernised with the help of Military
Professional Resources Inc, an American company specialising in military
training and procurement. This company's personnel were in Kosovo, along
with others from a similar company, Dyncorps, that helped in the
American-backed programme for the Bosnian army."
Michel Chossudovsky, author of "The Globalization of Poverty: Impacts of
IMF and World Bank Reforms" and a vocal critic of U.S./NATO actions in
Kosovo, refers to MPRI as a "U.S. mercenary outfit" and stated last year
that "MPRI is on contract to advise the KLA and General Agim Ceku
(financed by U.S. military aid). In 1995, MPRI advised the Croatian
armed forces in the planning of Operation Storm which led to the
massacre of Krajina Serbs."
In "Humanitarian Spies", Jared Israel, editor of the "Emperor's Clothes"
website, reported: "The U.S. verification team was composed of employees
of Dyncorp, a Virginia company that has grown rich off Government work.
At the 1992 Senate hearings on R. James Woolsey's appointment as head of
the CIA, Woolsey commented: "I own less than one-quarter of one percent
of the -- diluted shares of a company named Dyncorp here in the
Washington, D.C. area. And the corporation has, from time to time, had a
handful of very small contracts with the Central Intelligence Agency."
... Dyncorp's "very small contracts" have included covert work for the
Company in Columbia and Peru."
By the way, DynCorp announced last month that Ambassador William
Courtney, a former National Security Council senior staff director who
recently co-chaired the U.S. delegation to the Review Conference of the
OSCE, has now joined the company as president of its Security and
Intelligence Unit, DynMeridian.
A "leading information technology and outsourcing services firm" with
annual revenues of more than $1.2 billion (which I dare say would make
R. James Woolsey's "less than one-quarter of one percent" worth a rather
tidy sum), DynCorp provides a wide variety of services under government
and commercial contracts. Its security contracts have ranged from
providing physical security for U.S.-controlled installations in Qatar
to designing a "Safe Schools" program in partnership with the National
Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP). It also has
Information Technology contracts with the State Department, Department
of Defense, Army, Navy and Air Force, among other government agencies,
provides on-going support for the U.S. Department of Justice's Asset
Forfeiture Program to seize the assets of illicit organizations, and
will operate one of three regional data centers for the 2000 census.
And if you think NATO is the New World Order's armed forces, meet its
would-be private police force -- DynCorp. The company's International
Police Monitors website http://www.dyncorp.com/DynIPTF (the animated
graphic alone is really worth taking a look at) bears the motto "Our
mission is building democracy world wide," and provides background and
recruiting information seeking active duty police officers to serve in
the United States Civilian Police Force in Haiti and the International
Police Task Force in Bosnia.
DynCorp's online fact sheet on Bosnia states: "Since 1989 the United
States government has increasingly become involved in international
policing development and training. The first major project, Panama, was
followed by similar efforts in El Salvador, Somalia, and most recently
Haiti. ... The latest and largest international police task force,
consisting of about 1750 police officers from about 36 nations, is in
Bosnia."
Since then, DynCorp has also recruited and trained officers for the
international police force in Kosovo. A State Department official said
the international civilian police force will be instrumental in quashing
potential conflicts between Kosovars and Serbs. Before leaving for
training in Fort Worth, Texas, Officer Doug Winfield of Milwaukie,
Oregon stated: "I think it's real important what the U.S. and NATO are
doing: instilling values and a criminal justice system." These
privatized police forces are organized under contract to the U.S. State
Department in cooperation with the United Nations.
Additional material on MPRI and DynCorp is included following the
article below.
If you are interested in receiving further highlights regarding the
interlinked issues of corporatization, militarization, globalization and
privatization that will not normally be distributed to these lists,
please e-mail a request directly to:
•••@••.•••
Thank you,
Ron Rowe
Citizens' Alliance of Santa Barbara
(Santa Barbara Alliance for Democracy)
P.O. Box 2170
Simi Valley, CA 93062
(805) 581-3250
Fax: (805) 579-3825
E-mail: •••@••.•••
+++
Subject: [mil-corp] "Military companies" ready to administer US
military aid to Colombia
Date: Sun, 05 Mar 2000 22:00:45 -0800
From: Int'l Network on Disarmament and Globalization <•••@••.•••>
Network members:
More information on the privatization of war - in this case
"outsourcing" of US military aid to Colombia. Already, a half dozen
"military companies" have located in Colombia in anticipation of US
military contracts to administer and the deliver the Pentagon's $1.6
billion contribution to the "war on drugs."
Steve Staples
*****************
DALLAS MORNING NEWS Sunday, 27
February 2000
Contractors playing increasing role in U.S. drug war
By Tod Robberson
BOGOTA - Alex B. Pinero's resume reads like that of a man looking for a
lot of action and maybe even a little trouble.
A former member of the U.S. Army Special Forces, Mr. Pinero has served
in three combat theaters, speaks three languages and specializes in
field medicine, intelligence-gathering and psychological operations. "I
am also well-acquainted with and can operate in virtually any hostile
(geographic, literal or temporal) environment," his resume boasts.
Mr. Pinero is working in Colombia on a noncombat, private contract with
the U.S. government. Because he is a contract employee, he said, the
government would bear no responsibility should he run into trouble while
helping wage a rapidly escalating U.S. war on drugs in a land where more
than 20,000 leftist guerrillas are gunning for people like him every
day.
Thousands of highly qualified former U.S. service members such as Mr.
Pinero could be the answer to a big riddle dogging the Clinton
administration: How can Washington send $1.6 billion in mostly military
aid to Colombia without sharply increasing the current level of U.S.
military staffing needed to support that aid?
The answer, military officials and other specialists say, is a
well-established private business practice called "outsourcing," in
which companies that employ skilled specialists like Mr. Pinero take on
the jobs that the U.S. military either cannot or will not do.
In private business, outsourcing can be something as simple as hiring a
free-lance computer whiz to design a company Web site or specialized
software. In a military context, outsourcing is an increasingly popular
alternative for the government to provide counterinsurgency trainers,
pilots for surveillance aircraft or to staff intelligence-gathering
outposts in hostile territory without putting active-duty military
personnel at risk.
This is not mercenary work, according to specialists in the field. U.S.
law strictly limits such consultants to providing nonlethal service.
Firms await business
Neither the U.S. nor Colombian government has stated publicly how big a
role outsourcing will play if Congress approves the White House's
proposed $1.6 billion, two-year aid package to Colombia. Most of the aid
would pay for 63 combat helicopters along with the pilot training and
logistical support those aircraft will require, as well as the training
and outfitting of two Colombian army counterinsurgency/counternarcotics
battalions.
At least six U.S. military-specialty companies have set up operations in
the region, apparently in anticipation of future Colombia-related
contracts, according to U.S. military sources. Two Virginia-based
companies, DynCorp Inc. and Military Professional Resources Inc., or
MPRI, are completing contracts related to logistical support and
training of Colombian police and counterinsurgency forces, officials of
those companies say.
DynCorp, which has employed Vietnam-veteran helicopter pilots in
Colombia, provides maintenance and support for drug-crop eradication
flights, often over guerrilla-dominated territory.
MPRI spokesman Ed Soyster, a retired Army lieutenant general and former
director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, said his company is gearing
up for new business in case the new aid package is approved.
The company should be well-placed for a contract, since it also helped
the Colombian government devise the official, three-phase "action plan"
that was presented to Congress last month outlining how the $1.6 billion
would be allocated.
"We're a military company. We're able to hand-pick our people from a
select group of guys who like to come into this type of environment.
They have an established code of ethics and code of conduct," Mr.
Soyster said. "A guy works in this business and works for us because he
can continue to do the things he likes and does well. He's happy because
he's doing what he's trained to do."
Mr. Soyster said MPRI maintains a database of 11,000 retired officers
and enlisted service members available to work on temporary assignment.
The company also has provided training and logistical support for
military operations in the Balkans, Middle East and Africa, he said.
"I am unabashedly an admirer of outsourcing. . . . There's very few
things in life you can't outsource," said retired Army general Barry
McCaffrey, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control
Policy.
'Deliver the goods'
He said he did not anticipate a large-scale buildup of active-duty
troops to supplement the 80 to 250 U.S. military personnel serving in
Colombia, but he stopped short of saying that any additional training
spots would be given to private contractors.
"It's not my job to design the U.S. support effort to conduct logistics,
maintenance, training support for this $1.6 billion over the coming five
years. I personally do not anticipate a significant U.S.-enhanced
footprint in this country," he said. "Clearly we must have a U.S.
representation adequate to deliver the goods, to make sure that we know
what we're doing. . . . It's a huge package compared to what we've done
in the past."
Colombian Defense Minister Luis Fernando Ramirez acknowledged that
private U.S. military companies already are providing assistance to the
armed forces and that more probably would be contracted if the U.S. aid
package is approved.
"We must put in place the best people to manage these resources," he
explained, adding that private military companies often provide
personnel "with much more experience . . . at a lower cost" than either
his government or Washington can provide.
He revealed that the U.S. Southern Command is considering upgrading its
staffing levels in Colombia and bringing in a general full-time to
manage the military-aid package. Even that job, he suggested, could be
outsourced.
"Probably, it is more costly to send an active-duty general to be
present full-time in Colombia than it is to send a retired officer"
working for a private company, Mr. Ramirez said.
The wrong hands
Serious questions of accountability are raised, however, when private
contractors replace active-duty troops in the field, even if it is just
in an advisory capacity, said Carlos Salinas, Latin America program
director for the human-rights group Amnesty International. There must be
monitors on the advice and training that Colombian soldiers receive to
ensure that those are not passed on to known human-rights violators,
such as army units linked to paramilitary groups.
"The Defense Department itself, in its training, has to comply with
certain human-rights guidelines because they are mandated by law to do
so," Mr. Salinas said. "But it is unclear how far that mandate extends
when one is talking about, essentially, private actors."
James Woods, a Washington lobbyist and former deputy assistant secretary
of defense, said the political risks of using active-duty troops in such
dangerous places as Colombia often outweigh the advantages. The use of
retired military personnel under contract, by contrast, generally
provides a higher level of expertise with lower overall costs and
minimal political risks.
"If the U.S. government wants to pursue a major security-assistance
component - and I think it must - do you do it with a major buildup of
U.S. troops on the ground? I think the answer is no," he said.
Outsourcing has allowed Washington to provide an important military
presence in such war zones as Bosnia, Colombia and the Persian Gulf at
times when manpower shortages, budgetary constraints or political
pressures prevented the Pentagon from deploying active-duty military
personnel, said Georgetown University professor Herbert Howe, a
specialist in military outsourcing.
"The military has dropped over 40 percent in manpower and budget since
the late 1980s. . . . The U.S. government is increasingly shifting over
to outsourcing," Mr. Howe said. "I think we'll be seeing that more in
Colombia as well."
In addition, Mr. Howe said, there is inevitably a public outcry whenever
U.S. troops are injured or killed in a foreign conflict, whereas less
attention is paid when privately contracted military trainers or
specialists suffer the same fate. The government has minimal reporting
requirements regarding casualties suffered by private contractors.
3 died in crashes
DynCorp has lost three private-contract aviators in fatal crashes over
the last three years. Outsourcing specialists noted the minimal
attention paid in the United States to those deaths compared with the
days of front-page news generated last July when a spy plane carrying
five active-duty U.S. service personnel crashed in southern Colombia.
A former U.S. military officer who was responsible for outsourcing
various counternarcotics operations in Colombia said the "exposure risks
for Uncle Sam" are greatly reduced when private contractors take over
the dangerous assignments.
"The life is certainly just as important, whether it's a contract
employee or a soldier. But exposure-wise, whoa, it's much less," the
retired officer said, asking not to be identified.
"If something goes wrong, it's important for Washington to be able to
say, 'There wasn't a soldier killed.' It still gets attention with a
private contractor, but to the public, it has nowhere near the same
impact," the retired officer said.
Mr. Pinero, a contract employee with DynCorp, agreed to be interviewed
on condition that details of his mission in Colombia not be discussed.
He said he does not feel threatened working in Colombia's hostile
environment. He is, however, looking for another job.
"There is a lot of danger in Colombia. I'm aware of it in an abstract
sense. But then again, I spent 10 years in the Army, so this is
basically an extension of what I did in the Army," he said. "If you're
not jumping out of airplanes in the middle of the night or getting shot
at all the time, it's not that bad."
____________________________________________________________________
International Network on Disarmament and Globalization
405-825 Granville Street, Vancouver, British Columbia V6Z 1K9 CANADA
tel: (604) 687-3223 fax: (604) 687-3277
•••@••.••• www.indg.org
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as the first and only line in the message body.
+++
http://www.dalmatia.net/croatia/military/mrpi.htm
1995
Military Professional Resources Inc. (MPRI)
1201 East Abingdon Drive, Alexandria, VA
Military Professional Resources Inc. (MPRI), with $7 million in annual
revenues, provides military training and advice by retired U.S. military
officers under contract to foreing governments. Under a contract
initiated contract by with a request from the Croatian Defense Minister
to US Deputy Secretary of Defense John Deutch the company has played a
major role in assisting the Croatian army since the beginning of 1995.
CAPABILITIES
%< snip >%
The firm has such "capabilities," as it calls them, as the following:
Doctrine Development, Force Management, Mobile Training Teams, Wargame
Support, Officer and NCO Development, Democracy Transition and, very
last on the list, Military Training.
%< snip >%
+++
GENERALS FOR HIRE
CONFRONTED WITH ITS TRICKIEST TASK IN BOSNIA, THE U.S. HAS MADE PLANS TO
PAY SOMEONE ELSE TO DO IT
By MARK THOMPSON/WASHINGTON, WITH REPORTING BY MASSIMO
CALABRESI/SARAJEVO AND ALEXANDRA STIGLMAYER/TUZLA, WITH OTHER BUREAUS
TIME magazine; January 15, 1996; page 34
THIS IS THE AGE OF PRIVATIZATION. All across America, communities are
hiring for-profit firms to perform the tasks that have traditionally
fallen to government -- educating children, running prisons, even
building and maintaining highways. There is one job, though, that seems
to be an unlikely candidate for outsourcing: executing the foreign
policy of the U.S. If that is not the business of the Federal
Government, what is? In Bosnia, however, the U.S. has a problem: there
is one particular aspect of its mission that is crucial but that it is
loath to carry out. So the very 1990s solution is likely to be hiring a
private company to do the job instead.
For anyone who wants to rent a general, the place to go is Military
Professional Resources Inc., headquartered in a squat, red brick office
building in Alexandria, Virginia. Eight years old and with annual
revenues of about $12 million, MPRI is, according to its brochure, "the
greatest corporate assemblage of military expertise in the world." With
160 full-time employees and some 2,000 retired generals, admirals and
other officers on call, it is making a fair claim. Among its most
prominent executives are retired four-star General Carl Vuono, who ran
the Army during Desert Storm and now heads the company's growing
overseas business, and Crosbie ("Butch") Saint, who was once the chief
of the Army's operations in Europe and who oversees MPRI's work there.
This is the outfit that the U.S. will probably turn to for help in
Bosnia.
Why would the U.S. need MPRI? The Dayton accord calls for disarmament
negotiations to reduce the Bosnian Serbs' military edge over the weaker
Muslim-Croat Federation. While its European allies vigorously disagree,
the U.S.believes that even if arms control shrinks the Bosnian Serb
arsenal, the federation will require new weaponry to ensure a military
balance in the region. The accord allows arms to start flowing into the
region beginning in mid-March. "We will not be able to leave unless the
Bosnian government is armed and prepared to defend itself," says
Democratic Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware. "That's the ticket home for
Americans."
The problem is the Bosnian Serbs. They object to the notion that the
U.S., by agreement a neutral party, would make any move to strengthen
the Bosnian army. The U.S. fears Serb attacks on its troops if it uses
them to arm and train the Bosnians. In fact, the Clinton Administration
has pledged that U.S. troops will not play an active role in rearming
the Bosnians. So how is Washington to achieve what it considers the
necessary balance of power in the region? After months of fretting, the
U.S. has come up with a plan. Senior officials told TIME that some
private company, most likely MPRI, which has done work for the
Croats,will train the Bosnians, who will be freshly outfitted with
hundreds of tons of new weapons provided by the U.S. and its allies.
"MPRI has got the know-how and the track record in the Balkans," says a
senior Pentagon official.
Last week James Pardew, the Pentagon's point man in negotiating the
Dayton accord, flew to Sarajevo to urge the Bosnian government to hire
MPRI or a competitor like BDM Inc. or SAIC (Science Applications
International). Pardew plans to tell the Bosnians that weapons will not
begin to flow into Bosnia for months, but training (assuming the
Bosnians act swiftly to organize the effort) is expected to begin within
a few weeks, perhaps in Croatia, U.S. officials say. Assistant Secretary
of State Richard Holbrooke, who brokered the Dayton pact, recently spoke
favorably of MPRI in testimony to Congress and says training "can begin
as soon as the contracts are worked out."
MPRI is ready. "The Bosnians need training at the company level, putting
battalion staff together, that sort of thing," says retired Army Lieut.
General Harry Soyster. "It can be done pretty quickly." Formerly the
head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Soyster, MPRI's operations
chief, is the only official who speaks publicly for the company. For the
past year, MPRI has had 15 men in Croatia, a group headed by retired
two-star General Richard Griffitts. They have been teaching the Croats
to run a military force in a democracy, and recently signed a second
contract to reorganize Croatia's Defense Ministry. Also during the past
year, MPRI, under a State Department contract, has been monitoring cargo
flowing from Serbia to the Bosnian Serbs as part of an international
effort.
Croatia gave a dramatic demonstration of military power last August,
when it drove rebel Serbs from the Krajina region. That offensive took
place seven months after MPRI began its work in the country. Serb and
European military analysts suggested that the Croats had outside help,
and MPRI quickly found itself on the defensive. But Soyster insists
MPRI's role in Croatia is limited to classroom instruction on
military-civil relations and doesn't involve training in tactics or
weapons. Other U.S. military men say whatever MPRI did for the
Croats--and many suspect more than classroom instruction was involved --
it was worth every penny. "Carl Vuono and Butch Saint are hired guns and
in it for the money," says Charles Boyd, a recently retired four-star
Air Force general who was the Pentagon's No. 2 man in Europe until July.
"They did a very good job for the Croats, and I have no doubt they'll do
a good job in Bosnia. "
In a secret, just finished report that cost $400,000 to prepare, the
Pentagon has determined the Bosnians' military needs. The study
concludes that the Bosnian Serbs' advantage could be erased by giving
the Muslim-Croat Federation about 50 tanks plus similar numbers of
artillery and armored vehicles, say Pentagon officials familiar with the
findings. The Muslims also need antitank and antimortar weapons, light
arms and basics like boots and bullets. In an indication of how
important MPRI's role would be, the report contends that the forces need
more training than arming, especially in tactics for midsize units
involving hundreds of troops.
Biden, who backs the Bosnians, has quietly won $100 million in Pentagon
weaponry and supplies for Sarajevo in a 1996 spending bill. Some U.S.
officials say it will take several times that amount to right the
military balance. Nations likely to be asked for weapons and cash
include Turkey, Egypt and Pakistan. Those countries, expecting nearly $3
billion in U.S. aid this year, may have a hard time saying no.
As for the Bosnians, this aid effort will come with strings attached. A
key condition, senior U.S. officials told TIME, requires Bosnia to sever
all its military and intelligence links with Iran. Ejup Ganic, the
federation Vice President, gave TIME official confirmation that Bosnia
had received arms from Iran, bringing them through gaps in the NATO
no-fly zone. "What we received from Iran," he says, "it's kind of a
science-fiction solution. You cannot load a ship with ammunition and
bring it in a normal way." But Ganic won't quibble about cutting Iranian
ties now. "You bring us stuff," he says, and "we won't look anywhere
else."
The Serbs remain disturbed by the entire business. Last month several
U.S. lawmakers got a similar reaction from Serbian President Slobodan
Milosevic in Belgrade. Over espresso and pastries, Milosevic told them
that Americans "are looking for trouble," says Republican Representative
Jim Ramstad of Minnesota. Milosevic, widely blamed for igniting the
Balkan wars, has some unexpected allies. Retired top U.S. military
officers who until recently were responsible for the Balkans say the
plan may embolden the Bosnians to seize land now held bythe Bosnian
Serbs. Boyd suggests it would be better to leave well enough alone,
saying both sides are war weary and that a rough military stability
already exists. Retired General David Maddox, the chief U.S. Army
officer in Europe until last year, also criticizes the policy. "The more
we do to make sure they can fight well," he says, "the less motivation
there is for peace."
Given the risks posed by training the Bosnians and the importance the
U.S. has given the mission, it seems especially proper to ask if a
private company ought to be undertaking it. The desire to protect
American troops is understandable, but will the Serbs really distinguish
between them and MPRI trainers? By hiring consultant mercenaries to do a
messy job, it is easier for Washington to ignore the consequences and
fudge the responsibility. Once again, for better or worse, that seems to
be an overshadowing aim of America's policy in Bosnia.
+++
http://www.smh.com.au/news/9811/02/world/world6.html
The Sydney Morning Herald
Monday, November 2, 1998
KOSOVO
Private military to monitor pullout
By JONATHAN STEELE in London
The United States has asked a private mercenary firm to provide the US
military contingent to verify the withdrawal of Serb forces from Kosovo.
The move will allow President Bill Clinton to avoid the political risk
of having Americans die in active service in the Balkans.
European governments, including Britain, have seconded military officers
to the high-risk mission. However, because Yugoslavia's President
Slobodan Milosevic has refused to allow the monitors to be armed, US
officials believe it is safer to give the task to private contractors.
The winner of the State Department contract for about 150 men to join
the international monitoring group of 2,000 is DynCorp, a Virginia-based
company.
On its Web site, it says of itself: "Imagine technology with a touch of
humanity. Meet a team of experts who treat hi-tech like an art form."
Mr Spence Wickham, a retired US Air Force officer and director of
international operations in the DynCorp division that is handling the
Kosovo mission, said his team were arriving in the region over the
weekend.
"We have extensive experience of doing business for the military," he
said.
The team included weapons inspectors, verification experts and drivers
and technicians to operate the standard US infantry vehicle, the Humvee.
Mr Clinton's decision to dump the Kosovo mission on the private sector
has raised eyebrows in Europe.
A British defence expert, Ms Mary Kaldor, said: "It is extraordinary
that a country with a highly paid volunteer army should turn to a
private company of mercenaries. This is not the sort of task which
should be done for profit. It indicates the Clinton Administration's
determination to keep at arm's length [from the Kosovo conflict]."
However, the director of studies at the Royal United Services Institute,
Mr Jonathan Eyal, said Mr Milosevic would notice and "get the message".
- The Guardian
+++
http://www.jsonline.com/news/kosovo/jul99/jobs071099.asp
U.S. seeks officers for Kosovo
Washington Post
Last Updated: July 10, 1999
Washington - Job alert! Great pay and benefits, foreign travel,
interesting work. DynCorp Technical Services says the State Department
"is seeking active and recently retired police officers of any rank who
are eager to accept a challenging and rigorous assignment."
And where might this be? In beautiful downtown Prizren, Pristina, and
other hot spots in Kosovo. The State Department is looking for up to 750
folks - the numbers haven't been worked out - to serve with the
International Police Task Force in Kosovo as police monitors.
The pay for a one-year gig is $101,000, which includes per diem, a
completion bonus and hazard pay, the notice says.
They're looking for officers with a minimum of eight years' experience,
including some patrol and training expertise, to help build up a Kosovar
police force.
But the State Department is not going to take just anyone. You must be a
citizen, have a "valid U.S. driver's license and ability to drive a 4x4
vehicle with a manual transmission," have an "unblemished background"
and a U.S. passport, and be in "excellent health without temporary or
permanent disabilities."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is
distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest
in receiving the included information for research and educational
purposes.
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