Politics: J'accuse!

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
But everyone ignoring my religous underpinnings of wife-beating post? Shocking!

Indeed.

The point made by the panelist that I wish more Westerners could grasp is that by bringing certain negative cultural realities into religious law, the behavior does not become "sanctioned by" the religion so much as it is controlled, by comparison to silence of religion in the face of those realities. The New Testament is silent on domestic violence, so when a Christian commits domestic violence we consider it largely irrelevant to his religion. By contrast, numerous passages of the Bible condone --- nay, compel --- beating your children, without proscribing limits, and somehow we consider ourselves a more civilized religion.

Resorting to violence against women is a cultural phenomenon that tends to become more and more limited with women's economic and romantic freedom. I think we all can agree that marriage prospects work better under a free market model.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
My understanding is that mercenaries' increasing use in Iraq (by the coalition itself) stems in part from (i) limited coalition troop numbers, (ii) better skills & efficiency than the usual gov't trained troops, (iii) they're cheaper than using your own army (no gov't bloat, competition), (iv) better morale (better paid and no illusions about "how dare they send me into actual service just because I signed up!") and (v) easier to deploy because not subject to the military chain of command. (Why they would be used by private firms seems too obvious to go into.)

Weren't most of the Americans who are acting as security forces trained by the U.S. military? Is that factored into the cost? Because if you spend a bajillion dollars training them, and then they leave and you pay for them through a security service that allows them to earn significantly more, it seems like it would not necessarily be cheaper.

If they do something bad, whose jurisdiction are they under? They presumably can't be court-martialed, and they aren't on US territory, so if they break Iraqi law are they just subject to Iraqi courts? And if chain of command is bad, why don't we just get rid of it in the army (or portions of it).

It just seems . . . odd.

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Weren't most of the Americans who are acting as security forces trained by the U.S. military? Is that factored into the cost? Because if you spend a bajillion dollars training them, and then they leave and you pay for them through a security service that allows them to earn significantly more, it seems like it would not necessarily be cheaper.

Mercenary hires aren't supported by the military. In the US military, more than most, support is the tail that wags the dog - it is huge, gargantuan, and horrifically inefficient. It seems not only possible but likely that it is cheaper to pay a soldier you have trained 5-10x more as a mercenary, instead of supplying him in the field yourself.

If they do something bad, whose jurisdiction are they under? They presumably can't be court-martialed, and they aren't on US territory, so if they break Iraqi law are they just subject to Iraqi courts?

The most lucid response to that question I've so far seen is "that's a good question." I note for the record that, right now, there aren't really any Iraqi courts. There aren't really any Iraqi laws they could be accused of breaching. That seems common in a lot of areas where a lot of mercenaries get deployed.

And if chain of command is bad, why don't we just get rid of it in the army (or portions of it).

Damn, why didn't anyone ever think of that before?

Because then you're Donald Rumsfeld, and the military brass tells everyone "you don't know what you're doing because we're the military and we're the only people who know what we're doing." Which may or may not be true, but certainly most people believe it, and the first thing that goes wrong under a new management plan (regardless of whether the old military command structure overtly sabotages that plan) will be taken as proof positive.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
Mercenary hires aren't supported by the military. In the US military, more than most, support is the tail that wags the dog - it is huge, gargantuan, and horrifically inefficient. It seems not only possible but likely that it is cheaper to pay a soldier you have trained 5-10x more as a mercenary, instead of supplying him in the field yourself.

Well, they have to be supported in some way, and someone is getting paid for that support, and the security firms are in it for profit, so the US gov't is ultimately paying for the support, right? It has been my understanding that a great deal of the support for the actual real military is now provided by private firms (e.g. Halliburton) on the assumption that it is more efficient than having soldiers doing it and cheaper b/c of competition. I dunno. If my tax dollars are going to be spent (hah, to some extent I just wanted to use that phrase) training these people under a system that assumes that a trade-off for the extensive training is a period of service at a low salary, and then the people go off and get paid a ton at firms that are also paying CEOs, managers, etc., and my tax dollars are paying for that too, it seems like it might be wasteful.

It seems like if we (the US) just used our soldiers and didn't hire the security firms, there wouldn't be as much of a market for them. With less of a market, it would be less lucrative, and fewer people would go into it. But the more the gov't hires them, the more they are going to cherry-pick trained soldiers, and the more the gov't will need to hire them.

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic The most lucid response to that question [how do the non-military armed "security" people get punished if they do something wrong] I've so far seen is "that's a good question." I note for the record that, right now, there aren't really any Iraqi courts. There aren't really any Iraqi laws they could be accused of breaching. That seems common in a lot of areas where a lot of mercenaries get deployed.

So, there are a bunch of soldiers over there who, if they go and rape women or what have you, can at least be subject to court-martial (which shows we, the Americans, do not tolerate such behavior). Then there are these security forces who, if they go and rape women or what have you, are subject to no obvious consequences (other than probably (I hope) getting sent home and maybe losing their job).

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
Weren't most of the Americans who are acting as security forces trained by the U.S. military? Is that factored into the cost? Because if you spend a bajillion dollars training them, and then they leave and you pay for them through a security service that allows them to earn significantly more, it seems like it would not necessarily be cheaper.

Those are sunk costs. On the margin, in Iraq, it may be cheaper to use the guys we once trained.

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
Mercenary hires aren't supported by the military. In the US military, more than most, support is the tail that wags the dog - it is huge, gargantuan, and horrifically inefficient. It seems not only possible but likely that it is cheaper to pay a soldier you have trained 5-10x more as a mercenary, instead of supplying him in the field yourself.

I find this odd. There's a reason that the military is long on support. It's what we do better than other militaries. It's not clear that any other military in the world could pull off what we're doing in Iraq, so calling it "inefficient" seems not quite right. Presumably the mercenaries are being supported by private industry, and this has costs. Presumably it's also less reliable. They (the private support) don't have to be there, and may cut and run when the shooting starts. Would that be efficient?

I suspect the real reason we are using private suppliers is that the administration would rather spend more money than send more troops, for political and ideological (Rumsfeld's remaking the military) reasons.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Weren't most of the Americans who are acting as security forces trained by the U.S. military? Is that factored into the cost? Because if you spend a bajillion dollars training them, and then they leave and you pay for them through a security service that allows them to earn significantly more, it seems like it would not necessarily be cheaper.

If they do something bad, whose jurisdiction are they under? They presumably can't be court-martialed, and they aren't on US territory, so if they break Iraqi law are they just subject to Iraqi courts? And if chain of command is bad, why don't we just get rid of it in the army (or portions of it).

It just seems . . . odd.

The piece on Marketplace last week talked about the cost to the military in training them (they said about $250,000 per special forces soldier). http://marketplace.publicradio.org/s...04/13_mpp.html (scroll down a bit)

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
I suspect the real reason we are using private suppliers is that the administration would rather spend more money than send more troops, for political and ideological (Rumsfeld's remaking the military) reasons.

I tend to agree with this. Plus, in a situation where we are close to maxing out our military, it's good to have this hireable expertise sitting out there available on a short-term contract basis. Much cheaper, in the long run, than expanding the military with long-term hires (and thus long-term liabilities.)

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
I tend to agree with this. Plus, in a situation where we are close to maxing out our military, it's good to have this hireable expertise sitting out there available on a short-term contract basis. Much cheaper, in the long run, than expanding the military with long-term hires (and thus long-term liabilities.)

There's an editorial in the NYT today decrying this trend, but I'm not seeing the downside in a concrete way. I guess mercenaries are less useful than regular troops in that you can't use them in some of the same ways -- e.g., in large formations when things really go to hell -- but it's unclear that this has really made much of a difference.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

There's an interesting debate going on here between Jonathan Chait of The New Republic and Ramesh Ponnuru of The National Review over intellligence failures prior to 9/11.

eta: Chair is scoring points off Ashcroft, and Ponnuru is scoring points off an imaginary Democratic President after 9/11.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by bilmore
I tend to agree with this. Plus, in a situation where we are close to maxing out our military, it's good to have this hireable expertise sitting out there available on a short-term contract basis. Much cheaper, in the long run, than expanding the military with long-term hires (and thus long-term liabilities.)

Isn't this the point of the reserves? Should we have both the reserves and these security firms?

It bugs me that there is an incentive for currently active military people to leave, in the middle of a conflict, and go to the security firms to get more money in the short run -- and then either stay with the security firm or come back to the regular military.

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
There's an editorial in the NYT today decrying this trend, but I'm not seeing the downside in a concrete way. I guess mercenaries are less useful than regular troops in that you can't use them in some of the same ways -- e.g., in large formations when things really go to hell -- but it's unclear that this has really made much of a difference.

I'm mildly uncomfortable with it, because (a) quality control is not very clear, (b) it permits us to evade responsibility in a way that we can't through the use of troops, and (c) our ability to rely on the protections offered to troops to protect mercs is also fuzzy.

It's not only unclear how the government is accountable if the mercs do something stupid (like shoot up Iraqi civilians or something similar), consider also the effects of having our mercs captured. Certainly it's a bit inapplicable in today's conflict, where insurgents won't really give a shit about treaty requirements for treatment of prisoners, but generally speaking, can we demand that captured mercs get equivalent treatment to those of troops? I don't know.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Indeed.

The point made by the panelist that I wish more Westerners could grasp is that by bringing certain negative cultural realities into religious law, the behavior does not become "sanctioned by" the religion so much as it is controlled, by comparison to silence of religion in the face of those realities. The New Testament is silent on domestic violence, so when a Christian commits domestic violence we consider it largely irrelevant to his religion. By contrast, numerous passages of the Bible condone --- nay, compel --- beating your children, without proscribing limits, and somehow we consider ourselves a more civilized religion.

Resorting to violence against women is a cultural phenomenon that tends to become more and more limited with women's economic and romantic freedom. I think we all can agree that marriage prospects work better under a free market model.

In some parts of the world, the middle east being one of them, culture and religion are so intertwined that they are one.

Islam, like most religions, is not a static religion. It is not simply the koran and the various interpretations of the koran, which change with time. Islamic clerics reinterpret Islam every time they issue a fatwah. Islam is not what the religious scholars say it should be. It is the relgion that is actually practiced by the people who claim it to be their faith. There are several sects and subsects because different groups tweak their beliefs to be a bit or substantially different from other groups within Islam.

The culture influences the religion as it is practiced and the religion influences the culture. Because it is not politically correct to assail a religious belief, many people blame Arab culture for the discrimination and hatred and abuse of women that occurs in muslim countries. But islam is as much to blame for this horror as Arab culture is. You cannot separate the two as easily as that.

Like the bible, the koran has it good parts and its bad parts. Parts preach a message of violence and hate. And some of the practitioners of this religion hear that message and implement it. Others interpret it differently and say their interpretation is the true interpretation. Whatever. The fact is that the religion is what the people practice, not what you or anyone else says it should be. Islam as practiced by many is a hateful and violent religion. Hateful toward women, hateful toward gays, hateful toward non-muslims.

This is not just a cultural problem. It stems from their religious beliefs, too.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Isn't this the point of the reserves? Should we have both the reserves and these security firms?

Yes. A problem with the reserves is that their use is constrained by public support for whatever war is going on. One might also view this as an advantage.

It bugs me that there is an incentive for currently active military people to leave, in the middle of a conflict, and go to the security firms to get more money in the short run -- and then either stay with the security firm or come back to the regular military.

But there's no guarantee that there'll be these conflicts for the security firms to suck at the teat of. (E.g., Bush might not be re-elected.)

Originally posted by GA2GP
I'm mildly uncomfortable with it, because (a) quality control is not very clear, (b) it permits us to evade responsibility in a way that we can't through the use of troops, and (c) our ability to rely on the protections offered to troops to protect mercs is also fuzzy.

[G]enerally speaking, can we demand that captured mercs get equivalent treatment to those of troops?

(a) Why do you think quality control is better with the regular military? They don't have to worry about their contracts being renewed.

(b) Responsibility for what? And who is holding the Marines responsible for hundreds of civilian deaths in Fallujah?

(c) Yes. But with all the bad news coming out of Iraq the last few weeks, I haven't seen an account where this was a problem.

Since the people capturing our guys are not exactly inviting the Red Crescent in to check on them, I think the concerns about the treatment of captured dogs of war are academic.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Isn't this the point of the reserves? Should we have both the reserves and these security firms?

It bugs me that there is an incentive for currently active military people to leave, in the middle of a conflict, and go to the security firms to get more money in the short run -- and then either stay with the security firm or come back to the regular military.

I think this is a which came first the chicken or the egg thing. I think that the fact of the matter is that there is a high attrition rate in the military. Before the military ever started using these security firms, many well-trained and experienced military personnel leave the military rather than make the military their life-long career.

Faced with this constant loss of trained and experienced personnel, which I don't believe is caused by the potential to serve in these private security forces, what are the military's options? Pay more money to retain these people or hire them on a contract basis only when needed. The former is a very expensive option since you have to pay them more money even when they are not needed just to keep them around for when they might be needed. The latter makes more sense because they are only paid more money when they are needed.

I really don't think these people are enticed to leave the military because they will make more money in private security firms. I think they leave the military because they are enticed by better paying private jobs in general. Then when a war or other event occurs and an opportunity to make more money in a private security firm arises, they take that opportunity.

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Gattigap
I'm mildly uncomfortable with it, because (a) quality control is not very clear

It's not only unclear how the government is accountable if the mercs do something stupid (like shoot up Iraqi civilians or something similar),

This is a huge problem. Because of the huge spike in demand for the mercs, security companies haven't been able to screen like they'd like to. There's a lot less cherry picking than barrel bottom dredging. They end up with some psychos that went to Iraq just to drink beer and kick ass, but there's no beer there. Doubtless they have killed innocent Iraqis, but I doubt we'll ever find any reliable statistics on this.