A soldiers perspective on the war in Iraq

Sharp End International. Spy alert.

While it is save to assume that, if you run a blog critical of the official 9/11 conspiracy theory, you will be on a watch list and the site will be monitored, and it would be dangerously naive to assume you can write about or investigate Blackwater or other creepy private military organisations without them finding out, it is not common to find out who does the monitoring. And while we thought we were relatively safe, doing all this from a country that seemingly has all it’s civil rights firmly secured, it seems that the monitoring is done by a group that brings the threat these private contractors pose for all of us much closer to home that we find comfortable.

This morning as we checked the usage of the site, as we do every morning, we found something strange.
Wordpress lets you see which sites referred people onto your site, and lets you go back through those sites by clicking on the hyperlink.
In other words, someone puts a link to your site much as we link people trough to the sites of the articles we choose to publish.
Nothing strange in that. We sometimes click on those links to see what site has linked onto our one. If it’s an interesting site we make it part of the blog roll or read what people have to say. The links are generally made by people who agree with what they find here and want to share it on forums with their mates.

So it was somewhat surprising to find that one of the referrals was made from a private military contractor site called; Sharp End International.
What made it down right unnerving was the fact that there was no link on the page we connected too.

In other words the referrer wasn’t actually referring since there was no link.

A quick Google led me to a wikipedia entry about the company which apparently trains government and corporate entities. And this is were it gets down right scary. The company uses mostly Australian and New Zealand ex-special forces instructors and it is New Zealand were this site comes from.

Additionally; one of the photos used to promote the sites clearly shows Bremer III the “viceroy” of Iraq responsible for it’s destruction in the early days of the occupation. Paul Bremer the III was guarded not by Sharp End International but by Erik Princes Blackwater USA.
In fact it shows one of the Blackwater guys right behind Bremer.
And this is were we come close to drawing the line as this site is dedicated to 9/11 truth and the possible connection of Erik Prince with the traitors who are really responsible for the horrors of that day.

The same Wiki entry claims that the main customers of SEI are petroleum companies, mining facilities, financial institutions, corporate identities or celebrities.
While we are so not interested in celebrities all the other clients are very much on our watch list.
In fact the two other blogs we run are http://aotearoaawiderperspective.wordpress.com and http://kasm.wordpress.com. The first one is about international finance and its connection to John Key the rich banker turned politician and the leader of the opposition party of New Zealand and the second one is about Kiwis against seabed mining.

We will investigate further and in the mean time please be carefull, and above all; be warned.

Analysis: Big Oil to sign Iraq deals soon

Big Oil’s big dreams are close to coming true as Iraq’s Oil Ministry prepares deals for the country’s largest oil fields with terms that aren’t necessarily what companies were hoping for but considered a foot in the door of the world’s most promising oil sector.Iraq’s proven oil reserves are only smaller than those in Saudi Arabia and Iran — and the country is only about 30 percent explored.

Iraq produces about 2.4 million barrels per day, a recent increase from the 2 million bpd post-invasion average, but far below what its reserves could handle. Its oil sector is suffering from decades of Saddam Hussein-era mismanagement, U.N. sanctions and the effects of the current war.

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Domestic Spying, Inc.

A new intelligence institution to be inaugurated soon by the Bush administration will allow government spying agencies to conduct broad surveillance and reconnaissance inside the United States for the first time. Under a proposal being reviewed by Congress, a National Applications Office (NAO) will be established to coordinate how the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and domestic law enforcement and rescue agencies use imagery and communications intelligence picked up by U.S. spy satellites. If the plan goes forward, the NAO will create the legal mechanism for an unprecedented degree of domestic intelligence gathering that would make the U.S. one of the world’s most closely monitored nations. Until now, domestic use of electronic intelligence from spy satellites was limited to scientific agencies with no responsibility for national security or law enforcement.

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Gates: Security contractors conflict with U.S. mission in Iraq

The Defense secretary says guards who protect clients at any cost are working ‘at cross-purposes’ with soldiers trying to gain Iraqis’ trust.

By Peter Spiegel, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
October 19, 2007

WASHINGTON — The behavior of private security contractors in Iraq is in direct conflict with the goals of the U.S. military, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Thursday in an unusually frank critique, adding that the guards’ mistreatment of Iraqis is hindering Pentagon efforts at winning hearts and minds.

Gates said at a Pentagon news conference that he planned to meet with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in coming days to iron out new regulations governing the conduct of the estimated 8,500 armed guards working for the Pentagon and State Department in Iraq.

Last month, the Defense secretary sent a five-man team to Iraq to investigate contractor oversight after the high-profile killing of 17 Iraqis in a Baghdad shooting involving Blackwater USA, the private security contractor hired to protect U.S. diplomats.

Although Blackwater works for the State Department, the Pentagon employs the vast majority of such hired guns in Iraq — about 7,300 — and Gates within days ordered commanders in the country to be more aggressive in using military law to discipline contractors in their areas of responsibility.

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Blackwater won’t allow arrests

The Iraqi justice system was good enough for Sadam but not for Blackwater’s “Guys”? 

“We will not let our people be taken by the Iraqis,” said Erik Prince, CEO and chairman of Blackwater USA.

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A defiant Blackwater Chairman Erik Prince said yesterday he will not allow Iraqi authorities to arrest his contractors and try them in Iraq’s faulty justice system.
“We will not let our people be taken by the Iraqis,” Mr. Prince told editors and reporters at The Washington Times. At least 17 of 20 Blackwater guards being investigated for their roles in a Sept. 16 shooting incident are still in a secure compound in Baghdad’s Green Zone and carrying out limited duties.

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Good neighbor?

Apart from the fact that no reasonable human being would want Blackwater anywhere near were they live, why does a private mercenary firm need three bases spread all over the country? Why is a private mercenary firm accused of war crimes, who has withdrawn from their lobbying organisation for fear of an investigation into their professional conduct allowed to train American police officers? There are only a thousand Blackwater mercenaries in Iran, so what else do they do on those bases? And let’s not forget that they also have a fourth base in the Philippines.(Travellerev)

Blackwater keeps its eye on a tiny East County enclave.

By Pat Sherman 10/09/2007

Blackwater USA Vice President Brian Bonfiglio flashed a self-satisfied smile, gazing east across Round Potrero Road where, on Sunday, more than 200 Potrero residents and antiwar activists streamed onto an adjacent parcel of land. They had come-some from as far as Ventura-to protest the 824-acre paramilitary training facility the company hopes to open a mile down the snaky dirt road.”I don’t think the war profiteering signs are appropriate, quite frankly,” Bonfiglio said. “At the end of the day, this will be determined as a land-use project by the [San Diego County] Board of Supervisors.”

As the public face of the project-dubbed Blackwater West-it’s Bonfiglio’s job to sell the facility as a non-invasive windfall to the residents of Potrero, a rural hamlet 45 miles east of San Diego. Given his employer’s image as a supplier of trigger-happy mercenary armies, unaccountable to neither the Iraqi nor American governments, wooing Potrero’s 850 residents has been a dicey game. Five members of the Potrero Planning Board who voted in December to support the project are facing a recall election. Some 320 residents signed a petition opposing the project that was sent to the county Board of Supervisors and Congressman Bob Filner, the Democrat whose district includes Potrero.

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All you need is a crazy rich guy with a private army. part 4

Erik Prince’s connections read like a who is who of the 9/11 suspects and war profiteers.

If like me you have come to the realization that the official conspiracy theory about the events of 9/11 is impossible and that the body of scientific evidence proves that 9/11 was an inside job than you have to wonder how the perpetrators and planners could realize their ideologies. You have to wonder about how they could form a cadre of men prepared to ruthlessly kill Americans to further their own greedy agenda. This is one possible way.

Secretive and well connected Erik Prince, a ultra right wing re-converted catholic with a drive for a new crusade, might very well fit the bill. The next few weeks I will present the case.

In the mean time have a look at this PDF. It is a visual lay out of all the connections that have helped Erik Prince and Blackwater.
It will be updated as I find more connections. It will be followed by articles about the connections and what they mean in the bigger picture. 

Let me count the ways in which Erik Prince is connected

Iraq PM says ‘unfit’ Blackwater must go

BAGHDAD (AFP) — Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said on Wednesday that Blackwater should leave the country because of the mountain of evidence against the under-fire US security firm.

His comments came amid growing anger among Iraqis that “above-the-law” security contractors are continuing to operate in Iraq while Blackwater is being probed over a deadly shooting 17 days ago.

“I believe the abundance of evidence against it makes it unfit to stay in Iraq,” Maliki told a televised press conference in Baghdad.

A New York Times report on Wednesday citing witnesses, Iraqi investigators and a US official said that as many as 17 people were killed and 24 wounded when Blackwater employees opened fire in central Baghdad on September 16.

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Private soldiers no longer above the law

A helicopter operated by the US private security company Blackwater provides cover for a US ground convoy in Baghdad. Photograph: Patrick Baz/AFP/Getty Images
 

The House of Representatives today passed a bill to end the immunity of private security companies such as Blackwater in war zones.Blackwater, at the centre of a controversy over the killing of at least 11 civilians in Baghdad last month, is, like the other 170 private security companies operating in the country, subject to neither US nor Iraqi law.

The House bill closes this loophole. It secured the support of both Democrats and Republicans and was passed with an overwhelming majority, 389 to 30.

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Blackwater contractor wrote government report on incident

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) — The State Department’s initial report of last month’s incident in which Blackwater guards were accused of killing Iraqi civilians was written by a Blackwater contractor working in the embassy security detail, according to government and industry sources.

In this September 24 photo, an Iraqi looks at a car that was destroyed during the September 16 incident.

A source involved in diplomatic security at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad said a Blackwater contractor, Darren Hanner, drafted the two-page “spot report” on the letterhead of the Bureau of Diplomatic Security for the embassy’s Tactical Operations Center.

That office — which tracks and monitors all incidents and movements involving diplomatic security missions — has outsourced positions to Blackwater and another private firm, the embassy source said.

A highly placed industry source said that Hanner, who was listed on the report as the TOC watch officer, was working for Blackwater at the time the report was written, just after the September 16 incident occurred. He was to rotate out of Iraq this past week, the source said.

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Pentagon Issues Blackwater New $92 Million Contract

Presidential Airways, Inc is not just a nice aviation service, they have been implicated in the CIA rendition flights.
It is extremely worrying the a trigger happy mercenary group closely connected to Cheney gets this job in a highly volatile region were appart from Afghanistan no official American business is conducted.  

Earlier this month, Blackwater USA was involved in the fatal shooting of 11 Iraqi civilians. While the Iraqi government swiftly condemned the contractor, the Bush administration has continued to back Blackwater’s story that it was “defensive fire.”

Last Thursday, Gen. Peter Pace told reporters, “Blackwater has been a contractor in the past with the department and could certainly be in the future.” The next day, that future was already here. The Pentagon had issued a new list of contracts, including one worth $92 million to Presidential Airways, the “aviation unit of parent company Blackwater.” From the release:

Presidential Airways, Inc., an aviation Worldwide Services company (d/b/a Blackwater Aviation), Moyock, N.C., is being awarded an indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) type contract for $92,000,000.00. The contractor is to provide all fixed-wing aircraft, personnel, equipment, tools, material, maintenance and supervision necessary to perform passenger, cargo and combi Short Take-Off and Landing air transportation services between locations in the Area of Responsibility of Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan. This contract was competitively procured and two timely offers were received. The performance period is from 1 Oct. 2007 to 30 September 2011.

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Contracts to BLACKWATER USA

Blackwater earns more than 1 Billion since 2000.
And this is what can be traced.
Blackwater  became operational the same year (1997) PNAC wrote their infamous; Rebuilding America’s defences.
According to Al Clark who started Blackwater with Erik Prince the company hit the ground running, with al kinds of CIA and other contracts. Erik Prince by the way was an intern in the White house when Cheney was secretary of defence under Daddy Bush. (1992) This was the period before Cheney became a CEO for Haliburton and it was in this period that he asked Haliburton to research the privatization of the military. Erik Prince was the son of one of the republican party’s wealthiest supporters and Erik didn’t like all the things he saw at the white house. Inviting Gays and all these environmental laws and stuff like that. At the time Cheney and Rumsfeld and their Neocon cronies were regarded as the “Crazies”. (Sources Jeremy Scahill and col. Bowman)  

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The Age of Irresponsibility

How Bush has created a moral vacuum in Iraq in which Americans can kill for free.
By Michael Hirsh
Sept. 20, 2007 – Imagine a universe where a man can gun down women and children anytime he pleases, knowing he will never be brought to justice. A place where morality is null and void, and arbitrary killing is the rule. A place that has been imagined hitherto only in nightmarish dystopian fiction, like “1984,” or in fevered passages from Dostoevsky-or which existed during the Holocaust and Stalinist purges and the Dark Ages. Well, that universe exists today. It is called Iraq. And the man who made it possible is George W. Bush.

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Update: Blackwater in Iraq

According to the Veterans 911 truth site:

Randi Rhodes just reported that Bush called Malaki and that Iraq will reconsider its decision to ban Blackwater. who’s attorney is Ken Starr…!
Remember, Blackwater does not have that many Mercenaries in Iraq, but they are by far the most well connected.

Update: Will Iraq Kick Out Blackwater?

Don’t count your chickens until they hatch.

Although I would welcome the withdrawal and dismantling of all mercenary groups in Iraq and in all the other countries were they operate I would not count on that happening anytime soon. The US army is now a minority compared to the contractor groups in Iraq and the troops are so overstretched that there is no way they can replace them. Added to that Blackwater is protecting all the VIP’s, not the US army. It will be until hell freezes over before they leave Iraq.

Monday, Sep. 17, 2007 By ADAM ZAGORIN AND BRIAN BENNETT/WASHINGTON

Blackwater US private security contractors secure a site in Baghdad where a roadside bomb exploded near the Iranian embassy, 2005.

Ahmad al-Rubaye / AFP / Getty

TIME has obtained an incident report prepared by the U.S. government describing a fire fight Sunday in Baghdad in which at least eight Iraqis were reported killed and 13 wounded. The deadly incident occurred when a convoy of U.S. personnel protected by Blackwater security contractors came under small arms fire. Blackwater returned fire, resulting in the Iraqi deaths. The loss of life has provoked anger in Baghdad, where the Interior Ministry has suspended Blackwater’s license to operate around the country. Several Iraqi government officials have indicated their opposition to Blackwater’s continued presence in their country.

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Iraqi police say security contractors open fire in western Baghdad, killing at least 9

BAGHDAD: Security contractors opened fire in western Baghdad on Sunday, killing at least nine civilians and wounding 18, Iraqi police said. The U.S. Embassy said contractors working for the State Department were involved in an incident but provided no further details.

The shootings happened about 12:30 on Nisoor Square in the predominantly Sunni neighborhood of Mansour, a police officer said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to release the information.

The security contractors were in a convoy of six SUVs and left the scene after the shooting. The policeman said he did not have more details, but a witness said the shooting erupted after an explosion.

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Cholera Epidemic Infects 7,000 People in Iraq

Yep, the surge is working, add genocide through sickness to the list of war crimes.

BAGHDAD, Sept. 11 — A cholera epidemic in northern Iraq has infected approximately 7,000 people and could reach Baghdad within weeks as the disease spreads through the country’s decrepit and unsanitary water system, Iraqi health officials said Tuesday.

The World Health Organization reported that the epidemic is concentrated in the northern regions of Kirkuk and Sulaimaniya and that 10 people are known to have died. But Dr. Said Hakki, president of the Iraqi Red Crescent Society, a relief organization that has responded to the epidemic, said that new cases had turned up in the neighboring provinces, Erbil and Nineveh, indicating that the disease had spread.

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Most significant, Dr. Hakki said, were two cases in a village on the border between Kirkuk and Diyala Provinces, one involving a young girl. Baghdad is next to Diyala.

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Information Warfare, Psy-ops and the Power of Myth

This article was first published in February. 

By Mike Whitney

02/15/07 “ICH” — – The bombing of the Golden Dome Mosque in Samarra is the cornerstone of Bush’s psychological operations (psy-ops) in Iraq. That’s why it is critical to have an independent investigation and discover who is really responsible. The bombing has been used as a “Pearl Harbor-type” event which has deflected responsibility for the 650,000 Iraqi casualties and more than 3 million refugees. These are the victims of American occupation not civil war.

The bombing was concocted by men who believe that they can control the public through perception management. In practical terms, this means that they create events which can be used to support their far-right doctrine. In this case, the destruction of the mosque has been used to confuse the public about the real origins of the rising sectarian tensions and hostilities. The fighting between Sunni and Shiite is the predictable upshot of random bombings and violence which bears the signature of covert operations carried out by intelligence organizations. Most of the pandemonium in Iraq is the result of counterinsurgency operations (black-ops) on a massive scale not civil war.

The Pentagon’s bold new approach to psychological operations (psy-ops) appears to have derived from the theories of former State Dept official, Philip Zelikow (who also served on the 9-11 Commission) Zelikow is an expert on “the creation and maintenance of ‘public myths’ or ‘public presumptions’. His theory analyzes how consciousness is shaped by “searing events” which take on “transcendent importance” and, therefore, move the public in the direction chosen by the policymakers.

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As Alive as Elvis

Sunday, September 9. 2007

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On Saturday morning I found a copy of the full Bin Laden (2007-09-07) video. It is 677 Megs and took over two hours to download. By Saturday evening I had finished analyzing the video, and I completed the audio analysis this morning. (There is also a 3-minute version that is the first 3 minutes from the full video.)

My findings? I strongly believe that Bin Laden is dead.

Let’s see how I did on my Friday prediction…

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