http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/19/AR2009081904315.html?hpid%3Dtopnews&sub=AR

Quote :

"CIA Hired Firm for Assassin Program Blackwater Missions Against Al-Qaeda Never Began, Ex-Officials Say By Joby Warrick and R. Jeffrey Smith Washington Post Staff Writers Thursday, August 20, 2009 A secret CIA program to kill top al-Qaeda leaders with assassination teams was outsourced in 2004 to Blackwater USA, the private security contractor whose operations in Iraq prompted intense scrutiny, according to two former intelligence officials familiar with the events. The North Carolina-based company was given operational responsibility for targeting terrorist commanders and was awarded millions of dollars for training and weaponry, but the program was canceled before any missions were conducted, the two officials said. The assassination program -- revealed to Congress in June by CIA Director Leon Panetta -- was initially launched in 2001 as a CIA-led effort to kill or capture top al-Qaeda members using the agency's paramilitary forces. But in 2004, after briefly terminating the program, agency officials decided to revive it under a different code name, using outside contractors, the officials said. "Outsourcing gave the agency more protection in case something went wrong," said a retired intelligence officer intimately familiar with the assassination program. The contract was awarded to Blackwater, now known as Xe Services LLC, in part because of its close ties to the CIA and because of its record in carrying out covert assignments overseas, the officials said. The security contractor's senior management has included high-ranking former CIA officials -- among them J. Cofer Black, the agency's former top counterterrorism official, who joined the company in early 2005, three months after retiring from government service. Blackwater became notorious for a string of incidents in Iraq during which its heavily armed guards were accused of using excessive force. In the deadliest incident, 17 civilians were killed in a Baghdad square by Blackwater guards in September 2007 after the guards' convoy reportedly came under fire. The plan to kill top al-Qaeda leaders was thrust into the spotlight in July, shortly after Panetta briefed members of two congressional panels about the program. Panetta told House and Senate leaders that he had only recently learned of the program and, upon doing so, had canceled it. Panetta also told lawmakers that he thought they had been inappropriately kept in the dark about the plan -- in part because then-Vice President Richard B. Cheney had directed the CIA not to reveal the program to Congress. The CIA declined to comment Wednesday about Blackwater's alleged involvement in the program, which was first reported Wednesday night on the Web site of the New York Times. Efforts to reach Blackwater for comment late Wednesday were unsuccessful. Agency officials again defended Panetta's decision to terminate the effort and notify congressional overseers. "Director Panetta thought this effort should be briefed to Congress, and he did so," CIA spokesman George Little said. "He also knew it hadn't been successful, so he ended it. Neither decision was difficult. This was clear and straightforward." The House Intelligence Committee has launched an investigation into whether the CIA broke the law by failing to notify Congress about the program for eight years. Current and former agency officials have disputed claims by some Democratic lawmakers that the withholding of key details of the program was illegal. "Director Panetta did not tell the committees that the agency had misled the Congress or had broken the law," Little said. "He decided that the time had come to brief Congress on a counterterrorism effort that was, in fact, much more than a PowerPoint presentation." The effort, known to intelligence officials as the "targeted killing" program, was originally conceived for use in Iraq and Afghanistan, but officials later sought to expand it to other countries in the region, according to a source familiar with its inception. It was aimed at removing from the battlefield members of al-Qaeda and its affiliates who were judged to be plotting attacks against U.S. forces or interests. The program was initially managed by the CIA's counterterrorism center, but its functions were partly transferred to Blackwater when key officials from the center retired from the CIA and went to work for the private contractor. Former agency officials have described the assassination program as more aspirational than operational. One former high-ranking intelligence official briefed on the details said there were three iterations of the program over eight years, each with a separate code name. Total spending was well under $20 million over eight years, the official said. "We never actually did anything," said the former official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the program remains highly classified. "It never became a covert action." A second former official, also intimately familiar with details of the program, said the Blackwater phase involved "lots of time spent training," mostly near the CIA's covert facility near Williamsburg. The official said the teams simulated missions that often involved kidnapping. "They were involved not only in trying to kill but also in getting close enough to snatch," he said. Among team members there was "much frustration" that the program never reached an operational stage, he said. The CIA -- and Blackwater -- were not the only agents that sought to covertly kill key members of al-Qaeda using small, highly trained teams. A similar effort, officials say, was undertaken by U.S. Special Forces. "The targets were generally people on a kill or capture list," said a source familiar with Special Forces operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. "How did people get on the list? Well, if we knew that people were involved in planning attacks, they got on the list. More than half were generally captured. But the decision was made in advance that if they resisted, or if it was necessary for any reason, just kill them." "

Said to have never actually become a covert action, but obviously raises many issues.

8/20/2009 9:32:41 AM

so what's the problem here?

8/20/2009 9:34:42 AM

^what he said.

8/20/2009 9:39:04 AM

For one, the lack of direct control and accountability over non-enlisted 3rd party employees that has been demonstrated well at Abu Ghraib, and a variety of other incidents that led Blackwater to change it's name to Xe. There is always an element of losing direct control when outsourcing, but most outsourced tasks don't involve life or death.

8/20/2009 9:39:35 AM

Nobody sees the problem with letting for-profit ventures mechanize, arm up, and then letting them actually roll around and play soldier?

8/20/2009 10:26:30 AM

^ I think he's saying that since nothing ever came of it, what's the problem?

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 10:46 AM. Reason : ]

8/20/2009 10:45:55 AM

"No harm, no foul" does not cover the government paying private companies to fucking murder people.

8/20/2009 10:48:45 AM

yeah but they were all bad.

8/20/2009 10:56:43 AM

If we allow our government to send troops to other countries to kill people, then why wouldn't we allow our government to send mercenaries to other countries to kill people?

8/20/2009 10:58:36 AM

seems to me that assassinating the higher ups of the Taliban, Al Qaeda, etc could save the US a ton of money.

8/20/2009 11:07:42 AM

Quote :

""No harm, no foul" does not cover the government paying private companies to fucking murder people."

I'm not sure what this means. If the CIA used a government employee to "fucking murder people", they would still be paying someone to do it. A private company would just charge a higher fee.

If your problem is murdering people, then it shouldn't matter who does it. Maybe you're arguing that a government employed murder is more "pure of heart" than a Blackwater employed murder?

I don't know.

8/20/2009 11:11:01 AM

Quote :

"^ I think he's saying that since nothing ever came of it, what's the problem?"

Well, the same company was used extensively in Iraq (I'm sure that's in the article) and there were all sort of civility questions about their actions... So, really, something did come of using them in a case, but just not in this case.

8/20/2009 11:11:01 AM

then why don't we just do it ourselves instead of hiring these people?

that seems like a waste of money to me.

8/20/2009 11:12:21 AM

Wash your hands of anything bad.

It will obviously ultimately reflect poorly on the country as a whole if the contracted "soldiers" commit atrocities but it is a sort of alibi and blame can be shifted to the company higher-ups...

8/20/2009 11:14:06 AM

^^The CIA was banned from assisinations; i.e. Fidel Castro. It doesn't sound like Blackwater created hit squads; sounds more like they were used to gather intel, equp and train the CIA.

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 11:16 AM. Reason : .]

8/20/2009 11:15:42 AM

That being said, I protest this outsourcing on practical grounds. Any time you deal with outsourcing, you're facing a principal-agent problem. You never really know if the interests of the assassin will align with the interests of the government.

This is obviously still a problem for government employees (anyone see Quantum of Solace). But I think the government has more avenues for "controlling" the assassin than they would by simply hiring someone to kill. For example, they can more easily screen assassins, they can also more easily set up payment structure to promote good behavior. For example, how do you keep a cop from going dirty? Give him a really generous pension that he would lose if he ever turned crooked. That really raises the marginal cost of defecting.

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 11:23 AM. Reason : ``]

8/20/2009 11:19:27 AM

Some more discussion of it here:

http://bluenc.com/blackwater-tied-cia-assassination-plot

Quote :

"Remember not too long ago when incoming Director of the CIA, Leon Panetta called a special meeting of Congress to brief them on more of the underhanded B.S. that he had found was going on under the Bush Administration? Well, surprise, surprise! At the black heart of the matter once again was North Carolina's very own local mercenaries-for-hire and the Prince of Darkness, Blackwater and Erik Prince."

You can tell from the get go that the discussion is going to be very objective.

8/20/2009 11:23:01 AM

All sorts of legal ambiguity when dealing with soldiers or assassins for hire.

If contract employees commit illegal acts, can they:

1) Face court martial? No.

2) Be tried in the country attrocities took place? No, our government has resisted that saying it is unfair.

3) Be tried in US courts? No, jurisdiction in US courts has not been established?

4) The Hague? No, the US does not participate.


So there is no clear legal consequence for attrocities committed. The US also loses just as much face with the locals. The only real consequences that have been established to my knowledge is losing your job and possibly a lawsuit (if a US court will take it). I guess depending on your point of view, that could be a good thing, but certainly raises real moral issues for me.

8/20/2009 11:39:49 AM

^ good point, if true. That would also make it much harder to control private operatives.

But I don't know enough about international law to evaluate the claim.

Does anyone else? It seems like *some* legal avenues would be open. After all, if you murder someone in a foreign country, you will be tried for murder. Maybe its different because its warefare? I have never heard of another country trying to prosecute a U.S. citizen for something like this.

8/20/2009 11:44:34 AM

Quote :

""No harm, no foul" does not cover the government paying private companies to fucking murder people."

Quote :

"yeah but they were all bad"

lol

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 11:53 AM. Reason : ]

8/20/2009 11:52:31 AM

looks like it doesn't mention anything in that article, but the founder/CEO of Blackwater is an evangelical Christian who is on record stating that it is his Christian duty to kill Muslims. It was a Blackwater Abrams vehicle who went through a Baghdad block last year or some time with "Jesus Killed Mohammed" written in Arabic on the side.

sounds like a real winner. just the kind of person we want to outsource our fighting in Muslim countries to....


http://chattahbox.com/us/2009/08/05/blackwater-shocker-erik-prince-christian-crusader-implicated-in-murder/

Quote :

"According to “The Nation” piece, Prince recruited like-minded believers in his mission to kill Muslims, and that Prince and his merry band of dangerous fanatics used signs based on the ancient Christian crusaders, the Knights Templar. Prince’s men openly spoke of going to Iraq to “lay Hajiis out on cardboard.” Blackwater employees regularly referred to Arabs and Iraqis, as “ragheads” or “hajiis.” "

http://www.presstv.com/classic/detail.aspx?id=102603§ionid=3510203

Quote :

"In sworn statements filed on August 3 in federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia, the two testified that company owner and CEO Erik Prince may have murdered or arranged the murder of individuals cooperating with US federal authorities investigating the case. "[Prince] views himself as a Christian crusader tasked with eliminating Muslims and the Islamic faith from the globe," the former employee -- referred to as "John Doe 2" -- alleges in his statement. "[Prince's] companies encouraged and rewarded the destruction of Iraqi life," he adds. "

http://ispy.newsvine.com/_news/2007/10/22/1041046-blackwater-erik-prince-christian-supremacist-agenda

Quote :

"JEREMY SCAHILL:Well, I mean, I believe that Erik Prince is an ideological foot soldier. And I do believe that he's a Christian supremacist. And I think it's very easy to explain that. I mean, look, this is the guy who gave a half a million dollars to Chuck Colson, the first person to go to jail for Watergate who's now becoming a very prominent evangelical minister and an advisor to President Bush, one of the people behind the safe face initiatives. "

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 11:59 AM. Reason : quotes]

8/20/2009 11:55:49 AM

^ He is also ex-military. So we could have folks like him right now working for the CIA and wouldn't know it because they don't get called out on Air America or the American Prospect. So I don't think its a complaint that could be made specifically about private security firms like Blackwater.

Personally, that's another reason I distrust all military force. We all expect GI Joe, but we could just as easily get Col. Kurtz.

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 12:02 PM. Reason : ``]

8/20/2009 12:01:27 PM

double post

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 12:11 PM. Reason : INGLOURIOUS BLACKWATER]

8/20/2009 12:09:04 PM

8/20/2009 12:09:04 PM

If you heard about us, you prolly heard we ain't in the prisoner-takin' business--we in the killin'-Nazi business. And, Cousin, business is a-boomin'!

8/20/2009 1:50:32 PM

Is that movie any good, I hope it is

8/20/2009 2:00:38 PM

Quote :

"The CIA was banned from assisinations; i.e. Fidel Castro."

Is this a blanket ban or does it just apply to foreign Heads of State/Government?

Quote :

"If contract employees commit illegal acts, can they: 1) Face court martial? No. 2) Be tried in the country attrocities took place? No, our government has resisted that saying it is unfair. 3) Be tried in US courts? No, jurisdiction in US courts has not been established? 4) The Hague? No, the US does not participate."

#2 - In general, this only applied to Iraq and has recently been resolved. Three Americans were arrested and tried in a rather high profile case in 2004 in Afghanistan for allegedly running a private prison. They claimed that they were on a government contract but the US disavowed them.

#3 - Former Agency contractor David Passaro was tried here in Raleigh for allegedly killing an Afghan prisoner a few years ago. At least in this case, precedent and jurisdiction was established. I suspect that it could extend to include these teams.

8/20/2009 3:20:40 PM

Gerald Ford banned assassination it is my understanding that it banned assassination committed for political purposes.


I was responding to this...

Quote :

"Is this a blanket ban or does it just apply to foreign Heads of State/Government?"

[Edited on August 20, 2009 at 4:26 PM. Reason : ...]

8/20/2009 4:03:41 PM

^Thanks for the insight. I was hoping a couple of people better versed in international law would weigh in.


IMO, we are still operating in murky legal water here (although it appears there is some precedent). I'd prefer the court martial recourse personally, if it came to that, though it would hopefully be avoided by better established regulations and lines of oversight.

8/20/2009 4:20:52 PM

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/21/us/21intel.html?hp

more on it...part of me wondered if the times should be saying all the jalalabad stuff...had never been reported before

[Edited on August 21, 2009 at 2:56 AM. Reason : .]

8/21/2009 2:55:36 AM