The brisk business of private military firms (PMFs) currently operating in Iraq is not only significant to the defence community, but has wider ramifications for global politics and warfare. This paper by Peter W Singer analyses the private military industry, its origins and current role in Iraq, and suggests policy responses for an industry that appears to be here to stay. Advantages and disadvantages of PMFs must be weighed from the perspectives of both public policy and smart business sense.
PMFs provide professional services linked to warfare, including military skills, tactical combat operations, strategic planning, intelligence, operation and logistics support, and troop training. The private military industry emerged in the early 1990s because of the security vacuum produced by the end of the Cold war, transformations in the nature of warfare and the rise of privatisation of public services.
Over 60 PMFs contracted by the US government employ more than 20,000 personnel in Iraq. The costs of PMFs are considerable: the amount that PMF Halliburton will make from the ongoing 2003 Iraq War is roughly 2.5 times the cost of the 1991 Gulf War.
PMFs fill a gap in troop strength and perform work that US forces would prefer not to carry out. But some of the most controversial aspects of the Iraq War have involved PMFs, including allegations of war profiteering by Halliburton, the brutal killing of PMF employees by Iraqi insurgents and implication of PMF interrogators and translators in the scandal at Abu Ghraib prison.
Key implications of the use of PMFs are:
- Since PMFs are outside the military chain of command, they are free to make decisions that can affect military objectives, such as delaying, suspending or ending operations.
- The private military market is effectively unregulated; screening of potential employees is sometimes minimal or insufficient.
- PMFs allow governments to carry out actions that generally would not gain legislative or public approval, resulting in a lack of transparency and accountability and the outsourcing of public policy.
- PMFs are not subject to military justice. International law does not define the status of contractors; most of the world’s governments do not have applicable laws to regulate and define jurisdictions under which PMFs operate.
- There are growing concerns within the military about what PMFs signify for the health of the profession and general resentment of firms and individuals using the military profession for personal and organisational profit.
The following are recommended policy responses to the concerns raised by the use of PMFs:
- Financial accounting of the scope, costs and results of the use of PMFs is sorely needed.
- The military needs to decide which roles can be privatised without affecting core military functions.
- The US defence leadership needs to improve their ability to negotiate, manage and oversee contracts with PMFs.
- International involvement is needed to resolve legal and jurisdictional dilemmas affecting legal control of PMFs. Each state involved with the industry must develop and amend laws relevant to the industry.
The US government is uninformed and ill-equipped in its relations with the private military industry, as either client or regulator. While meeting security needs with private military solutions is not necessarily bad, advantages and disadvantages must constantly be weighed from the perspective of both public policy and smart business sense.
