The Mercenary Position: posted by Richard Seymour

Iraq and the "Security Situation"

British forces were awarded a reputation for commonsensical care and calm when handling the natives in Basra, the ever-present implication being that those dopy, vulgar Americans didn’t know how to deal with savages on account of their Hollywood blow-‘em-up mentality. Lessons were learned, however, when it turned out that the residents of Basra could kick some occupier ass too when the mood took them. Recalling an earlier time when New Labour was maligned for using mercenary companies like Sandline International to do its dirty work in Sierra Leone, the British (and Americans) now employ mercenaries in both Baghdad and Basra. Global Risk Strategies (which sounds vaguely like a student thesis on Ulrich Beck) is a British-based firm which drafts ex-servicemen and cops from across the globe to take care of menial security duties in Iraq. Ghurkas are employed, Fijians are recruited, but no Iraqis. Not only are these mercenary armies creating a fat profit margin for a British company, but they’re also much cheaper for coalition authorities because they are largely non-European. That would also explain the presence of a large number of South African hired guns in Iraq:

'"There are definitely more than 1 500 South Africans doing duty there (Iraq). More South Africans will be killed because as the Americans are pulling out, South Africans are filling the void," said a respected security analyst.'

Iraqis are also "non-European" but they are, for obvious reasons, considered a "security risk".

The British envoy to Iraq is called Brian Wilson, and part of his remit is to ensure British companies get a slice of the reconstruction cake as the US serves it up. To which end, he secured the accompaniment of various UK companies to a conference in Kuwait called "Rebuild Iraq 2004" , among them Securewest International (which is at least honest about whose interests it serves), which supplies "security guards" from its subsidiary, Ghurka Manpower Services , based in Nepal.

Take a look at the operating bases of this company, notice its contiguity with US imperial prerogatives - notably its continued occupation of Guam, which "relies heavily on military spending" to sustain its economy. It also protects US bases in the United Arab Emirates, as well as guarding US Naval bases in America itself. The 'special relationship' congeals money and violence in more ways than this. Everything is up for sale in Iraq, and the Kuwait expo mentioned above discusses them all in some depth. Oil , technology, water, communications, healthcare , power, education , and the list goes on.

And don't think that the US has excluded itself from cashing in on repression. "Nour USA, a privately held U.S.-led consortium, has won a $327 million contract to supply Iraq’s new armed forces and the Iraqi Civil Defence Corps ... "

That there is nothing new about this confluence of state and capitalist interests is exactly what should be arresting about it. We are supposed to be living in a different era, not merely since the arrival of New Labour, but since the British Empire cascaded into ruins. Post-colonialism was to have meant that the ‘poisoned gift’ (Hardt and Negri) of national liberation would constrain the decisions of imperialist policy makers, state sovereignty solidly underpinning the accepted norms of international law. It isn’t the case that national sovereignty was always respected – but it did at least mean that the US felt compelled to justify its principles in terms of its commitment to opposing the “interventionism” of other states. (This latter Orwellianism used to justify US support for the Khmer Rouge and associated forces in the 1980s as they fought the Vietnamese. Only a genuine ideologue could construe US policy in Indochina as adhering to the principles of opposing “interventionism”). But the resurgence of colonialism has brought all of its attendant vices with it, and this includes patronage, corruption and repression.

Aside from the mercenary armies being shipped in, what do the occupying forces intend for the "New Iraq"? It emerges that they intend to recreate the old secret service , at a cost of approximately $1bn a year:

""The presence of a powerful secret police ... will mean that the new Iraqi political regime will not stray outside the parameters that the US wants to set," said John Pike, an expert on classified military budgets at the Global Security organisation. "To begin with, the new Iraqi government will reign but not rule.""

It's specific remit, of course, is to destroy the Iraqi Resistance - something Saddam Hussein could have told them a thing or two about when he was playing golf on the Whitehouse lawn.

"Where are democracy and human rights in Iraq?" asks Zeineb Al-Assam of Iraqi Democrats Against the Occupation. They are in the mouth of Paul Bremer and the minds of the Iraqi Provisional Authority.

Well, if all of that has got you in the mind that somehow what the US has done to Iraq amounts to no more than a neo-colonial raid, let me put your soul at ease. Because the good news is, Pepsi Is Back in Iraq! Hallelujah, Praise the Lord, rejoice, rejoice, rejoice!