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Category Archives: Military Industrial Complex
Marine reportedly killed by opium-fueled private contractors
Pentagon originally said Marine killed in combat
RawStory.com Headlines/John Byrne
The Pentagon confirmed late Tuesday that it is investigating the death of a 24-year-old Indiana Marine after he was shot to death in Afghanistan, allegedly by several US-paid private security contractors.
Also posted in Created Terror, Drugwar, Middle East Tagged Afghanistan, Heroin, Mercenaries, Opium, Pentagon Leave a comment
Blackwater guards stole weapons in Kabul and went on deadly rampage
Times Online/ BLN
Private American security guards working for the US military in Afghanistan removed hundreds of handguns and automatic weapons from stores intended for the exclusive use of the Afghan police and used them on drunken shooting rampages that killed two Afghan civilians and injured at least two more.
Also posted in Created Terror, Middle East Tagged Afghanistan, Blackwater, Cocaine, death squads, Paravant Leave a comment
Darpa Plans Test for Hypersonic Weapon
Nathan Hodge/Danger Room
The Pentagon’s far-out science arm is planning an April test flight for a prototype of a hypersonic weapon that — in theory — could cross the Pacific Ocean in under two hours.
“These Guys Are Like Vultures”: Profit-Driven Private Contractors Flocking to Haiti
Anthony Fenton, IPS News
20 Feb 2010
VANCOUVER, Canada, Feb 19, 2010 (IPS) — Critics are concerned that private military contractors are positioning themselves at the center of an emerging “shock doctrine” for earthquake-ravaged Haiti.
The US Military’s German Fetish
Loving the German war machine to death.
William Astore/MoJo
19 Feb 2010
This story [1] first appeared on the TomDispatch [2] website.
“Why do people have a fixation with the German military when they haven’t won a war since 1871?” —Tom Clancy
I’ve always been interested in the German military, especially the Wehrmacht of World War II. As a young [...]
Hiring Death Squads Is Coming Back to Haunt U.S. Companies
Charlie Cray, AlterNet
A federal judge recently refused to dismiss a civil suit filed against Chiquita which charges that the company paid leftist (FARC) guerrillas operating near its plantations in Columbia — during a period when the FARC killed four American missionaries, according to CNN.
Also posted in Corporations, Created Terror, Latin America Tagged Chiquita, Columbia, death squads, Dole, Mercenaries Leave a comment
U.N. Rejects ‘Militarization’ of Afghan Aid
Rod Nordland/NYT
KABUL, Afghanistan — Senior United Nations officials in Afghanistan on Wednesday criticized NATO forces for what one referred to as “the militarization of humanitarian aid,” and said United Nations agencies would not participate in the military’s reconstruction strategy in Marja as part of its current offensive there.
Also posted in Middle East, Militarization Tagged Afghanistan, Militarization, NATO, UN Leave a comment
Totally Occupied: 700 Military Bases Spread Across Afghanistan
Nick Turse/Tomdispatch
In the nineteenth century, it was a fort used by British forces. In the twentieth century, Soviet troops moved into the crumbling facilities. In December 2009, at this site in the Shinwar district of Afghanistan’s Nangarhar Province, U.S. troops joined members of the Afghan National Army in preparing the way for the next round [...]
Iraq Orders Former Blackwater Guards Out
Iraq gives hundreds of former and current Blackwater employees 7 days to leave country
Qassim Abdul-Zahra/Commondreams
BAGHDAD — Iraq has ordered hundreds of private security guards linked to Blackwater Worldwide to leave the country within seven days or face possible arrest on visa violations, the interior minister said Wednesday.
Private armies worry U.N. peacekeepers