Among these contract soldiers are former members of America’s most highly trained counterterrorism units. Two companies in particular, Blackwater USA and Triple Canopy, were early specialists in providing tier-one operators-former SEALs, Delta Force and Recon Marines. These are the elite warriors who have carried out some of the most challenging and secretive military operations. They are the best of the best, the most highly trained soldiers in the world and collectively they are one of the most sophisticated and lethal weapons in the US arsenal. And they are now for rent.
In 2003 Triple Canopy explained its mission on its Web site, writing, “Triple Canopy provides legal, moral and ethical Special Operations services consistent with US National Security interests.” [23] These private military corporations have secret contracts with multiple government agencies, reportedly with the Departments of Energy, State, and Defense as well as the CIA. Blackwater also has secret contracts with the Department of Homeland Security. [24] The president of Blackwater, who openly aspires to create the world’s largest private army, once boasted that he has contracts that are so secret “he can’t tell one federal agency about the business he’s doing with another.” [25] Private military corporations have privatized the fog of war, conveniently obscuring questionable activities from the light of public scrutiny. Blackwater claims to be ready for any type of mission. At a conference in Amman, Jordan in early 2006, Cofer Black, the former director of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center and now the Vice Chairman of Blackwater, offered Blackwater’s for-hire army to police global hotspots. “Black said, Blackwater could have a small, nimble, brigade-size force ready to move into a troubled region on short notice.” [26] Blackwater recently announced plans to open jungle training facilities at Subic Bay in the Philippines and desert training facilities at an undisclosed site in Southern California. It’s positioning itself for United Nations peacekeeping missions, and, according to its Web site, “Blackwater Mobile Security Teams stand ready to deploy around the world with little notice in support of US national security objectives, private or foreign interests [emphasis mine].” [27]
The Pentagon’s most secretive and controversial spy unit has not been outsourced. [28] As part of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld’s desire to stop “near total dependence on the CIA,” he created a new espionage organization, planting military boots firmly in CIA turf. [29] Title 10 of the United States Code has traditionally been interpreted in such a way as to limit the collection of human intelligence in foreign countries to times of hostilities or when the threat of hostilities is imminent, but Pentagon lawyers have recently found a creative work-around for these restrictions by defining the War on Terror as global and ongoing. [30] This cleared the way for military spies, GI Joe’s 21st Century replacement: Bond. Master Sergeant Bond.
The new Pentagon spy agency, the Strategic Support Branch (SSB, portrayed as Force Zulu in this novel), is staffed with linguists, case officers, signals intelligence specialists, interrogators and, most strikingly, Special Forces operators, reportedly drawn from the military’s most elite special units-Delta Force, former Gray Fox, and DEVGRU/SEAL Team 6. [31] The unit frequently changes its name and it fields spies throughout the world to gather human intelligence and to recruit foreign assets, functions that are the mainstay of CIA clandestine operations. It is active in both friendly and unfriendly countries, operating outside of Congressional oversight, largely due to the diversion of funds approved for other programs and because of its claims that its activities do not strictly meet its own definition of covert actions. However, the new CIA Director General Hayden has noted the problem of overlapping missions between the CIA and the SSB. According to The New York Times, “General Hayden said it had become more difficult to distinguish between traditional secret intelligence missions carried out by the military and those by the CIA ‘There’s a blurring of functions here.’” [32]
The Department of Defense running spy networks around the world signals a major shift toward the militarization of intelligence and challenges the very existence of the CIA. It’s very probable that the shift in leadership at the Pentagon is a reprieve for the Agency and may even signal the end of unilateral covert actions by the Department of Defense.
With very little strategic planning, public debate, or Congressional oversight, American national security has been handed over to the private sector-to small loyal companies run by longtime US government veterans as well as to large multinational firms-corporations with international clientele, foreign ownership, and with primary allegiance to their shareholders. With proper oversight, the private sector has consistently demonstrated its ability to deliver government services more effectively and more efficiently than the state, but we may be approaching the limits of government privatization as national security is put in question.
War and espionage have been transformed in the twenty-first century as the government has scrambled to respond to an unconventional enemy. Soldiers are spies. Spies are soldiers. And the War on Terror has been outsourced.
[23] The company has now replaced this with a more sanitized version, omitting mention of special operations and also excluding any mention of alignment with US interests. The version quoted can be found in the Internet archive at: http://web.archive.org/web/20040914020610/www.triplecanopy.com/company/mission.php.
[24] In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Blackwater sent 150 heavily armed soldiers to patrol the disaster area under contract with the Department of Homeland Security. Many were fresh from Iraq and others waiting for security clearance to go to Iraq. See Jeremy Scahill, “Blackwater Down,”
[25] Yeoman, “Soldiers of Good Fortune.”
[26] Bill Sizemore, “Blackwater USA Says It Can Supply Forces for Conflicts,”
[27] http://www.blackwaterusa.com/securityconsulting/services.asp, June 7, 2006.
[28] Seymour Hersh, “The Coming Wars. What the Pentagon Can Now Do in Secret,”
[29] Barton Gellman, “Controversial Pentagon Espionage Unit Loses Its Leader,”
[30] Barton Gellman, “Secret Unit Expands Rumsfeld’s Domain,”
[31] Gellman, “Secret Unit;” Thom Shanker and Scott Shane, “Elite Troops Get Expanded Role on Intelligence,”
[32] Eric Schmitt, “Clash Foreseen Between CIA and Pentagon,”