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Iraq is rapidly vanishing into the mists of uncollectable, unknowable news, with information travelling only as far as an Iraqi scream can be heard. But sometimes, if you peer closely, you can glimpse reality. Last week, Shia militiamen seized four “security contractors” working for the Canadian company Gardaworld. Buried in the story of this small horror is the bigger tale of a vast shift in how Western wars will be fought in the 21st century if the American right has its way - and one of the great lost scandals of this war.
These men are not “security contractors”, nor are they “civilian operatives”, nor “reconstruction workers”. There are now more of them in Iraq than there are professional soldiers: Britain alone has 21,000 in the country, raking in $1.6bn a year.
As he scurried out the door in 2004, Paul Bremer - the first US viceroy to Iraq - issued Order 17, which exempted all mercenaries operating in the country from having to obey the law. He in effect gave these men a licence to kill - and they are using it, every day.
Yas Ali Mohammed Yassiri was a peaceful 19-year-old Iraqi trying to get on with an ordinary life in a deeply unordinary Baghdad when he boarded a taxi on his street in the Masbah neighbourhood. The mercenaries guarding the US embassy spokesman in Baghdad drove around the corner, so Ali’s taxi slowed down - but the convoy opened fire anyway, to clear their path. Ali was hit in the throat and died immediately. Although the US embassy now admits the convoy “opened fire prematurely”, the mercenaries were merely sent home; they are free, happy men.
This is not a one-off freak. It is virtually an everyday occurrence. Colonel Thomas Hammed, who was placed in charge of rebuilding the Iraqi military by Bush, explains, “They [the mercenaries] made enemies everywhere. I would ride around with Iraqis in beat-up Iraqi trucks, they were running me off the road. We were threatened and intimidated.”
