Outsourcing the Global War on Terrorism

Outsourcing the Global War on Terrorism PDF Author: G. Lovewine
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137370262
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
The US military strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan made use of private military and private security companies on an unprecedented scale. In this environment, actions and operations can greatly affect the efficacy of the US military - creating unintended diplomatic and tactical consequences.

Outsourcing the Global War on Terrorism

Outsourcing the Global War on Terrorism PDF Author: G. Lovewine
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137370262
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 228

Get Book

Book Description
The US military strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan made use of private military and private security companies on an unprecedented scale. In this environment, actions and operations can greatly affect the efficacy of the US military - creating unintended diplomatic and tactical consequences.

Outsourcing the Global War on Terrorism

Outsourcing the Global War on Terrorism PDF Author: G. Lovewine
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137370262
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 375

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Book Description
The US military strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan made use of private military and private security companies on an unprecedented scale. In this environment, actions and operations can greatly affect the efficacy of the US military - creating unintended diplomatic and tactical consequences.

Outsourcing National Defense

Outsourcing National Defense PDF Author: Thomas C. Bruneau
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781955055925
Category : Civil-military relations
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Every year, the US Department of Defense allocates more than $400 billion to for-profit firms. Which raises the question: Where does the money go? Thomas Bruneau takes a deep dive into the murky waters of national defense outsourcing to answer that question. Moving beyond the issue of private military contractors, Bruneau investigates the scope, legality, and implications of the private sector's vast involvement in securing the nation.

Outsourcing Duty

Outsourcing Duty PDF Author: Michael Robillard
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190671459
Category : Civil-military relations
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
"Are contemporary soldiers exploited by the state and society which they defend? More specifically, have America's professional service members been uniquely exploited insofar as they have disproportionately carried the moral weight of America's collective war-fighting decisions since the inception of the all-volunteer force post-Vietnam and particularly since 9/11? In this work, Michael Robillard and Bradley Strawser argue that many of American soldiers have indeed been exploited in this unique way. By offering their original normative theory of 'moral exploitation'; the notion that persons or groups can be wrongfully exploited by being made to shoulder an excessive amount of moral responsibility, moral risk, and exposure to 'dirty hands', Robillard and Strawser make the case that such a state of affairs indeed describes America's present relationship with her military. By offering a thorough and in-depth analysis of some of the exploitative and misleading elements of present-day military recruitment, the pernicious civil-military divide existing between military members and the civilian principle both within the organs of government and the public at large, and the stifling effect that 'Thank You for Your Service', 'I support the troops' culture has had on serious public engagement concerning America's ongoing wars, Robillard and Strawser offer a tour de force of eye-opening arguments on the demoralizing state of affairs for the American soldier. They conclude by arguing for several normative and prudential prescriptions to help close this ever-widening fissure existing between America and its military and existing within America herself. In so doing, their work gives a much needed and urgent voice to America's other 1%"--

Spies for Hire

Spies for Hire PDF Author: Tim Shorrock
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0743282248
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 451

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Book Description
Reveals the formidable organization of intelligence outsourcing that has developed between the U.S. government and private companies since 9/11, in a report that reveals how approximately seventy percent of the nation's funding for top-secret tasks is now being funneled to higher-cost third-party contractors. 35,000 first printing.

Philosophical Perspectives on the 'War on Terrorism'

Philosophical Perspectives on the 'War on Terrorism' PDF Author: Gail M. Presbey
Publisher: Rodopi
ISBN: 9042021969
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
This book responds to the Bush Administration position on the "war on terror." It examines preemption within the context of "just war"; justification for the United States-led invasion of Iraq, with some authors charging that its tactics serve to increase terror; global terrorism; and concepts such as reconciliation, Islamic identity, nationalism, and intervention.

Terror and Consent

Terror and Consent PDF Author: Philip Bobbitt
Publisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 0141916826
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1019

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Book Description
The wars against terror have begun, but it will take some time before the nature and composition of these wars is widely understood. The objective of these wars is not the conquest of territory, or the silencing of any particular ideology, but rather to secure the necessary environment for states to operate according to principles of consent and make it impossible for our enemies to impose or induce states of terror. Terror and Consent argues that, like so many states and civilizations in the past that suffered defeat, we are fighting the last war, with weapons and concepts that were useful to us then but have now been superseded. Philip Bobbitt argues that we need to reforge links that previous societies have made between law and strategy; to realize how the evolution of modern states has now produced a globally networked terrorism that will change as fast as we can identify it; to combine humanitarian interests with strategies of intervention; and, above all, to rethink what 'victory' in such a war, if it is a war, might look like - no occupied capitals, no treaties, no victory parades, but the preservation, protection and defence of states of consent. This is one of the most challenging and wide-ranging books of any kind about our modern world.

Licensed to Kill

Licensed to Kill PDF Author: Robert Young Pelton
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 1400097827
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 367

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Book Description
Robert Young Pelton first became aware of the phenomenon of hired guns in the War on Terror when he met a covert team of contractors on the Afghanistan/Pakistan border in the fall of 2003. Pelton soon embarked on a globe-spanning odyssey to penetrate and understand this shadowy world, ultimately delivering stunning insights into the way private soldiers are used. Enter a blood-soaked world of South African mercenaries and tribal fighters backed by ruthless financiers. Drop into Baghdad’s Green Zone, strap on body armor, and take a daily high-speed ride with a doomed crew of security contractors who dodge car bombs and snipers just to get their charges to the airport. Share a drink in a chic hotel bar with wealthy owners of private armies who debate the best way to stay alive in war zones. Licensed to Kill spans four continents and three years, taking us inside the CIA’s dirty wars; the brutal contractor murders in Fallujah and the Alamo-like sieges in Najaf and Al Kut; the Deep South contractor training camps where ex–Special Operations soldiers and even small town cops learn the ropes; the contractor conventions where macho attendees swap bullet-punctuated tales and discuss upcoming gigs; and the grim Central African prison where contractors turned failed mercenaries pay a steep price. The United States has encouraged the use of the private sector in all facets of the War on Terror, placing contractors outside the bounds of functional legal constraints. With the shocking clarity that can come only from firsthand observation, Licensed to Kill painstakingly deconstructs the most controversial events and introduces the pivotal players. Most disturbingly, it shows that there are indeed thousands of contractors—with hundreds more being produced every month—who’ve been given a license to kill, their services available to the highest bidder.

America's Captives

America's Captives PDF Author: Paul J. Springer
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
ISBN: 0700617175
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
Notwithstanding the long shadows cast by Abu Ghraib and Guantnamo, the United States has been generally humane in the treatment of prisoners of war, reflecting a desire to both respect international law and provide the kind of treatment we would want for our own troops if captured. In this first comprehensive study of the subject in more than half a century, Paul Springer presents an in-depth look at American POW policy and practice from the Revolutionary War to the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Springer contends that our nation's creation and application of POW policy has been repeatedly improvised and haphazard, due in part to our military's understandable focus on defeating its enemies on the field of battle, rather than on making arrangements for their detention. That focus, however, has set the conditions for the military's chronic failure to record and learn from both successful and unsuccessful POW practices in previous wars. He also observes that American POW policy since World War II has largely sought to outsource POW operations to allied forces in order to retain American personnel for frontline service-outsourcing that has led to recent scandals. Focusing on each major war in turn, Springer examines the lessons learned and forgotten by American military and political leaders regarding our nation's experience in dealing with foreign POWs. He highlights the indignities of the Civil War, the efforts of the United States and its World War I allies to devise an effective POW policy, the unequal treatment of Japanese prisoners compared with that of German and Italian prisoners during World War II, and the impact of the Geneva Convention on the handling of Korean and Vietnamese captives. In bringing his coverage up to the so-called War on Terror, he also marks the nation's clear departure from previous practice-American treatment of POWs, once deemed exemplary by the Red Cross after Operation Desert Storm, has become controversial throughout the world. America's Captives provides a long-needed overarching framework for this important subject and makes a strong case that we should stop ignoring the lessons of the past and make the disposition of prisoners one of the standard components of our military education and training.

Hubris, Self-Interest, and America's Failed War in Afghanistan

Hubris, Self-Interest, and America's Failed War in Afghanistan PDF Author: Thomas P. Cavanna
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1498506208
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 364

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Book Description
This book describes the conduct of the US-led post-9/11 war in Afghanistan. Adopting a long-term perspective, it argues that even though Washington initially had an opportunity to achieve its security goals and give Afghanistan a chance to enter a new era, it compromised any possibility of success from the very moment it let bin Laden escape to Pakistan in December 2001, and found itself locked in a strategic overreach. Given the bureaucratic and rhetorical momentum triggered by the war on terror in America, the Bush Administration was bound to deploy more resources in Afghanistan sooner or later (despite its focus on Iraq). The need to satisfy unfulfilled counter-terrorism objectives made the US dependent on Afghanistan’s warlords, which compromised the country’s stability and tarnished its new political system. The extension of the US military presence made Washington lose its leverage on the Pakistan army leaders, who, aware of America’s logistical dependency on Islamabad, supported the Afghan insurgents – their historical proxies - more and more openly. The extension of the war also contributed to radicalize segments of the Afghan and Pakistani populations, destabilizing the area further. In the meantime, the need to justify the extension of its military presence influenced the US-led coalition into proclaiming its determination to democratize and reconstruct Afghanistan. While highly opportunistic, the emergence of these policies proved both self-defeating and unsustainable due to an inescapable collision between the US-led coalition’s inherent self-interest, hubris, limited knowledge, limited attention span and limited resources, and, on the other hand, Afghanistan’s inherent complexity. As the critical contradictions at the very heart of the campaign increased with the extension of the latter’s duration, scale, and cost, America’s leaders, entrapped in path-dependence, lost their strategic flexibility. Despite debates on troops/resource allocation and more sophisticated doctrines, they repeated the same structural mistakes over and over again. The strategic overreach became self-sustaining, until its costs became intolerable, leading to a drawdown which has more to do with a pervasive sense of failure than with the accomplishment of any noble purpose or strategic breakthrough.