(Erik) Prince of Blackwater heads to Africa

[Starry Messenger]

http://news.yahoo.com/prince-blackwater-heads-africa-171749665.html

Erik Prince, the man who founded Blackwater, the private military contractor that became synonymous with mercenary excess during the Iraq war, has apparently begun a bold new business venture: He's going to be investing with a group of unnamed Chinese government-linked companies in resource extraction and infrastructure in sub-Saharan Africa.

<snip>

Prince made a fortune during the early and extremely fat years for contractors of the global war on terror, thanks to political connections and an appetite for risk. Roughly $2 billion of US contracts in Iraq flowed through the company. But the name "Blackwater" eventually grew tarnished under the weight of alleged corruption and murder in the field. It was Blackwater employees who were who were ambushed and killed in Fallujah in 2004, sparking the US assault on that Iraqi town that helped further polarize the war. In 2007, panicking Blackwater guards unleashed a barrage of fire in Nisour Square in Baghdad, killing 17 civilians.

The massacre cemented Iraqi fury at private military contractors and set the stage for the Iraqi governments refusal to allow US forces to remain in Iraq with immunity from local prosecution, something that forced the US departure at the end of last year. By the time Prince sold out of Blackwater in 2010, which he'd renamed "Xe" in an attempt to dissociate his venture from its unsavory public image, US government contracts were drying up. In April 2010, five senior Blackwater executives (not Prince though) were indicted on weapons violations and making false statements to law enforcement.

When Prince sold the business in Dec. 2010, The New York Times reported it was because the State Department had threatened not to do business with the firm as long as Prince was associated with it.

I shudder to think of the havoc they can cause in Africa. Of all the Bush-era pirates still on the loose, Erik Prince is one of the worst.

[Schema Thing]

1. straight out of a Hollywood script. Cartoon Evil writ unto reality.

[summerschild]

2. Can the world ever forgive the U.S. for Bush and Cheney?

The evil spawn lives on in prosperity at the expense of mankind.

[War Horse]

3. Holy crap

This can't end well

[Starry Messenger]

4. That was pretty much what came out of my mouth.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse...

[Volaris]

5. JUST what continental Africa needs...

another Warlord.