[Peace-discuss] Fwd: Blackwater/Xe Pulls Out of Illinois

[C. G. Estabrook]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Dan Kenney <dkenney53 at hotmail.com>
Date: Thu, Nov 11, 2010 at 11:43 PM
Subject: Blackwater/Xe Pulls Out of Illinois

      Blackwater/Xe Flees Jo Daviess County
      But Training Continues
      By Dan Kenney
      Co-Coordinator of No Private Armies


Nearly four years ago citizens joined together in a small church near
Mt. Carroll Illinois forming No Private Armies/ Clearwater to Stop
Blackwater. The citizens group worked for four years to get
Blackwater, now Xe, to leave Illinois. The last major demonstration
held at the Blackwater/Xe training site in northwest Illinois occurred
April 27th 2009 and resulted in 22 arrests.


Blackwater was once the largest and most powerful mercenary company in
the U.S. making over $1 billion in U.S. contracts. But now beleaguered
with lawsuits, and having undergone massive changes in the company’s
administration the sole owner of Blackwater, Eric Prince has moved out
of the country and put the company up for sale.


The Galena Gazette reports that Blackwater/Xe as of October 1st 2010
no longer has a financial interest in the Jo Daviess’ County facility.
It is now a private business locally owned and operated. According to
the current business owner Eric Davis, who was the manager of the site
for Blackwater since 2007, “Blackwater is currently in the process of
moving their equipment that still remains back to North Carolina.”

<http://galenagazette.com/Search.asp?Keyword1=Blackwater%2FXe&
SearchBox=1&SectionID=0&ReturnCount=20&btnsearch.x=54&btnsearch.y=11>


In 2009 Blackwater changed the name of their training facilities to
U.S. Training Center. They still operate two training facilities one
in San Diego and the other in Moyock North Carolina. Blackwater also
owns and operates a mobile training unit that travels the country
training law enforcement.


The facility on Skunk Hallow Road twenty miles south of Stockton,
Illinois has been renamed North American Weapons and Tactical Training
Center. The new company is owned by Impact Training Group. Mr. Davis,
former U.S. military, reports that all of the full and part-time
instructors are former law enforcement.  The company’s Facebook page
states: ‘Impact Training Group offers the finest and most
comprehensive firearms and tactics instruction available.”


The NAWTTC also offers, “a unique training experience that can
accommodate any of your training requirements or needs. Whether you or
your unit wishes to rent our ranges, participate in IMPACT’s training
courses, or just learn basic fundamentals of marksmanship give us a
call and we’ll make the arrangements.”


The North American Weapons Group joins the many other companies that
have sprung up around America over the past decade. These companies
have moved in to capitalize on the growing trend to outsource the
training of local law enforcement and military. Over the past two
years I have been contacted by citizens in California, Florida,
Virginia, North Carolina, Ohio and Michigan concerned about start-up
Blackwater want-a-bes.


It is good to know Blackwater was not able to make sufficient profit
to continue to operate a training facility in northwest Illinois.
However the fight against the outsourcing of America’s security
continues. Currently contractors out number American soldiers in
Afghanistan, where there are 206,000 private contractors performing
many tasks, and in Iraq where 177,000 contractors remain. Over 40,000
of these contractors are armed and may engage in combat. In the first
six months of 2010 contractor casualties outnumbered those of US
soldiers; there is an increasing reliance on mercenaries to carry out
American operations as US troops are brought home.


We are witnessing the largest transfer of combat fighting and security
work from public hands to private in the history of our country. We
are also witnessing the privatization of war by multi-billion dollar
companies such as  Dyncorp and Blackwater and hundreds of others like
them. Some 600 private companies are profiting off of the wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan. It is reported that nearly half of every tax dollar
spent in these conflicts goes to a for profit military contracting
company.


Senator Levine after a trip to Afghanistan stated clearly recently one
of the dangers this privatization process presents:


       “The reliance on private security contractors in Afghanistan too
often empowers local warlords and powerbrokers who operate outside the
Afghan government’s control. There is even evidence that some security
contractors work against coalition forces, creating the very threat
that they are hired to combat. Not only do these contractors threaten
the security of our troops, but they put the success of our mission at
risk –”


If American citizens want their security provided by soldiers who take
an oath to uphold and protect our constitution and have strong
allegiance to our country then we need to remain vigilant of what is
happening to our security and what is happening to the way we conduct
our wars. We also need to be watchful of how and by whom our local law
enforcement is being trained.

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