Executive Outcomes Against All Odds Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Are you looking to buy Executive Outcomes Against All Odds? Here is the right place to find the great deals. we can offer discounts of up to 90% on Executive Outcomes Against All Odds. Check out the link below:

>> Click Here to See Compare Prices and Get the Best Offers

Executive Outcomes Against All Odds ReviewToday the role of private defense contractors, private military companies, private security and advisory companies and similar organizations have become well known through the employment of Blackwater in Iraq. Prior to the legitimacy that Blackwater brought to the business in Iraq there was a long period where such organizations, staffed mostly by white ex-military professionals, gained a great deal of bad press as `mercenaries' in Africa and elsewhere doing the dirty work that locals were either incapable of doing or that foreigners wanted done. Executive Outcomes (EO) and its story from 1989/1993 to 1999 represents a mid-way point between the over-professionalization of these types of companies and the more rambo-derring do of a previous era.
This story is intertwined entirely with the life of Eeben Barlow, the author, who was born in Rhodesia and joined the South African Defense Forces in 1974. He rose through the ranks, eventually commanding 32 Battalion's elite reconnaisance unit. Eventually he was recruited by the Civil Cooperation Bureau (CCB) and from there through his operations, made contact with other men who would become integral to EO such as Tony Buckingham and Simon Mann. His first missions involved Angola and the civil war there between MPLA and UNITA. When EO became operational and more involved in 1993 it ended up confronting the very movement, UNITA, that South Africa had actually worked with before.
Barlow details the widening area of operations of EO and its recuritment of ex-SADF personell, especially from elite units such as Koevoet and other people involved wit counter-insurgency. More surprising is that it also received applications from former members of the ANC military wing. Eventually EO was tasked with supporting the Angolan governments attempts to recover territory and natural resources, including diamond mining areas from UNITA and by 1994 it had achieved its objectives of forcing UNITA into a ceasefire. Barlow details many of these operations and provides excellent analysis of the `blood diamonds' question and the resolution of the conflict.
In 1995 as EO's reputation grew it was hired by Sierra Leone to stop the Revolutionary United Front (RUF)'s attempt to take over the country. This successful mission was concluded when the diamond areas, controlled by the RUF, were re-captured. Other missions followed but in general EO's greatest days were behind it. Disinformation, spread by numerous governments and the press, focused negative attention on the `mercenaries' and their supposed attempt to `re-colonize' Africa, an irony considering they were influential in helping African governments that had hired them and that the EO inclucded black Africans in its ranks. In the end Barlow details the duplicity of the UN and the international community and the fact that numerous African countries were allowed to be destroyed by genocide, such as in Rwanda, while governments did nothing and at a time when the EO could have done much.
An excellent book with numerous maps, documents and color photographs. A must read for anyone interested in Africa in the 1990s and also in the role of `mercenaries' in conflict. This is no dry read, but the best in storytelling and furthermore it is all true.
Seth J. Frantzman
Executive Outcomes Against All Odds Overview

Want to learn more information about Executive Outcomes Against All Odds?

>> Click Here to See All Customer Reviews & Ratings Now

Read More...

A Bloody Business: America's War Zone Contractors and the Occupation of Iraq Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Are you looking to buy A Bloody Business: America's War Zone Contractors and the Occupation of Iraq? Here is the right place to find the great deals. we can offer discounts of up to 90% on A Bloody Business: America's War Zone Contractors and the Occupation of Iraq. Check out the link below:

>> Click Here to See Compare Prices and Get the Best Offers

A Bloody Business: America's War Zone Contractors and the Occupation of Iraq ReviewAn element of private military companies is the rediscovered opportunity to join "the fight" without joining a public military organization. Reasons for taking the private route include being too old, too unfit, short-term goals (i.e. quick money, A Bloody Business: America's War Zone Contractors and the Occupation of Iraq Overview

Want to learn more information about A Bloody Business: America's War Zone Contractors and the Occupation of Iraq?

>> Click Here to See All Customer Reviews & Ratings Now

Read More...

Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Are you looking to buy Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army? Here is the right place to find the great deals. we can offer discounts of up to 90% on Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army. Check out the link below:

>> Click Here to See Compare Prices and Get the Best Offers

Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army ReviewI read this book in one night after hearing Mr. Scahill speak in Washington DC. The book is a remarkable and bracing wake up call about the privatization of war and how that subverts even basic notions of democracy. I find it remarkable that people criticize Mr. Scahill for using terms like "radical Christian right" - as if these terms are caricatures and ad hominem attacks. Hardly. In fact Schaill then spends hundreds of pages breaking down exactly what is so "radical Christian right" about Blackwater. He is a serious journalist who has uncovered a story that is both illuminating and frightening. It's hard to have any respect for people who say "I didn't even get to the first page" and then feel like they can write a review on its content.
Last point: As good a writer as Scahill is, he's a better public speaker. People should go hear what he has to say. These aren't easy truths to consume, but they are truths that define and explain the current calamaties unleashed on the worldBlackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army Overview

Want to learn more information about Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army?

>> Click Here to See All Customer Reviews & Ratings Now

Read More...

Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Updated Edition (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs) Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Are you looking to buy Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Updated Edition (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs)? Here is the right place to find the great deals. we can offer discounts of up to 90% on Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Updated Edition (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs). Check out the link below:

>> Click Here to See Compare Prices and Get the Best Offers

Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Updated Edition (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs) ReviewThroughout history, private interests have performed military duties and always proved a critical political factor. Celts and Germans worked in the Roman Emperor's personal Praetorian Guard, King Edward I employed professional companies of archers, and the Swiss fought all over Europe, and are still guarding the Vatican. It's only in the 19th and 20th centuries that the state has become the sole legitimate agent in the conduct of military operations. The 1990s, however, have witnessed the emergence of private organized interests at every level of military operations. The twist comes because today these private military firms (PMFs) are organized as twenty first century corporations, with business plans and long term profit objectives.
Singer's analysis begins with an account of private military interests in ancient and modern times. This gets us used to the idea that PMFs have been around before and are really nothing new. In the second section, Singer classifies PMFs in three segments, each characterized by how far its activities are from actual fighting. First and most obvious there are the military provider firms that place frontline military units (e.g. Executive Outcomes) second there are the consulting firms who train and shape a client's military (e.g. Military Professional Resources Inc.) and third there are the firms that provide logistical and support services such as food delivery (e.g. Brown and Root).
Lastly, Singer examines the implications of using PMFs, which of course being corporations are motivated by profit. Singer illustrates how seemingly simple precepts result in fiendishly complex moral problems.
Do we feel uneasy at for-profit military firms? Of course we do and so we are tempted to dismiss any question of using them. But In 1994, one of the more unsavory firms, Executive Outcomes, created a plan that for some 150 million dollars could have stopped the Rwandan genocide and saved hundreds of thousands of lives.(*) The UN Security Council balked at the costs, nothing was done until the genocide was well under way and half a million people were butchered.
Do we support relief organizations such as CARE? Do we give them money? I do. But how should we feel about the Red Cross and CARE using that money to hire PMFs as protection? Is it right for them to support PMFs? Is it right of us to expect them to go into dangerous situation with inadequate UN or local military protection?
Singer's conclusions are only tentative, and given the emphasis he's placed on how complex the moral dilemma is, this is only proper. He neither condemns nor supports the rise of PMFs, he merely states that they exist and are on the rise, he describes how they operate, and he points out the practical and moral dilemmas that arise from making use of them. He ends with a rewording of the proverb that war is too important to be left to generals: war is too important to be left to private industry. In other words, he warns us that while PMFs are here to stay we must keep them in check and on a leash.
Vincent Poirier, Tokyo
(*) See comments for more on this.
VPCorporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Updated Edition (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs) Overview

Want to learn more information about Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Updated Edition (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs)?

>> Click Here to See All Customer Reviews & Ratings Now

Read More...

Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Are you looking to buy Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror? Here is the right place to find the great deals. we can offer discounts of up to 90% on Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror. Check out the link below:

>> Click Here to See Compare Prices and Get the Best Offers

Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror ReviewLicensed to Kill is Robert Young Pelton's broad survey of the modern world of mercenaries. Strike that, of contractors. Mercenaries, after all, as Doug Brooks of IPOA (International Peace Operations Association) said in the movie Shadow Company: anyone convicted as being a mercenary should be shot along with his lawyer (Doug, pardon my paraphrasing). Regardless, Pelton's subtitle captures what these guys are: hired guns. Or as one of the contractors in the book put it: "guns with legs".
Pelton's book is (or can be) a quick read. It's conversational, often with the feel that you're sitting in a pub having a beer while he tells you a story (as you do in his World's Most Dangerous Places books). For me, however, it wasn't a quick read. I found myself highlighting sentences, scribbling in the margins, and applying colored flags for quick and future reference. Pelton may challenge the journalist\ community with how he gets into the action (journos not always being the type who will ride with the bad guy when something might happen), but this is how he gets the facts, the story, and the respect that opens doors later. A perpetual cycle, his access gets him more access and so on. Unlike other others who seek to justify a point of view, Pelton comes off balanced, telling it like it is and, very importantly, with context.
Licensed to Kill is more than a narrative of private operators, it is an almost forensic look into the use of private military forces. High profile actors in the world of hired guns, such as Erik Prince and Blackwater, Tim Spicer, Simon Mann, and Michael Grunburg (profiled deeper in Three Worlds Gone Mad) of various ventures, and even a con-artist who's convinced he's the greatest American hero.
This book is a great resource that pulls the curtain aside to see how PMCs operate, a look into their motivations, and where they are being used. If you're not provoked to learn more, you're not paying attention.Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror Overview

Want to learn more information about Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror?

>> Click Here to See All Customer Reviews & Ratings Now

Read More...

WAR DOG: Fighting Other People's Wars -The Modern Mercenary in Combat Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Are you looking to buy WAR DOG: Fighting Other People's Wars -The Modern Mercenary in Combat? Here is the right place to find the great deals. we can offer discounts of up to 90% on WAR DOG: Fighting Other People's Wars -The Modern Mercenary in Combat. Check out the link below:

>> Click Here to See Compare Prices and Get the Best Offers

WAR DOG: Fighting Other People's Wars -The Modern Mercenary in Combat ReviewAll I can say is reading this was a very emotional experience as I relived some of those memories from Ventor's book, War Dog.
It is not only a work of truth but an amazing story of historical facts that should be read by anyone who truly wants to understand the nature of modern, post cold war conflict and how closely integrated international economy is with these small wars.
He also, speaks not only of the 'contrary to popular opinion' fact, that most modern mercs were former distinguished soldiers who left their service and continue to serve with more honor than many civilians will ever know or have. Mercs who also were smart enough to see a way to make some money doing what they were already good at from years of service. Mercs who risk their lives for causes, not just money, and that many of these causes, still actually serve the good of their own homelands through indirect means.
Also, they understand that many of their enemies are not out for anything other than pure greed and will stop at no inhumane horror to attempt achieving this. Using child soldiers, hacking off limbs of old people with dull machetes, taking bets and then cutting the babies out of pregnant women to see if it's a boy or girl that falls out...
These mercs understand what no politician or self professed peace lover will ever understand or be able to say, much less take action on...And that is that some people in this world are not kind, but ruthless and the only way to stop them is with force...
And that's what this book is all about, these men who choose to lay their lives on the line, sure for some money, if they live and when they get paid (if ever), but mostly for a cause they believe in, in places most can't even fathom and in ways, many will never understand, until they live it.
These men fall in love with a woman, or a country, or an ideal and often, money is the least of their motives. Read for yourself and form your own opinion. This is the closest to ground truth anyone can ever get without actually going there and living through it- if they live though it.
For me, my tour in Africa in some ways, was one of my quietest in terms of combat actually fought, as my wars were in other places. But, in terms of the blood shed and horrors of inhumanity, I've seen nothing like these wars.
And, I've seen nothing like the brave men I met there. The Russian crews I served with were some of the best ever and the South African men I met and worked with there, make many heros look small in comparison. To those men go the real honors and salutations.
And to Ventor for capturing it, so that their stories will be told, the truth will be know, people can understand and maybe, just maybe, someone somewhere, who is in a position to make a change, might just do so and in that, all our efforts combined, will make a difference.
A good read, a better book and a great story for everyone who seeks to understand where we are and where we're going.
Salute!
>>----->WAR DOG: Fighting Other People's Wars -The Modern Mercenary in Combat OverviewMercenaries have been around since the dawn of civilization, yet today they are little understood. While many modern freelance fighters provide support for larger military establishments, others wage war where the great powers refuse. In War Dog, Al Venter examines the latter, in the process he unveils a remarkable array of close-quarters combat action.

Having personally visited everywhere he describes, Venter is the rare correspondent who had to carry an AK-47 in his research along with his notebook and camera. To him, covering mercenary actions meant accompanying the men into the thick of combat. During Sierra Leone's civil war, he flew in the government's lone Hind gun ship-piloted by the heroic chopper ace "Nellis"-as it flew daily missions to blast apart rebel positions. In this book Venter describes the battles of the South African mercenary company Executive Outcomes and after stemming the tide of Jonas Savimbi's UNITA army in Angola they headed north to hold back vicious rebels in West Africa.

This book is not only about triumph against adversity but also losses, as Venter relates the death and subsequent cannibalistic fate of his American friend, Bob MacKenzie, in Sierra Leone. Here we see the plight of thousands of civilians fleeing from homicidal jungle warriors, as well as the professionalism of the mercenaries who fought back with one hand and attempted to train government troops with the other.

The American public, as well as its military, largely sidestepped the horrific conflicts that embroiled Africa during the past two decades. But as Venter informs us, there were indeed small numbers of professional fighters on the ground, defending civilians and attempting to conjure order from chaos.

In this book we gain an intimate glimpse of this modern breed of warrior in combat. Not laden with medals, or even guaranteed income, they have fought some of the toughest battles in the post- Cold War era. They simply are, and perhaps always will be, "War Dogs."



REVIEWS

"A disturbing insight into the ever growing world of unconventional private armies. Like it or not, Venter tells it to us the way it is."John Le Carre

"In this work Al Venter has delved into the real-life exploits of the War Dogs... to illuminate how the privateers have continued to conduct battle in the wake of the Colonial Age.The true stories in this work are more impressive than fiction, and in terms of Africa, this book should be on the must read list for the U.S. State Department and British Foreign Office." Frederick Forsyth

"...a gripping and hugely informative read. ...highly recommended. ...impressive and enlightening."The Herald, 07/2008

"...a remarkable read with thriller moments that take you deep into the action"Raider, 11/2008

Want to learn more information about WAR DOG: Fighting Other People's Wars -The Modern Mercenary in Combat?

>> Click Here to See All Customer Reviews & Ratings Now

Read More...