In other words: A discussion of The Bush Administration
Terrorist Mercenaries on U.S. Payroll in Iraq War
When a suicide bomber parked a van disguised as an ambulance in front of the Shaheen Hotel in the Karadah neighborhood of Baghdad on January 28 and blew himself up, he killed four people and wounded scores of others.
He also blew the lid off a dirty little secret of the Coalition Provisional Authority: due to its “outsourcing” of privatized security services, the CPA has put terrorists, mercenaries and war criminals on the payrolls of companies contracted by the Pentagon.
After the Shaheen Hotel blast, departmental spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa at South Africa’s Foreign Ministry confirmed that one of the Westerners killed was South African Frans Strydom. Four of the wounded were also South African nationals, including Deon Gouws, who sustained serious injuries.
...
Strydom was a member in the Koevoet, Afrikaner for “Crowbar,” an outlaw group that paid bounty for the bodies of blacks seeking independence during the 1980s. The Koevoet terrorized blacks in Namibia and northern South Africa for more than a decade. Hundreds of deaths are attributed to its members.
More notorious is Gouws’ past. A former police officer, Gouws was a member of the infamous Vlakplaas death squad that terrorized blacks under apartheid. Only after South Africa established the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Col. Eugene de Kock, a former death-squad leader who supervised Gouws, applied for amnesty, did the activities of the Vlakplaas come to light. Gouws faced a choice: repent by confessing, or be charged with crimes. He applied for amnesty, confessing on his application for absolution to killing 15 blacks and firebombing the homes of “between 40 and 60 anti-apartheid activists.”
There are an estimated 1,500 South Africans employed by security contractors in Iraq, according to the South African foreign ministry. Many used their backgrounds as mercenaries during Apartheid to bolster their credentials.
After being pardoned but ostracized in South Africa, “Where are these men expected to go?” asked Judge Goldstone.
Unfortunately the answer seems to that is these men could then go to work for the US government (via a 'security firm') and help "liberate" Iraq. Tragic.
This is our nation being tarnished be these bastards (I include Bush in this list)!
- rob 4:43 PM - [PermaLink] -
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