A miniscule, equivocating part of me is almost barely certain that a percentage of what Blackwater does in Iraq is noble and good. But lashing out at the US government’s prosecution of the senseless killing of 17 innocent Iraqi civilians is certainly not. During the time of the killings, the legal environment Blackwater operated in was nebulous, resulting in a Rambo-like atmosphere that was ripe for civilian casualties.
Now that a Federal grand jury has indicted the Blackwater forces, and the sights of US justice are trained squarely on their foreheads, the rightwing paramilitary outfit is lashing back like a rabid, cornered wombat.
When the killings occurred in September of last year, Amnesty International wrote the following:
In this environment, serious allegations of contractor involvement in human rights violations - including the torture at Abu Ghraib and hundreds of shootings, sometimes lethal, of Iraqi civilians - have emerged, yet contractors have not been held accountable.
A recent and gruesome example of this occurred near Nisour Square, Baghdad, on September 16, when at least 17 Iraqis were killed after contractors of Blackwater Worldwide, a contractor of the U.S. State Department, reportedly shot several rounds from their armored vehicles.
This is neither the first time nor an isolated incident of Blackwater personnel using lethal force against Iraqi civilians. The last widely reported incident was of a Blackwater contractor shooting and killing the Iraqi Vice President's body guard, on December 24, 2006. Additionally, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform reported at an October 2 hearing that Blackwater engaged in 195 shootings since 2005, firing the first shots 84% of the time.
To that point, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates admitted to Congress at the time that oversight of security contractors in Iraq was lacking:
"But we clearly have to have proper oversight procedures and oversight activities in place to make sure they're doing what they're supposed to," he said, adding: "My concern is whether there has been sufficient accountability and oversight."
According to an Iraqi investigation into the horrible events that day, the Blackwater posse fired without provocation, and not a single shot was returned from the 17 dead. Against this backdrop, the amoral tools who have come to Blackwater’s defense are attacking the US government for—FINALLY—holding the rogue security firm accountable. According to Blackwater’s deluded attorneys:
"the indictment is an effort by bureaucrats in Washington to second-guess split-second decisions made by honorable men during a firefight in the most dangerous neighborhood in the world."
"Once the jury understands the events of Sept. 16, they are not going to do what the Department of Justice is doing -- which is second-guessing honorable men in a firefight,"
Seventeen innocent civilian deaths in a single "firefight," and Blackwater’s shocked they’re going to trial? I have four words for them:
Welcome back to America.