Mercenary Nepalese personnel are being recruited in droves for security work in Iraq guarding Baghdad Airport, the former palace of Saddam Hussain in Baghdad now serving as the US Embassy as well as providing escort duties. These personnel are formerly serving soldiers of the British Army Gurkha Regiment, most having completed 22-years of service. What is alarming is the fact that the Nepalese security personnel are taking part in a situation purely for the purpose of financial gain, carrying lethal weapons, H&K MP5 machine guns, 9mm pistols as well as an array of precision killing tools on the streets in most towns and cities of Iraq. How many Nepalese security personnel have lost their lives is a well kept secret since it does not serve the purpose of the coalition nor the private mercenary companies that hire them to advertise the real nature and number of casualties, the families of the dead mercenaries are simply paid off to remain silent about this, again a financial incentive behind the silence. Who said loyalty is earned, well it is true, loyalty is a commodity that is bought and paid for in this world, contrary to popular myths. Alarmingly, the fact that the Nepalese mercenaries are willing to work for financial gain in support of what is an illegal occupation of Iraq is really a short sighted one simply because if one is to believe in Karma or ying-and-yang, then what the concept of what goes around comes around would at some point would apply here. The Nepalese state is facing serious insurgency as well as civil strife, the King is highly unpopular and his removal from power is imminent, don’t just take my word for it, 2006 is going to be a decisive year for the power struggle in Nepal, watch and learn. But what of the Iraqis who have been killed by these mercenaries, Iraq's interior ministry have tried to impose legal boundaries on the private security business operating in Iraq but to no avail, the now defunct Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) head, Paul Bremner upon departure from Iraq gave blanket immunity to Private Security Companies and mercenary personnel, as a result, not one prosecution has been brought against these mercenaries despite reports of mismanagement of a large chunk of the US$ 18 Billion having being misappropriated by the CPA and overcharging by and for the Private Mercenary Security Companies in Iraq since the illegal invasion. What is even more surprising is the fact that these Nepalese Mercenaries are being paid much less than their British, American, South African and South American counterparts, even the Fijian Mercenaries are being paid much, much more.
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Oh no! People carry guns! And get paid for it!
10.02.2006 17:26
What about all the thousands of other 'military/security consultants' there? What about DynCorp? What about all the others (lots of UK, southafrican, american of course, australian etc).
See
What gets me most about the above post is its rather poor understanding of reality. Lets look at some facts. Nepalese have been volunteering to fight in the UK army for hundredas of years, as, you've guessed it, mercenaries. They wwere not UK or empire ciotizens, they were soldiering for cash.
Nepalese still supply men to the UK Gurkha regiments, and also to the Gurkha regiments of the Indian army. Its a local tradition basically.
And the pay is going to be incredible in comparison to what can be earnt anywhere in Nepal.
British soldiers are leaving the army and going straight to the 'private military contractors' employment because they get 10 times the official soldiers pay.
And please, get don't get all holy talking about 'precision killing tools': they are called guns and most people in iraq have one around the house anyway.
optimist
NEPALESE MERCS, A LOSE-LOSE SITUATION
10.02.2006 17:27
NEEOM
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11.02.2006 01:27
In the interests of accountability I hope you will take my advice and learn to write propertly.
May I suggest the section on paragraphs of most use.
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Billions For Iraq Reconstruction Unaccounted For
11.02.2006 14:15
Stuart Bowen, special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, says $8.8 billion is unaccounted for because oversight on the part of the Coalition Provisional Authority, the entity governing Iraq after the war, "was relatively nonexistent."
The former No. 2 man at the Coalition's transportation ministry, Frank Willis, concurs. "I would describe (the accounting system) as nonexistent." Without a financial infrastructure, checks and money transfers were not possible, so the Coalition kept billions in cash to pay for its multitude of projects. "Fresh, new, crisp, unspent, just-printed $100 bills. It was the Wild West," says Willis.
Such an atmosphere made it possible for billions to go missing and companies to defraud the Coalition. Custer Battles, a company quickly formed after the war to get reconstruction contracts, goes on trial next week, accused in a whistleblower suit by an ex-employee of bilking the U.S. government out of $50 million.
"(Custer Battles) wanted to open fraudulent companies overseas and inflate their invoices to the U.S. government," says the whistleblower, Robert Isakson. He says he refused to go along with the scheme and "two weeks later, apparently I heard they began exactly the fraud they described to me," he tells Kroft.
Willis remembers Custer Battles, which was formed by former Army Ranger Scott Custer and a failed congressional candidate, Mike Battles, who claimed to be active in the Republican Party and have connections to the White House.
"They came in with a can-do attitude, whether they could or not," he says. "They were not experienced. They didn’t know what they were doing."
They nevertheless got contracts and their work quickly drew complaints.
"They failed miserably," says Col. Richard Ballard of a $16.8 million contract Custer Battles got to secure the Baghdad Airport. Col. Ballard, the inspector general for the Army in Iraq at the time, says the company failed to provide the X-ray equipment required by the contract.
"These were multi-million-dollar devices for which they received a considerable cash advance so that they could procure them, and then they never procured this equipment," says Ballard. On a bomb-sniffing dog and trainer Custer Battles did procure, Col. Ballard says, "I think it was a guy and his pet, to be honest with you," he tells Kroft. The colonel noted that the dog "would refuse to sniff the vehicles."
In a memo obtained by 60 Minutes, the airport’s director of security wrote to the Coalition: "Custer Battles has shown themselves to be unresponsive, uncooperative, incompetent, deceitful, manipulative and war profiteers. Other than that, they are swell fellows."
Instead of removing Custer Battles, the Coalition praised them and continued to give them contracts. One of those contracts involved procuring trucks for moving cash around the country — some of which were inoperative and had to be delivered via tow truck.
"I don't really know (how they got away with it)," says British Col. Philip Wilkinson, to whom the trucks were delivered. "The assumption that we had was that they had to have high political top cover ..."
Custer and Battles are now under federal investigation and declined to be interviewed. But in taped depositions, they disavowed any knowledge of fraudulent invoices outlined in the lawsuit.
Watching you Blue Sky