The Colonels Corner The Invisible Soldiers Part 9

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0:00 Okay, you guys will give me just a minute. I'm running a few minutes behind. I need to set up the rumble. So I'm going to do that while we chat. I have to tell you, I gave Cousin It a long stern talking to because she's been messing with Grok. And now Grok is suspended. I'm not saying she caused it, but I'm saying maybe. That's funny. It's so funny. Oh, my God.

0:30 The irony there is just rich, okay? So I responded to Alpha Warrior posting that picture about it being suspended, that that's what happens when you take Wikipedia away from Grok for its answer. It gets a little controversial. That is so funny. Oh, my God. Yeah, it's just hysterical. It looks like a...

1:01 Something you would see on Babylon B, doesn't it? Yes. Yeah, that's a good point. Holy crap. Okay. Let's see. Let's get this down here. I am going crazy today because we're doing our road trip and I have people coming to see at the house and the baby.

1:31 was here all weekend. So we got literally nothing done. And we have a new airline that flies into our local airport now. And my daughter went up to Nashville for her husband's brother's wedding and flew on that airline. They fly directly to Nashville, but they don't fly back. The 10 o'clock return flight last night.

1:59 got delayed and delayed and delayed. And it finally took off at like three o'clock in the morning. But by three in the afternoon, they had decided just to rent a car and come home because he had to go to work today. And so, yeah, it's just been chaos. So the baby stayed an extra night, which of course I'm not complaining about, but it kind of threw the whole day into craziness. But anyway.

2:29 We're here for it. We can adjust. We can improvise. So I was hoping we were going to be done with this book, but it does look like we'll have one more time. And because I'm going to be traveling tomorrow, the show won't be on until later in the afternoon, probably around seven or so East Coast time. Because, of course.

2:59 we won't get to our destination until about four. So just FYI, I will keep you guys updated on the travel schedule. And we're one day closer to meeting Bridget in Nashville. Yay! Cheers and celebration everywhere. Yeah. And one day closer to having more cantaloupe from Bridget in Nashville. Yes, yay!

3:29 Cheers and celebration everywhere. Yes. All right. Definitely for me. Okay. So we're on Chapter 14, Part 9. And we went through Iraq and the Matrix contract and all of that part. So the name of this chapter is Beyond Iraq.

3:54 And it starts off with by the time President Obama announced the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, the private military security companies were in line to collect billions of dollars in contracts for another five years. They included SOC Inc., which was a firm with an extensive. It was the firm that had the extensive training facility that we talked about earlier in Nevada.

4:26 whose contract to safeguard the Baghdad embassy would bring in nearly $1 billion to the company. Triple Canopy, who had a five-year $1.5 billion contract for embassy security. What do you think we were doing in that embassy that needed all of that protection? Armor Group, Control Risk Group, DynCorp, Inris, and Aegis. And as always, there were many smaller firms working as subcontractors.

4:55 though they were not listed on the Baghdad embassy website. And that's how they hide all of this stuff. What was noted on that site, however, was a big caveat. Quote, the U.S. government assumes no responsibility for the professional ability or integrity of the persons or firms whose names appear on the list. Unquote. No responsibility for the people they hire that goes over there and kills civilians.

5:27 These contracts hardly resembled the feeding frenzy of the Iraq War, but they were lucrative for several firms and resulted in new ones being created, some without any track record and many in search of subcontractors from third countries. There were, in fact, enough unknown firms with unfamiliar names popping up in Baghdad that some underwriters of Lloyd's of London

5:55 got suspicious. Insurers typically demanded that these companies produce what they called security protocols from the military if the company wanted insurance. The Iraqi contracts would cushion some of the top firms during the industry's transition from wartime. And while the gold rush in Iraq was ending, the pursuit of the next market had already begun. What exactly were those markets? Wherever

6:24 instability threatened to develop. Wherever the military commitments of states exceeded their capabilities, wherever preventive war was a ruling principle, wherever governments were viewed as incapable of supplying defense or security fast enough in times of sudden conflict. In other words, everywhere the CIA operates and the Arab Spring was right around the corner just to make sure.

6:52 To be sure, there were plenty of work for private military contractors during the Arab Spring, especially protecting companies trying to operate in the midst of the political unrest. For example, in Bagram, excuse me, Bahrain, where Aegis had an office in the capital, the firm, according to its own release, implemented a crisis management plan for an unnamed multinational energy company and evacuated

7:21 from the location. A few months after the protests debated, the UN released a study showing that the use of mercenaries in armed conflict had vastly increased. Examples included Arab countries during the Arab Spring. Muammar Gaddafi, it noted, had brought in hired guns from Eastern Europe and from African nations to fight the protesters, the inorganic protesters.

7:52 Although leaders in the private military security industry argued that hired guns in the Arab Spring were not the companies that formed the backbone of their industry, they were clearly some mainstream companies acting as brokers of combatants deployed to stop the protests. The UN stressed that the presence of private forces, whether employed by companies or self-employed, was growing worldwide, and human rights was a problem.

8:19 but even the UN had begun to employ private military security companies. Since its inception, the UN had relied on governments to send peacekeepers to guard UN personnel in hostile environments. For years, its committees and councils had been critical and watchful of what was described as mercenaries. What then changed? Mainly, it was the rising number of UN relief workers who had been killed or kidnapped in recent years.

8:46 The Taliban killing five UN employees in Pakistan in October 2009 was one example. That year, the former head of diplomatic security for the U.S. State Department, Gregory Starr, became the UN top security official. Starr had been a proponent of private military contractors in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and he pressed for the UN to start using them as well.

9:15 A U.N. spokesman then tried to explain the organization's intention, falling back on definitions. He, Starr, wanted to know that our understanding of the current usage of the term private security contractors typically refers to contractors doing close protection work for movement security, such as Blackwater, Triple Canopy, DynCorp, and Aegis, and many other companies providing this type of service.

9:42 However, the UN doesn't avail itself to that type of service. We do use some private companies to provide static security guards at some sites like Afghanistan. This was a controversial move for the UN. Using private military corporations instead of government peacekeepers sent a message. As one former UN peacekeeper said, we care about you, but not to the point of taking risks for our own selves.

10:12 But UN security Ban Ki-moon told the press in early 2010 that the UN will have to turn to the private sector to protect its people. That year, the UN had contracted a subsidiary of the London-based private military company to provide several hundred Nepal mercenaries to guard the UN officials in Afghanistan.

10:40 The humanitarian organizations were reporting that UN peacekeepers have been quietly turning to private security, particularly in hazardous areas like Somalia and Afghanistan. And again, if you didn't have the CIA creating these instabilities, you'd have no need for these companies. In 2010, the UN spent $75 million on security services.

11:06 a 73% increase from 2009. The figure would continue to grow. By 2012, they were spending $124 million, which was an increase of 300% from their 2009 figure. In a report called Contracting Insecurity, Private Military and Security Companies in the Future of the UN,

11:36 The Global Policy Forum, which monitors international organizations, including the UN, noted the difficulty in defining security services. The caution that the UN statistics were not an exact reflection of reality was issued. However, the figures nonetheless show a market increase. A far bigger market, however, was the fast-growing businesses for private military security companies was maritime security.

12:05 which received an immense boost from the U.S. State Department. In late October 11, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sent a memo asking diplomats to promote the use of privately contracted armed security on merchant vessels to deter or prevent pirating off the Horn of Africa. For the shipping industry, this was a huge surprising endorsement of private military

12:35 companies. Clinton, after all, had been a strong critic all along. The maritime memo drew little attention in the mainstream media, but the use of armed security on ships had been intensely debated in the shipping industry, which had been reluctant to place armed guards on board. Now the U.S. State Department was not only endorsing it, but encouraging it. It was a major victory for companies like Aegis that

13:03 were strong in maritime security, and also for Blackwater, now called XE Services, and soon to be renamed Academy, which even had a 183-foot vessel outfitted for disaster response in maritime security. With a focus on the Gulf of Aden, one of the biggest shipping lanes in the world, this was very big business, also benefiting, especially if armed security did in fact deter piracy.

13:33 would be the insurance industry, which we established early on in this book, was tightly linked to Aegis. Once again, the government was stepping aside and allowing the private sector to sell right in, and it wasn't just off the coast of Somalia. In early November, Andrew Shapiro, the Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of...

13:56 Political Military Affairs, spoke to the Defense Trade Advisory Group to explain the State Department's thinking, quote, with so much water to patrol, it is difficult for international naval forces in the region to protect every commercial vessel. Working with the industry, we recently established a national policy encouraging countries to allow commercial ships transiting high-risk waters to have armed security teams on board.

14:23 The reason for this is simple. To date, no ship with an armed security team aboard it has been successfully pirated. We believe that the expanded use of armed security teams by commercial vessels is a major reason why we have seen a decline in the number of successful pirate attacks this year. Therefore, we have recently demarked

14:44 countries to permit the use of privately contracted armed security personnel on commercial vehicles. And we are also working with industry and transit countries to make it less onerous for private contracted security personnel to visit foreign ports, unquote. In America, too, the business was picking up. The idea of preventing war at home

15:11 was seeping into the collective consciousness of Americans, echoing the familiar rationale for using private security when governments appeared unable to come through with mandates to safeguard citizens. Just like the Mexican-American border. If unstable environments stimulated the market for private military and security companies, then the Mexican-American border was a candidate for another bonanza.

15:38 Capitalizing on such potential in the summer of 2011 was the firm International Security Agency, ISA. It had headquarters in Houston. ISA employed former security special forces as well as former police and told the press that it had done work in 33 countries. Its rationale for security work was, as the Texas Tribune described it, quote,

16:04 If the government cannot protect its citizens, it's up to the individual, unquote. But wait a minute. The individual isn't doing jack shit. The U.S. government is funding it. So it is the U.S. government using private security to avoid the blowback from using the military.

16:31 In August 2011, ISA announced that it had received the required license to operate in McAllen, Texas, on the Mexican border. At the time, ISA President Jerry Bromley, B-R-U-M-L-E-Y, told the press, quote, I love my country. If I were king or emperor of America, I would do exactly what Ronald Reagan did. You know what? You hurt all American citizens. I don't care where you are, and I'm coming after you.

17:01 And we're in America, unquote, which is hilarious since Ronald Reagan gave amnesty and began the large scale attack on the United States by leaving the border open when he promised to secure it. Nice quote. In this presentation to the McGowan business community that summer, ISA showed a newsreel clip of a car chase along the U.S. border that ended with one car in the river.

17:29 Another clip displayed the devastation following an explosion of car bombs on the Mexican side of the border, an animated rendering of Glenn Beck telling the audience that drug dealers were tantamount to terrorists and that the government would not and could not protect Americans from violence they caused. In its corporate slideshow, the company then informed potential clients about the expertise of its employees.

17:58 who were trained in military skills and who, as the ISA president implied, had aggressive rules of engagement. The presentation harkened back to Iraq in 2004 and 2005. Our practice, Bromley said, is if someone raises a weapon to me and I feel threatened with my life or the life of my client, I am taking action. I am not going to lose America.

18:24 lose an American because of rules of engagement say, well, you know, you have to wait until you're shot at. The presentation demonstrated what a military-style cadre is complete with a photograph of a camouflaged soldier raising a weapon and taking aim. ISA, according to its website, required its applicants to be former military with at least four years of service and an honorable discharge, a federal law or civilian law enforcement officer with at least two years of service,

18:55 a security officer with at least six years of service, or a personal protection agent with more than three years of experience. Pay scales began at $200 a day and could go up to $2,500 a day, depending on the work. The firm's overall quest, as presented in its promotional material, was to stop drug cartels instigating violence in the U.S. before it started.

19:24 Well, if that was their goal, they failed. When asked whether it was appropriate to hire private security firms to guard the border and what his concerns for accountability might be, Texas Governor Rick Perry, then a candidate for the Republican nomination for president, said through his deputy press secretary, quote, let's be clear here.

19:45 It is the federal government's responsibility to protect Americans by securing the international border between the U.S. and Mexico. Since the federal government is not fulfilling that responsibility, it is unfortunate but not surprising that citizens living along the U.S.-Mexico border feel unsafe with their own property and that they could be looking to hire personal security, unquote. Quelling fears along the Mexican border promised to become a profitable business.

20:14 and it extended beyond the realm of guarding homes, individuals, and businesses. There was money to be made, for example, in the crackdown on immigration. Private military security companies could run and sometimes own their own detention centers. This was a high-growth market. In 2005, there were 280,000 detentions, and by 2011, there were 400,000. The demand?

20:43 was such that the close proximity to the Mexican border of some of the training sites, for example, Playas, only 40 miles from the border, meant that they could easily be used as future detention centers. After all, immigration enforcement had become another growing market for the private military security companies, which is now you know why it's been left open. By 2011, private contractors controlled half of all

21:13 immigration detention beds in the U.S. Although it was a niche market, it was often identified by analysts as one source of potential growth. Detention attracted the large multinational firms known for their vast offerings of what once was government services. G4S, with more than 600,000 employees in 120 countries, was one.

21:42 owned by both the British Armor Group and the large American security company called Wackenhut, had been one of the corporate participants in the 2008 meeting in Montreux. As part of the immigration work, it was under contract with the U.S. government Department of Homeland Security to escort illegal border crossers back to Mexico. So Wackenhut was associated with the CIA.

22:10 on many occasions. But despite border patrol work and immigration-related armed security, private military security remained nearly invisible to Americans. That they would continue to have a presence and influence in Iraq and Afghanistan would have been a surprise to most Americans as well. But that they played an even bigger role back home within the U.S. borders would have been totally surprising. And yet they were establishing a presence on Main Street.

22:39 By the fall of 2011, there were dozens of municipalities, counties, townships in the United States that had hired private military security companies to train their police force. Oftentimes, Blackwater was the trainer. You want to know why we have road cops? Now you know. Big cities on the list include Atlanta, Washington, D.C.

23:11 New York City, Chicago, and LA. That should tell you everything. There was no law prohibiting the training of police in military methods. Blackwater figured that out, thus identifying the training of domestic police as a potential lucrative business. In the beginning, the market consisted mainly of the Department of Homeland Security, which was in a hurry to improve local police protection in the event of a

23:42 quote-unquote terror attack. It was quick to utilize Blackwater's police training services funding and supporting police departments nationwide to employ Blackwater. Blackwater, the contractor that works with the CIA, a lot. In addition, some municipalities were considering contracting private military security companies for special duties, such as patrolling a city's most dangerous neighborhoods.

24:13 The theory was that this saved the city money from insurance benefits and retirement packages to bulletproof vests and uniforms. Okay, I have to stop here for a second. When you think about this in practice, we already know, based on declassified documents, that the CIA had basically critical units.

24:45 in LA, both at the county and the city level, that was under the control of the CIA. We found that out in the aftermath of the RFK assassination. And when you have people that work closely with the CIA, and some people even consider Blackwater a CIA front,

25:11 And they're training the local police. Do you think that the local police is going to clean up the drugs that the CIA is trafficking into the United States over the border and into these big cities, primarily focusing on minority neighborhoods? Well, I'm going to suggest that they don't because they haven't. Okay.

25:42 The difference between a police officer trained to keep the peace and a soldier was quite easy to identify. A policeman was legally required to protect and serve the citizens of the state, to assume innocence unless there is a reasonable suspicion of illegal activity, and to use weapons against American citizens only as a last resort. A soldier is trained to identify enemies and, if necessary, kill them.

26:09 I stand ready to deploy, engage, and destroy the enemy of the United States in close combat. That combat was their creed. And although most policemen trained by a private military company would remain dedicated to their oath of office, there were definitely exceptions. Evidence of potential problems bubbled up in the autumn of 2011 when Occupy Wall Street movement inspired demonstrations in U.S. cities and towns and on

26:38 university campuses as people protested the greed of the 1% of the U.S. population. Although there were no direct involvement of private military companies, as had been the case in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina when Homeland Security brought in Blackwater, there were clear signs of the militarization trend in policing. The protests began on September 17th in New York City.

27:06 with the occupation of a park near Wall Street. These were nonviolent protesters using their First Amendment right to express their views, thus inspiring some journalists to refer to them as the American Autumn following the Arab Spring. But in early October, things began to change. In their black full battle uniforms, armed with assault rifles, sometimes even M4s like the military, some police began to act the way they looked.

27:36 In Oakland, for example, police kicked and attacked demonstrators, including war veterans, shooting them in the face with tear gas canisters. An ex-Marine who had spent two years on duty in Iraq was hit so hard in the head with a police projectile while he was texting that he was taken to the hospital in critical condition for nearly two months. He had lost his ability to speak, as if it was a flashback scene from the disaster at Nizor Square.

28:06 Oakland police flew through a flashbang grenade at the people who ran to help the wounded vet. Does that sound like January 6th to you? In November, a former Washington state peace officer who had earned a Bronze Star and Purple Heart while serving in Iraq teamed up with an attorney in Arlington, Virginia, to warn in the Atlantic about the consequences of bringing military-style training to domestic law enforcement. Quote,

28:35 When police officers are dressed like soldiers, armed like soldiers, and trained like soldiers, it's not surprising that they act like soldiers, unquote. It was potentially a shameful situation for the United States, especially when the UN, the watchdog of human rights violation across the globe, turned its gaze on the nation that considered itself the beacon of freedom. In early December, Frank LaRue, the UN's special envoy for protecting free expression,

29:04 drafted a memo to the U.S. government demanding to know why it was not protecting the rights of Occupy Wall Street protesters. From his view, as long as they were peaceful, nonviolent demonstrations occupying public spaces, the government had an obligation to protect their rights and not to assert excessive force. What was at risk, LaRue wrote, was Americans' credibility as a model democracy.

29:31 In late 2011, another affront to democracy was taking shape as the government was outsourcing jobs to design, maintain, and operate cyber capabilities for national security. Yeah, how'd that work out? This included devising defenses against cyber attacks and even orchestrating offensive cyber tactics. In what some government officials were calling the cyber contractor complex,

29:58 There was a shift in 2011 from internal defense of infrastructure to offensive strategies, including cyber surveillance, sometimes aimed at American citizens, a startling reality that would soon be exposed to the world by former private contractor Edward Snowden. Equally unsettling was the fact that a few of the new surveillance systems operated by companies that were under contract to the U.S. government.

30:26 For the industry, it meant yet another market to inspire the incubation of new and powerful capabilities from within the industry of private military security companies. In early December 2011, six presidential hopefuls from the Republican Party gathered at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, to debate the issues of the day. The publicity leading up to the debate, which aired on ABC, made it sound more like a wrestling match than a political contest.

30:57 as the main attraction appeared to be anticipated showdown between the frontrunner, Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House, and runner-up Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts. On stage, Romney and Gingrich took the center podiums. Next to them were Rick Santorum, Rick Perry, Ron Paul, and Michelle Bachman. Commentators Diane Sawyer and George Stephanopoulos moderated.

31:27 The questions as well as the answers were somewhat expected, except for one. It happened when Diane Sawyer asked the candidates to comment on the payroll tax cut that was set to expire at the end of the year. If the tax cut ended, Sawyer said, it would add as much as $1,000 tax burden to every American family. Congressman Paul had 30 seconds to respond. At first, Paul, the libertarian, commented predictably.

31:55 as if following a familiar script. I want to extend the tax cuts because if you don't, you raise taxes. But I want to pay for it. And it's not that difficult. In my proposal, in my budget, I want to cut hundreds of billions of dollars from overseas. The trust fund is gone. But how are we going to restore it? We have to quit spending. We have to quit this being the policemen of the world. We don't need another war in Syria or another war in Iran.

32:26 Still true today. Then he moved on to an unscripted part. Quote, just get rid of the embassy in Baghdad. We're pretending that we're coming home from Baghdad. We build an embassy there that cost a billion dollars and we're putting 17,000 contractors in there and pretending our troops are coming home. Unquote. After that, the camera zoomed out and panned across the stage to show the reaction of the others.

32:54 The rules of the debate allowed for 30-second rebuttal, but after Paul's comment came only silence. No one else had anything to say. It was as if Paul had opened a door, just a crack, and invited the others to enter, but they slammed it shut. Despite the bills proposed to enhance transparency and control of private military and security contractors, the advocates for and against them, the wartime contracting commissioners,

33:23 Eye-opening report, the work of journalists and scholars trying to sort out the complex, the dedication of Swiss initiative, and the casualties, war profits, and power, there was still little, if any, public awareness about this industry. Was it possible that these companies were so well integrated into the fabric of American defense and security that there was no incentive for a dialogue? The current president was using them, actually depending on them.

33:52 Perhaps more than ever. President Obama had proposed reforms in February of 2009 to reduce the Pentagon's reliance on private contractors and to increase the number of personnel scrutinizing the contracts. What was called the insourcing initiative would reduce the number of contractors and jobs ranging from logistical support to anti-terrorism training and replace them with government employees. In fact.

34:22 33,000 by 2015. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates announced the plan in April of 2009, but only 16 months later, it was gone. He told the press that he was not satisfied with the progress. Dispelling past defeats, Representative Jan Sikowsky

34:46 was still determined to expose the facts of the industry, repeatedly telling the press and Congress that hiding the truth about these companies and keeping the knowledge of their force hidden was damaging the nation. She was persistent and would not be detoured. She was especially concerned about the issue of casualties, having introduced legislation to require the government to collect and release the names of all contractors killed or injured.

35:15 Not telling the American public about contractor casualties, she told her colleagues in 2007, masks the fact that we're privatizing our military. With new reports showing that contractor casualties in 2010 had exceeded military death in both Iraq and Afghanistan, her concern deepened. And as troops exited Iraq, another issue was beginning to surface. Contractors who were missing in action.

35:43 By the fall of 2011, though few Americans knew, there were eight Americans missing in action in Iraq. One was a U.S. soldier and the other seven were private contractors. Also under the radar was the exploitation of subcontractors. On the surface, the word was that jobs with private military security companies brought big bucks and great perks. But these were the stories about private contractors in Iraq making salaries that far exceeded.

36:13 the paychecks of Uncle Sam's traditional troops. But subcontractors were in a different class. As the House on Oversight and Government Reform learned in the fall of 2011 at a hearing, testimony revealed that tens of thousands of workers hired by the private military security companies as subcontractors were hired at very low wages from third world nations, particularly in Africa.

36:42 They lived in wretched housing, including barbed wire compounds on U.S. bases. They had no insurance, no health care benefits and no compensation if injured and no access to medical services. Worse still, they were untold numbers of sexual assaults. And yet Representative Gerald Conley from a Virginia Democrat.

37:07 said not a single case of human trafficking, sexual assault, wage theft, or related crimes had been prosecuted by the DOJ. Neither the Army nor the AFIS Exchange nor any other component of DOD or the State Department has suspended or debarred a single federal contractor for this abuse. At that hearing, both Republicans and Democrats agreed that the American taxpayers was funding work that produced profits for some companies.

37:36 and exploited workers. These labor practices violate every human value that we have as a country. Our departments of state and defense stand up and fight for human rights around the globe. No, we don't. But have turned a blind eye to these foreign workers. That came from Representative none other than James Lankford from Oklahoma. You know, the senator who still doesn't give a shit.

38:07 We believe that all men and women are created equal, and the U.S. must not stand idly by, and he never did a damn thing about it. Another hidden problem was the struggle of contract veterans. What should they even be called? Contractors injured in Iraq or Afghanistan, sometimes suffering from lifelong disabilities, were not recognized as military veterans.

38:31 politicians pay little attention to their problems and the military has not publicized their contributions. And yet another unrecognized casualty of the privatization of war was the numerous unsolved legal cases involving incidents of abuse and misconduct, delayed often by the jurisdictional complexity of these international businesses and the skills of excellent attorneys who

38:58 whom successful companies could now afford. Lawsuits filed against private military companies dating back as far as 2004 languished oftentimes for many years. A judge in the D.C. court of appeals dismissed such a case in 2010, one that was wandering through a jurisdictional maze. The plaintiff was the father of a young girl who had been fatally shot by an employee.

39:27 of the private military company in Baghdad in 2007 while she was in a car riding home from church. The defendants were a company based in North Carolina under contract to USAID and a private military company based in Dubai hired by USAID contractor for protection. The father was a U.S. citizen.

39:52 There was no doubt that the girl had been shot by the employees of the private military company, but what jurisdiction had legal authority to allow a lawsuit? The case had been bounced from the U.S. District in D.C. to the U.S. District in the Eastern District of North Carolina to a superior court of the District of Columbia and then back to North Carolina, this time to state court and then to the D.C. Court of Appeals, only to be dismissed there.

40:21 By 2011, it seemed more like a game of hot potato than justice. After Kadem's suit, he was the special forces Iraqi interpreter that got shot in the foot at the beginning of the book, was reinstated in 2010 in D.C. federal court, the judge asked Kadem's attorney to prove the legal rationale for trying the case there. Again, the ongoing issue was jurisdiction.

40:49 The 2004 contract with the DOD under which the Cadem's shooter had been employed was a London-based Aegis. The Aegis American subsidiary had not opened until 2006. Besides, it was not the legal entity under the contract with the DOD when the shooting occurred. Thus, the defense argued that trying the case in D.C. or anywhere in the U.S. was not legally possible.

41:15 To counter that and to prove that D.C. was where the case should be, in 2011, his attorneys began to gather evidence, including phone records and travel data, to try and show how much business Aegis was doing in D.C. before the shooting. How many times did Aegis staffers travel to D.C. to attend meetings, luncheons, dinners in an effort to procure contracts? How many other contracts did they have with U.S. agencies that might prove further presence in the nation?

41:45 If the firm had secured a contract in the U.S. and profited from it, the attorneys argued it was taking advantage of business opportunities in the U.S. and should be held liable there. What comes with opportunity are the laws, said one of Cottom's attorneys. As one of the lawyers representing victims of the Abu Ghraib torture incident said,

42:08 We are hoping these cases will make a difference, serve as deterrents, draw attention to the need for heightened accountability. But by now, nearly nine years after the beginning of the Iraq war, we're still facing how to make companies accountable in some cases where there is no question a crime took place. What concerned Shazikowski?

42:31 and other industry critics was that the flow of contracts to private military security companies accused of human rights violations, murder, bribery, among other transgressions, continued at an even faster pace with no resolution of criminal conduct. Take Blackwater, for example. In December 2009,

42:55 The judge had dropped all allegations against four employees charged with the deaths of the 17 Iraqi civilians in Nisour Square, citing missteps by the Department of Justice. The State Department reportedly did threaten to deny the firm contracts as long as Eric Prince owned the company. But then in the summer of 2010, Prince sold the company.

43:19 In mid-December that year, he sold XE to an LA-based consortium of investors, including one that had close ties to Blackwater from the start. And by 2011, the case in which pro-sectors argued that the contractors used grenades and machine guns in unprovoked attacks, while defense attorneys claimed the Iraqi insurgents had ambushed the contractors.

43:51 Meanwhile, there had been new contracts awarded to the successor of Blackwater, including one during the summer of 2010 for nearly $250 million, to work for the CIA and the State Department in Afghanistan. At the time of the award, CIA Director Leon Panetta told ABC commentator Jake Tapper, quote, I have to tell you that in the war zone, we continue to have need for security.

44:20 You've got a lot of forward bases. We've got a lot of attacks on some of these bases. You've got to have security. Unfortunately, there are few companies that provide that kind of security. The State Department relies on them, and we rely on them to a certain extent. They, Blackwater, now XE, provided a bid that underbid everyone else by $26 million, and a panel that said that they can do the job, that they have shaped up their act.

44:50 There really was not much choice but to accept the contract, unquote. And again, that's just blatant bullshit because we know from the contract with Matrix that they don't care who's the lowest bidder. In response to the news, Blackwater's unofficial biographer, Jeremy Scahill, wrote in The Nation, What we are seeing clearly is the Obama administration not only using Blackwater in sensitive operations globally,

45:19 but actively defending the company's continued existence as a government contractor in good standing, unquote. And after commenting on Blackwater's payment to Democrat lobbyists in 2010, Scahill went on to say, quote, no one is paying attention to what should be a major story of Blackwater's thriving second marriage to the current administration, the money trail, unquote.

45:44 The Nation headline article said Blackwater's new sugar daddy, the Obama administration. Sikowsky's drive to expose the hidden details of the industry was largely Blackwater inspired, a drive that moved into high gear in the autumn of 2011 after she was hand delivered a letter from Washington, D.C. attorney Victoria Tunzing. Y'all know who Victoria Tunzing is. I was kind of shocked when I read her name in here.

46:15 She represented Eric Prince. In the two-page letter, Tunsing accused Salkowski of making false and deflammatory statements against Prince in a September news article in London. Isn't that interesting? She's Eric Prince's attorney. The article described a new video game owned by Prince and called Blackwater.

46:44 The game was set in a fictional town in North Africa, and it featured a team of Blackwater operatives depicted as heroes. According to Tunsing, when the reporter asked Sikowsky to comment on the game, she said, among other things, if Mr. Prince had not immigrated to the UAE, which does not have extradition agreements with the U.S., he too would be now facing prosecution, according to Blackwater-related incidents.

47:11 In the letter, Tun Sing praised Prince for his military service with SEAL Team 8 in Haiti, Haiti, the Middle East, and the Balkans, every one of which was CIA-derived bullshit. Not saying anything about the military, CIA-derived bullshit. And noted the examples of Mr. Prince's support for human rights around the world.

47:39 This included funding famine relief in Somalia and the Sudan and contributing to building hospital schools and orphanages and churches in the Middle East and Asia. She went on to say that Sikowsky's statement to the publication was libelous and malicious. She characterized her earlier efforts to persuade Congress to investigate Prince as an abuse of her congressional powers. She stressed the fact that

48:07 Prince had never committed a crime, nor had he ever been charged with one. Neither had he immigrated to the UAE. He maintained a residence in the U.S. And Tenzing noted several instances when the representative used Blackwater as an example of problems in private security contractors. He does, in fact, live in the UAE. Whether or not he denounced his U.S. citizenship is a completely different issue. So I find all of that hilarious. And notice that all of these people,

48:38 just like the Aegis, Blackwater, they all set up foundations, just like George Soros, just like the Ford Foundation, just like the Carnegie Endowment for War Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, so that they can fall back on that to override their wrongdoings. But their philanthropers, speaking on the House floor in late November 2011,

49:07 Sikowsky described the contents of the lawyer's letter to her, talking in a self-assured tone as if reminding her colleagues in Congress that she would not be silenced. She called it heavy-handed tactic, attempted intimidation of a member of Congress. I want to make it clear to Mr. Prince that I will not stop working to end our reliance on private security contractors and to investigate any and all allegations of misconduct.

49:34 And she was just as outspoken in her comments to her colleagues. Quote, while many hours have been spent by this body debating the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, far too little has been devoted to the U.S. growing dependence on private military contractors, the weapon-carrying for-profit security companies who have become integral and counterproductive actors in our war efforts.

50:20 End of quote. All of which is true.

50:24 Before the end of 2011, the company changed its name again to Academy. Academy's first CEO was Ted Wright, a former, you just can't make this shit up, a former executive at Kellogg Brown and Root Incorporated. And for those of you who may have missed it, remember the Office of Public Safety and that shadow organization that ran?

50:58 along with it, PSSI that we found out that was really the CIA's version and that they had infiltrated all of the Office of Public Safety offices. That PSSI was sold to Vanell, Brown and Root. So, this is literally the CIA. Just throwing that out there. Okay.

51:31 Wright wanted a different name to reflect the recent changes in the company's leadership, mainly newcomers to the board of directors and management. And guess who that was? Former National Security Agency head and CIA executive Bobby Ray Inman. Now, you can do any kind of search on Bobby Ray Inman and you're going to come up with.

52:02 Operation Gladio after Operation Gladio. Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft. Jack Quinn, the former White House counsel to President Bill Clinton and former chief of staff to Vice President Al Gore. That's Jack Quinn. OK. Jack Quinn also was the I'm going to try not to laugh. Regulatory.

52:36 compliance officer for AIG, who went bankrupt in 2008. Remember that. And AIG is the successor to CV Star CIA operation. Again, you just can't make this shit up. So CIA, CIA, attorney for Bill Clinton. Okay.

53:09 Got it. And the regulatory compliance officer would have been the guy that should have figured out AIG was going to fail. Nope. Didn't see it coming because it was a controlled demolition in order to steal our money. Wright also wanted the new name to help shape a low profile, more boring image. So, you know, name it something like Academy. It's spelt weird. OK.

53:41 The image, after all, was the ruling factor to these people. At the Pentagon during the first week of 2012, President Obama announced to the American public that he was urging Congress to accept a $500 billion cut in U.S. military budget over the next decade. So Obama starts by saying we need to beef up the military and cut down private military companies.

54:08 And then turns around and cuts the military while beeping up private military. See who pulls the strings? Yeah. All right. He also said this was a strong new strategy that came about largely because of the post 9-11 wars were coming to an end so we could have that military savings. But at the same time, telling you.

54:40 There's so much shit going on in the world that we have to have all these private military that cost three times as much as a military person. It literally makes no sense because they think we're stupid. The proposal would be hotly debated in Congress, but such a shift was inevitable for this cut in defense budget was not just about the end of a long war in Iraq and Afghanistan and not even just about the budget. What Obama didn't mention was that it was very much a shift.

55:14 from military to private military security companies, from a traditional military to a mix of primarily focused on special forces drones and PMCs. What was undisclosed was the reality that as the traditional military began to shrink, non-traditional approaches to national security and defense grew by leaps and bounds. Early in the year, in the drawing room of the Special Forces Club in London,

55:48 Remember that place that we talked about at the very beginning of the book where all of the spies are that had the picture of Wild Bill Donovan in the room. Eric Westrop discussed the future of wars and roles of private security companies. The private security companies will evolve into multinational and multifunctional firms so that governments and corporations will go to them as single servers and get used to relying on them.

56:18 They will succeed more and more. And what seems hidden now will simply be integrated into future generations and they won't know the difference. Traditional militaries will become smaller and the industry will grow. And we will be right back to where we were in the 1800s when all of these mega oligarchs had all of their own private military and security. But this time, they're all going to be funded by us and not them.

56:47 It's actually a brilliant, evil, bastard thing to do because they're not having to pay for it. Okay, that's it for today. And we will definitely finish this next session, whenever that happens to be. Okay. One of the, Shelly the Kiwi over on Rumble quoted or referenced the chaos and control. Yes.

57:28 And absolutely nailed it. Because that's what they do. It's like funding both sides of the war. Except now they're using the PMCs to do the same thing. So the CIA goes in and destabilizes the country. And then the private military security companies come in, either hired by the oligarchs, but preferably USAID in the past.

57:55 or the State Department, or the Department of Defense to secure the country. And they're not securing the country for the people in the country. They're securing the country to be exploited by the oligarchs, just as it's always been. They just basically offloaded the cost onto us because the contracts are being funded with our tax dollars. Again,

58:26 I mean, if you could figure out as a business how to get a government or another entity to pay for a big chunk of your expenses and kind of pat you on the back and just use a few pennies of the savings to set up this foundation to make yourself look like a benevolent, caring person.

58:54 taking all of the dirty part of your business off your books and sticking it to someone else to pay for, that's literally what they've done. It's crazy. Right, right. And I tell you what, the name, you know, I happened on a good article I posted down below on, and it was actually, it wasn't calling out Blackwater. It was just,

59:26 actually in almost like an admiration type situation, was explaining how Blackwater started, how it split, how it had subsections that split off from it and then went on to form other groups and then changed its name and then was grouped together and changed its name and then grouped together and changed its name.

59:53 It really takes a giant wiring diagram just to see all the moving parts of all these PMCs because it's not just a PMC. They had a subsidiary that was a training group. They had a subsidiary that was the actual military. They had a subsidiary that was a weapons dealer. They had a subsidiary that actually made the vehicles. They had a subsidiary that trained the dogs. Yeah.

1:00:23 Yeah. And each one of those changes and morphs and changes and morphs. So and gives birth to all these other ones, you know. Well, somewhere here. Let me see if I can reach over here and grab it. I read a book. I don't even remember which book it's from. That started talking about this because everything that we do comes back to something else we've done.

1:00:51 OK, so I had to get my sketch pad out and start a wiring diagram because what I found, I don't know if it's on here or not. What I found is once you started looking at these, they were all connected, as you're saying, to each other. The mergers and I'm still trying to find that the mergers and acquisitions.

1:01:21 of these companies is crazy. And what I was trying to do is track stock-wise, like this one says that they were a bunch of investors created Academy with all of the CIA. And that's exactly what the CIA does for front companies. They get, that's how they created.

1:01:52 Q Intel and how Q Intel created Palantir. And sometimes the people doing the investing don't even know they're investing with the CIA because of the way it's done. It's it's crazy. So I'm still thumbing through my notes to see if I actually have that.

1:02:21 It's in one of these books. I have way too many. I've been doing way too much shit. You need a secretary, a better secretary. Yeah, I need one that's here. Let me see if I can find it. But anyway, suffice it to say what I mapped out, I showed it on one of our videos. What I mapped out was that.

1:02:54 through mergers and acquisitions, they all ended up in the hands of all of the nefarious people that we talked about through all of these different sections. It also, oh, here it is. Okay, I got it. All right. So if you looked at the contract intelligence part of it, you had Booz Allen, CACI,

1:03:24 C-S-R-A-S-A-I-C, which is a CIA front, which spun off Leidos. And Leidos ended up with Reardon. And Reardon, that's the name of a guy, okay? He's the president and executive manager of Leidos.

1:03:52 Leidos was bought by the Constellas Group, and they owned Apollo. And Apollo had Leon Black on the board. They had, oh, and their CEO travels to UAE, which, weirdly enough, is where Eric Prince ended up.

1:04:22 And Apollo also had Leon Black on its board. And Leon Black was associated with Drexel Burnham Lambert Investment Bank, which was guilty of the junk bonds milking thing, which, again, is another way to launder money.

1:04:49 All of these keep going around in a circle. You have DynCorp, which owners was C-E-R-B-E-R-U-S, capital. And they were associated with Steven Feinberg, who is the founder and CEO of the company C-E-R-B-E.

1:05:21 Again, it's just a chain of them. It's like playing musical chairs. The companies all change ownership. And I didn't even go into the boards because the boards, if you look at the boards, they all share people on the board. And they're dominated by ex-CIA and ex-FBI. Yeah.

1:05:49 Like Clarence Kelly, FBI Director. Deputy CIA Director, Secretary of Defense, Frank Carlucci. How many times have we come across him? This is just Wackenhut. Board of Directors, William Casey. Before, he was Ronald Reagan's CIA Director. Wackenhut was the company that was on the Indian Reservation that was involved in the Promise software.

1:06:18 That was eventually stolen from ends law by the CIA and Mossad and given a back door and sold by Robert Maxwell. Wackenhut was involved in that whole thing. And during the McCarthy, this is a quote from Wikipedia. So, you know, take it with what it is. It says during the McCarthy era, they.

1:06:44 Right when George Wackenhut began compiling names with information on politically suspect individuals. Now, he's the one that started Wackenhut, accusing them of, quote, communist activities. When have we heard that before? And anyway, long story short, he ends up with two and a half million people, files on two and a half million people. One in every 46 American adults. Yeah. American files. Right. Yes.

1:07:14 Right. Yeah. And by 66, he had collected over 4 million names. So you guys remember that we talked at the very beginning of this about executive outcomes. That's where the Aegis guy started as a mercenary, got jailed, was picked up attempting a coup. Their parent company, Strategic Resource Corporation, which we talked about earlier.

1:07:43 also had another company called SACACEN, S-A-C-A-C-E-N. You will not be surprised to find out that they were contracted to the WWF, the World Wildlife Fund, for Congo. And you know what they were doing in Congo? Guarding Heineken breweries in Congo. Of course, of course. SACACEN.

1:08:14 if that's how you say it, S-A-C-A-C-E-N, also was financed by Eric Prince. And it was ran by a guy named Lapras, L-U-I-T-I-N-G-H, however you say that last name. And he was involved in Angola in the 1980s under Reagan. So it's just a big circle. And my chart.

1:08:46 I'll just show it on Rumble, got so convoluted, I could barely follow my own lines of how all of these people overlapped. But DynCorp was protecting Karzai, Paul Brimmer. And yeah, and this was before I ever even read this book. I had like this whole thing mapped out from another book. It's just crazy.

1:09:17 So this book definitely puts into context some of the earlier research that I've done, that we've done. And can I throw one last thing in here? You know, because we always, you know, you guys always say, yeah, these are sick, twisted people. To put in perspective, in Belgium, Wackenhut, the individual, is said to have worked with extremists in the 1980s who in turn had contracts with...

1:09:48 security services, Wackenhut left Belgium in the early 80s after allegations that security guards lured immigrant children into basements and beat them for sport. In Belgium? You mean where Mark Dutro set up operations? Right. Exactly about the same time, even. Yeah. And he was found with dead kids in his basement.

1:10:16 Right. Exactly. But I'm sure it's just a coincidence. So Shelly, the Kiwi over on Rumble, says, I went on a hunt last week and found Peter Thiel's property here in the Bay of Islands in New Zealand. All these evil bastards are buying up New Zealand and building bunkers all over. And New Zealand is definitely part of the.

1:10:48 There's a lot of people that we've come across that own property in New Zealand. It was looked at as kind of the place where they could all run to. Cyprus is another one. For a million dollars in quote unquote investment in Cyprus, you can buy citizenship and they have no extradition treaty with the United States.

1:11:20 For whatever that's worth. Yeah, right. Those are things that I look for. And thank you, Shelly, for adding that. Yeah, it's a crazy story. And I did want to mention, I don't think I put a bookmark on it. The post that I did earlier about the, let me see if I can pull it up real quick.

1:11:54 About the indictment that just got unsealed of the four people that were running guns to the Mexican cartel. I did want to briefly talk about that because it had some very interesting. As soon as I see these names, one of the names I recognize the spelling of.

1:12:23 And that's the Bulgarian arms dealer. He's come up a couple of times. Yeah, I didn't bookmark it. He's come up a couple of times in other storylines as being a weapons dealer. And so then I went and looked at the other guys, both of the other guys that's from the Uganda area.

1:12:52 and Uganda is one of those hotspots for the CIA as well, was both of those people are associated with like an exporting company in where? The UK. And so you have people that, and it was not like a small amount. It was like $57 million, if I remember correctly, that.

1:13:21 Worth of weapons to include a tank, by the way, and missiles and all kinds of stuff that they were involved in. If you guys didn't see that post, please share that, because every one of these things that is exploding right now, the unsealed indictments in many cases are going to track back to stuff that we already know.

1:13:51 things that we've discovered here. And as soon as I saw that Hungarian's name, I was like, oh, son of a bitch. Because Hungary, or not Hungary, sorry, Bulgaria. Bulgaria is like the weapons trafficking hub for a lot of Gladio. It comes up over and over and over again.

1:14:20 Again, I won't be able to find it, but whatever. You guys will be able to find it on my page probably faster than I can. Yeah, I'm looking. Yeah. That was just a crazy find. If they didn't, I don't see it on my page, which is weird. Yeah, me neither. Huh. But it wouldn't be the first time, but I'm looking.

1:14:54 Yeah. And did it mention Bulgaria specifically? Yeah. Okay. No. Repeatedly. Okay. I'm going to try and cheat. The Kenyan national and other foreigners that have been indicted in the United States for allegedly conspiring to supply. Yep. Found it. Okay. If you would repost that, please. Yep. I will stick it in the pill. Yeah. If you guys would repost that, I'd appreciate it.

1:15:27 Because it's not showing up on my, just thumbing through my post earlier. And, oh, yeah, I see it. Is that the same one? I think so, yeah. The one you said, hey, Alpha. Oh, well, there's another one. It came out this morning. And that's the guy that ICE just nabbed that has involvement in 29 murders.

1:16:05 He was picked up by the ICE Tampa and Miami officers. So I assume he was here in Florida. And he has ties to a book I literally just finished reading last night about Columbia. Columbia has come up on our radar multiple times. And when I found this book, I wanted to Columbia.

1:16:35 Thanks to the CIA and the U.S. South Com, the Southern Command, and their employment of special forces has went down and trained. What we were told was paramilitary people to combat drugs. Well, they didn't actually combat drugs. They combat competitors.

1:17:02 to the drug market that the CIA controlled. And this book does an amazing job of laying it out. So that's probably the next book we're going to do. And again, everything that we've been told is a lie. And it is laid bare in this book about how, why they take out certain people.

1:17:32 We have noticed through the last two and a half years that when they announce a war on whatever, it has nothing to do with whatever its stated purpose is. The war on terror was never a war on terror. It was the creation of a terrorist network for them to employ. The war on drugs was never about the war on drugs. We discovered long ago.

1:18:03 During the Nixon administration that his war on drugs was actually taking out the Corsican mafia, which were competitors to the CIA controlled Sicilian mafia. And this book lays out people whose name you will readily recognize that have either been assassinated and it was touted as being a good thing when.

1:18:33 In fact, it had nothing to do with being a good thing. It's that person wasn't playing along. Not that all of the people not playing along aren't bad people, but you will figure out why certain people were taken out. So anyway, yes, Maker, Sarge, everybody over on Rumble, please hit the like button. You guys are doing a wonderful job over there.

1:19:04 I appreciate it a lot. So I think all along had his hand up. Okay. I just wanted to get slightly off topic. However, it is related, I think, to the overall theme of Operation Gladio in a way that, you know, this book came out. It's called.

1:19:33 And I've mentioned it before. It's by about this one term congressman named Allard Lowenstein, who is, you know, whoa. One eight hundred. Whoa is the best way of describing this guy. You know, he was definitely an infiltrator into left liberal organizations, like especially among the young people of the 1960s. Wow.

1:20:00 And so later, but at the same time, he has this ambivalent shenanigans going on. Like in 1974, he goes to visit Frank Carlucci, you know, future Reagan secretary of defense. And I'm really not doing a good job. So let me just say he seems to be like half masquerading as this. But for containment purposes, you know, sort of.

1:20:29 pretending to be Peter while working for Paul type scenario that we see so frequently throughout the Operation Gladio, you know, things that you have mentioned throughout the show. And I think that'd be really, really, really fruitful for folks to check out this book. It is kind of dated in a way. It's called, again, The Pied Piper. The author is Bruce Cummings. It came out in 1985 by Growth Press.

1:20:59 It was roundly attacked in the New York Review of Books, which is always a good sign. In other words, it's it's definitely he hit a nerve here in 1985 before anyone even knew anything about Operation Gladio. And it's it's so apropos versus both U.S. politics and foreign politics, including Africa, Portugal, Spain, South America.

1:21:27 Tell everybody the name of the book again. Yeah, sorry. It's called The Pied Piper by Bruce Cummings. And it was published in 1985 by Growth Press. I think it would be so relevant to look at this book with Gladio glasses because it's just like, well, the whole thing is Gladio. And what's interesting about that time frame in 1985, if you go over to Italy.

1:21:54 you will find that many of the people in 1985, the reporters, the state prosecutors, were just starting to realize that all of the assassinations occurring in Italy

1:22:15 And the one reporter that was assassinated did a lot of writing in the 1980s, making the allegations without access to the information. And I think it was in 1989 when they first discovered the list of the P2 members. So, yeah, the timing would be perfect to look at that as far as

1:22:44 The information there were spot reports throughout Europe of, hey, this looks like a coordinated thing going on here talking about domestic terror events. So, yeah, it would be interesting to look at his. I think I bought that book the first time. I haven't read it yet. Yeah. Yeah. The other thing, Colonel, is, you know.

1:23:14 It's far from a perfect book. In other words, a lot of what he says about the JFK administration, he doesn't really dwell on it, but you can see that he's been subjected to what I would call left gatekeeping propaganda in the mode that was extremely prevalent in the 1980s among the so-called left with a bunch of quotes around it, you know, such as Seymour Kersh, Noam Chomsky, and Alexander Coburn.

1:23:43 the nation they it's just like um so he's he's definitely of his time 1985 but as you mentioned it's definitely the time period is relevant in terms of european journalists kind of waking up and lastly i i mean for me he is not a he's kind of an enigmatic figure for me because i really haven't made up my mind on this dude because he of course

1:24:11 was killed was assassinated in um allard lowenstein i'm talking about in um when 1980 as soon as he reopens the rfk assassination and also he was the guy mobile uh reopens the i'm sorry the rfk assassination investigation in 1980 and think of all the cleanup operations that were going on before ronnie got into the white house here right but also going back to 1968

1:24:39 He was the key pivot man in a sort of dump Lyndon Johnson movement that was first went for what I consider a CIA bait divider candidate, namely Eugene McCarthy. Those children were too damn clean for Gene, if you know what I agency mean, Colonel. And later he went for RFK. So he's such an ambivalent character. And it's like he does seem to have been, you know, a gladio.

1:25:09 you know, play in both sides or, you know, for, he's definitely an Intel lock, but the question of whether he, you know, died realizing what he had become is, is open for debate, I think. But yeah. And everyone, this is a stunning book. Yeah. Okay. Thanks. Okay. Anybody else? Nope. All right. Awesome. Thanks everybody. Donnie visions back in school.

1:25:43 I know I had to go downtown this morning and the traffic is crazy. The first day of school, which it was today. So anyway, thanks, everyone, for being here. I appreciate it. And again, tomorrow will not be at four o'clock. It'll be closer to seven o'clock tomorrow to finish up the book. So thanks, everyone, for being here. Take care.

Entities here

Blackwater22 United States10 Erik Prince10 U.S. State Department9 CIA9 Iran9 Afghanistan9 Jan Schakowsky8 Aegis Defense Services8 International Security Agency7 Operation Gladio7 U.S. Congress6 Barack Obama6 Ronald Reagan6 Baghdad6 Washington, D.C.5 Wackenhut5 Victoria Toensing5 Arab Spring5 Pentagon4 Paul Robeson4 DynCorp4 London3 Somalia3 Bolivia3 U.S. Department of Homeland Security3 Democratic Party3 Ted Wright3 Hillary Clinton2 New Zealand2 Brown and Root2 Republican Party2 Italy2 Office of Policy Coordination2 USAID2 Bill Clinton2 Occupy Wall Street2 Apollo Global Management2 Frank Carlucci2 Odessa, Texas2

Claims made here

Barack Obama ordered_assassination_of SOC Inc. book_quoted ▶ 3:54

“And it starts off with by the time President Obama announced the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, the private military security companies were in line to collect billions of dollars in contrac…”

SOC Inc. funded Baghdad book_quoted ▶ 4:26

“whose contract to safeguard the Baghdad embassy would bring in nearly $1 billion to the company. Triple Canopy, who had a five-year $1.5 billion contract for embassy security. What do you think we wer…”

Triple Canopy funded Baghdad book_quoted ▶ 4:26

Aegis Defense Services carried_out_attack Bahrain book_quoted ▶ 6:52

“To be sure, there were plenty of work for private military contractors during the Arab Spring, especially protecting companies trying to operate in the midst of the political unrest. For example, in B…”

Muammar Gaddafi recruited Taliban book_quoted ▶ 7:21

“from the location. A few months after the protests debated, the UN released a study showing that the use of mercenaries in armed conflict had vastly increased. Examples included Arab countries during …”

Hillary Clinton funded Aegis Defense Services book_quoted ▶ 12:05

“which received an immense boost from the U.S. State Department. In late October 11, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sent a memo asking diplomats to promote the use of privately contracted arme…”

International Security Agency funded McAllen, Texas book_quoted ▶ 16:31

“In August 2011, ISA announced that it had received the required license to operate in McAllen, Texas, on the Mexican border. At the time, ISA President Jerry Bromley, B-R-U-M-L-E-Y, told the press, qu…”

Wackenhut funded U.S. Department of Homeland Security book_quoted ▶ 21:42

“owned by both the British Armor Group and the large American security company called Wackenhut, had been one of the corporate participants in the 2008 meeting in Montreux. As part of the immigration w…”

Oakland carried_out_attack Occupy Wall Street book_quoted ▶ 27:36

“In Oakland, for example, police kicked and attacked demonstrators, including war veterans, shooting them in the face with tear gas canisters. An ex-Marine who had spent two years on duty in Iraq was h…”

Paul Robeson member_of Republican Party documented ▶ 30:26

“For the industry, it meant yet another market to inspire the incubation of new and powerful capabilities from within the industry of private military security companies. In early December 2011, six pr…”

Paul Robeson member_of U.S. Congress documented ▶ 31:27

“The questions as well as the answers were somewhat expected, except for one. It happened when Diane Sawyer asked the candidates to comment on the payroll tax cut that was set to expire at the end of t…”

Barack Obama headed United States documented ▶ 33:52

“Perhaps more than ever. President Obama had proposed reforms in February of 2009 to reduce the Pentagon's reliance on private contractors and to increase the number of personnel scrutinizing the contr…”

Robert Gates headed Pentagon documented ▶ 34:22

“33,000 by 2015. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates announced the plan in April of 2009, but only 16 months later, it was gone. He told the press that he was not satisfied with the progress. Dispelling …”

Jan Schakowsky member_of U.S. Congress documented ▶ 34:46

“was still determined to expose the facts of the industry, repeatedly telling the press and Congress that hiding the truth about these companies and keeping the knowledge of their force hidden was dama…”

Gerald Connolly member_of Democratic Party documented ▶ 36:42

“They lived in wretched housing, including barbed wire compounds on U.S. bases. They had no insurance, no health care benefits and no compensation if injured and no access to medical services. Worse st…”

James Lankford member_of Republican Party documented ▶ 37:36

“and exploited workers. These labor practices violate every human value that we have as a country. Our departments of state and defense stand up and fight for human rights around the globe. No, we don'…”

Blackwater carried_out_attack Baghdad documented ▶ 38:58

“whom successful companies could now afford. Lawsuits filed against private military companies dating back as far as 2004 languished oftentimes for many years. A judge in the D.C. court of appeals dism…”

USAID funded Aegis Defense Services documented ▶ 39:27

“of the private military company in Baghdad in 2007 while she was in a car riding home from church. The defendants were a company based in North Carolina under contract to USAID and a private military …”

Aegis Defense Services funded Pentagon documented ▶ 40:49

“The 2004 contract with the DOD under which the Cadem's shooter had been employed was a London-based Aegis. The Aegis American subsidiary had not opened until 2006. Besides, it was not the legal entity…”

Erik Prince founded Blackwater documented ▶ 42:55

“The judge had dropped all allegations against four employees charged with the deaths of the 17 Iraqi civilians in Nisour Square, citing missteps by the Department of Justice. The State Department repo…”

Blackwater carried_out_attack Nisour Square massacre documented ▶ 42:55

Erik Prince sold Blackwater documented ▶ 43:19

“In mid-December that year, he sold XE to an LA-based consortium of investors, including one that had close ties to Blackwater from the start. And by 2011, the case in which pro-sectors argued that the…”

U.S. State Department funded Blackwater documented ▶ 43:51

“Meanwhile, there had been new contracts awarded to the successor of Blackwater, including one during the summer of 2010 for nearly $250 million, to work for the CIA and the State Department in Afghani…”

Jeremy Scahill exposed Blackwater book_quoted ▶ 44:50

“There really was not much choice but to accept the contract, unquote. And again, that's just blatant bullshit because we know from the contract with Matrix that they don't care who's the lowest bidder…”

Jan Schakowsky exposed Blackwater documented ▶ 45:44

“The Nation headline article said Blackwater's new sugar daddy, the Obama administration. Sikowsky's drive to expose the hidden details of the industry was largely Blackwater inspired, a drive that mov…”

Victoria Toensing member_of Erik Prince documented ▶ 46:15

“She represented Eric Prince. In the two-page letter, Tunsing accused Salkowski of making false and deflammatory statements against Prince in a September news article in London. Isn't that interesting?…”

Erik Prince member_of SEAL teams guest_asserted ▶ 47:11

“In the letter, Tun Sing praised Prince for his military service with SEAL Team 8 in Haiti, Haiti, the Middle East, and the Balkans, every one of which was CIA-derived bullshit. Not saying anything abo…”

Erik Prince funded Somalia guest_asserted ▶ 47:39

“This included funding famine relief in Somalia and the Sudan and contributing to building hospital schools and orphanages and churches in the Middle East and Asia. She went on to say that Sikowsky's s…”

Erik Prince funded Sudan guest_asserted ▶ 47:39

Ted Wright headed Blackwater documented ▶ 50:24

“Before the end of 2011, the company changed its name again to Academy. Academy's first CEO was Ted Wright, a former, you just can't make this shit up, a former executive at Kellogg Brown and Root Inco…”

Ted Wright member_of Brown and Root documented ▶ 50:24

Brown and Root funded PSSI host_asserted ▶ 50:58

“along with it, PSSI that we found out that was really the CIA's version and that they had infiltrated all of the Office of Public Safety offices. That PSSI was sold to Vanell, Brown and Root. So, this…”

Bobby Ray Inman headed International Security Agency documented ▶ 51:31

“Wright wanted a different name to reflect the recent changes in the company's leadership, mainly newcomers to the board of directors and management. And guess who that was? Former National Security Ag…”

Jack Quinn member_of Al Gore documented ▶ 52:02

“Operation Gladio after Operation Gladio. Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft. Jack Quinn, the former White House counsel to President Bill Clinton and former chief of staff to Vice President Al…”

Jack Quinn member_of Bill Clinton documented ▶ 52:02

Eric Westrop member_of Special Forces Club documented ▶ 55:14

“from military to private military security companies, from a traditional military to a mix of primarily focused on special forces drones and PMCs. What was undisclosed was the reality that as the trad…”

CIA funded Palantir Technologies host_asserted ▶ 1:01:52

“Q Intel and how Q Intel created Palantir. And sometimes the people doing the investing don't even know they're investing with the CIA because of the way it's done. It's it's crazy. So I'm still thumbi…”

Tyco International founded Leidos host_asserted ▶ 1:03:24

“C-S-R-A-S-A-I-C, which is a CIA front, which spun off Leidos. And Leidos ended up with Reardon. And Reardon, that's the name of a guy, okay? He's the president and executive manager of Leidos.…”

Tim Reardon headed Leidos host_asserted ▶ 1:03:24

Tyco International front_for CIA host_asserted ▶ 1:03:24

Constellis funded Apollo Global Management host_asserted ▶ 1:03:52

“Leidos was bought by the Constellas Group, and they owned Apollo. And Apollo had Leon Black on the board. They had, oh, and their CEO travels to UAE, which, weirdly enough, is where Eric Prince ended …”

Constellis funded Leidos host_asserted ▶ 1:03:52

Leon Black member_of Apollo Global Management host_asserted ▶ 1:04:22

“And Apollo also had Leon Black on its board. And Leon Black was associated with Drexel Burnham Lambert Investment Bank, which was guilty of the junk bonds milking thing, which, again, is another way t…”

Leon Black associated_with Drexel Burnham host_asserted ▶ 1:04:22

Steven Feinberg founded Cerberus Capital Management host_asserted ▶ 1:04:49

“All of these keep going around in a circle. You have DynCorp, which owners was C-E-R-B-E-R-U-S, capital. And they were associated with Steven Feinberg, who is the founder and CEO of the company C-E-R-…”

Cerberus Capital Management funded DynCorp host_asserted ▶ 1:04:49

William Casey headed CIA host_asserted ▶ 1:05:49

“Like Clarence Kelly, FBI Director. Deputy CIA Director, Secretary of Defense, Frank Carlucci. How many times have we come across him? This is just Wackenhut. Board of Directors, William Casey. Before,…”

William Casey member_of Wackenhut host_asserted ▶ 1:05:49

Frank Carlucci headed CIA host_asserted ▶ 1:05:49

CIA carried_out_attack Wackenhut host_asserted ▶ 1:06:18

“That was eventually stolen from ends law by the CIA and Mossad and given a back door and sold by Robert Maxwell. Wackenhut was involved in that whole thing. And during the McCarthy, this is a quote fr…”

Robert Maxwell trafficked Wackenhut host_asserted ▶ 1:06:18

Mossad carried_out_attack Wackenhut host_asserted ▶ 1:06:18

George Wackenhut founded Wackenhut host_asserted ▶ 1:06:44

“Right when George Wackenhut began compiling names with information on politically suspect individuals. Now, he's the one that started Wackenhut, accusing them of, quote, communist activities. When hav…”

Strategic Resources Corporation funded Executive Outcomes host_asserted ▶ 1:07:14

“Right. Yeah. And by 66, he had collected over 4 million names. So you guys remember that we talked at the very beginning of this about executive outcomes. That's where the Aegis guy started as a merce…”

Strategic Resources Corporation funded SACACEN host_asserted ▶ 1:07:43

“also had another company called SACACEN, S-A-C-A-C-E-N. You will not be surprised to find out that they were contracted to the WWF, the World Wildlife Fund, for Congo. And you know what they were doin…”

SACACEN funded World Wildlife Fund host_asserted ▶ 1:07:43

SACACEN funded Heineken host_asserted ▶ 1:07:43

Erik Prince funded SACACEN host_asserted ▶ 1:08:14

“if that's how you say it, S-A-C-A-C-E-N, also was financed by Eric Prince. And it was ran by a guy named Lapras, L-U-I-T-I-N-G-H, however you say that last name. And he was involved in Angola in the 1…”

Luitingh headed SACACEN host_asserted ▶ 1:08:14

Luitingh member_of Angola host_asserted ▶ 1:08:14

DynCorp supplied_arms_to Hamid Karzai host_asserted ▶ 1:08:46

“I'll just show it on Rumble, got so convoluted, I could barely follow my own lines of how all of these people overlapped. But DynCorp was protecting Karzai, Paul Brimmer. And yeah, and this was before…”

Wackenhut associated_with Belgium host_asserted ▶ 1:09:17

“So this book definitely puts into context some of the earlier research that I've done, that we've done. And can I throw one last thing in here? You know, because we always, you know, you guys always s…”

Wackenhut removed_from_power Belgium host_asserted ▶ 1:09:48

“security services, Wackenhut left Belgium in the early 80s after allegations that security guards lured immigrant children into basements and beat them for sport. In Belgium? You mean where Mark Dutro…”

Peter Thiel secretly_owned New Zealand host_asserted ▶ 1:10:16

“Right. Exactly. But I'm sure it's just a coincidence. So Shelly, the Kiwi over on Rumble, says, I went on a hunt last week and found Peter Thiel's property here in the Bay of Islands in New Zealand. A…”

Bolivia front_for Operation Gladio host_asserted ▶ 1:13:51

“things that we've discovered here. And as soon as I saw that Hungarian's name, I was like, oh, son of a bitch. Because Hungary, or not Hungary, sorry, Bulgaria. Bulgaria is like the weapons traffickin…”

CIA funded Colombia host_asserted ▶ 1:16:35

“Thanks to the CIA and the U.S. South Com, the Southern Command, and their employment of special forces has went down and trained. What we were told was paramilitary people to combat drugs. Well, they …”

United States Central Command funded Colombia host_asserted ▶ 1:16:35

Richard Nixon targeted_for_regime_change Mafia host_asserted ▶ 1:18:03

“During the Nixon administration that his war on drugs was actually taking out the Corsican mafia, which were competitors to the CIA controlled Sicilian mafia. And this book lays out people whose name …”

CIA funded Sicilian Mafia host_asserted ▶ 1:18:03

Bruce Hemmings founded The Pied Piper host_asserted ▶ 1:20:29

“pretending to be Peter while working for Paul type scenario that we see so frequently throughout the Operation Gladio, you know, things that you have mentioned throughout the show. And I think that'd …”

Allard Lowenstein associated_with Eugene McCarthy host_asserted ▶ 1:24:39

“He was the key pivot man in a sort of dump Lyndon Johnson movement that was first went for what I consider a CIA bait divider candidate, namely Eugene McCarthy. Those children were too damn clean for …”

Allard Lowenstein associated_with Lyndon B. Johnson host_asserted ▶ 1:24:39

Allard Lowenstein member_of CIA host_asserted ▶ 1:25:09

“you know, play in both sides or, you know, for, he's definitely an Intel lock, but the question of whether he, you know, died realizing what he had become is, is open for debate, I think. But yeah. An…”