Senator Obama Presses Bush on Blackwater
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Printable FormatThe Hill by Elana Schor
September 25, 2007
As Democrats weigh new limits on the private security firms in Iraq, one of the party's presidential hopefuls on Monday pushed President Bush to shed new light on war contractors before Congress does so first.
Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) has proposed clarifying that private contractors accused of misconduct can be tried under U.S. law and urging the Pentagon to pursue such civilian prosecution. Following a Sept. 16 shooting that infuriated the Iraqi government and got the contracting firm Blackwater USA briefly barred from the country, Senate aides are working on adding parts of Obama's plan to the defense authorization bill.
Obama told Bush in a Monday letter that he should pin down information immediately on offenses committed by contractors.
"It is our government's obligation to ensure that security contractors in Iraq are subject to adequate and transparent oversight and that their actions do not have a negative impact on our military's efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan," Obama wrote.
His proposal also would require the Justice Department inspector general to report to Congress on the number of complaints it has received against private contractors, and the number of investigations opened and criminal cases pursued in response. Baghdad officials are investigating Blackwater's actions in the Sept. 16 violence and other recent incidents that caused Iraqi civilian casualties, and the State Department launched its own probe late last week.
Obama told Bush he was "disturbed" by the Blackwater episode, which "raises larger questions about the role of private security contractors."
The Democratic Policy Committee held a hearing on Friday to receive testimony from investigators and whistleblowers who have followed issues of legal liability for private contractors in war. Aides said elements of another amendment laying down new rules for reporting by contracting firms, authored by Sens. Jim Webb (D-Va.) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), are likely to be included in the defense bill.
Contractors largely welcome the new oversight to end uncertainty about civilian workers' role in combat operations. International Peace Operations Association President Doug Brooks, who represents many of the industry's biggest companies, lamented lawmakers' growing inclination to take aim at contractors as part of a broader anti-war argument.
"This can't be a partisan issue," Brooks said. "We've used contractors in the past. We will use contractors. We can't do without them from a long-term peacekeeping perspective."
Peter W. Singer, a Brookings Institution scholar who has pioneered research into private security firms, said the vehement congressional response to the Blackwater shooting was largely due to the company's support of Republicans.
"If it was not a Blackwater but an Armor Group or Triple Canopy or Cochise [competing firms], if they'd been involved in this episode, it would have been looked at differently," Singer said.
Meanwhile, the Senate's nine freshman Democrats wrote to their leaders Monday seeking a vote on their bill to establish a commission on wartime contracting modeled after the 1940s-era Truman Committee.
"Recent events underscore the urgency of our initiative," the freshmen wrote to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.), referring to the Blackwater shooting.