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Harry Hope · Guest

From The Washington Post, 6/2/07:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/01/AR2007060102261.html?hpid%3Dtopnews&sub=AR

Judge Halts Award Of Iraq Contract

By Alec Klein and Steve Fainaru
Washington Post Staff Writers

Saturday, June 2, 2007; Page D01

A federal judge yesterday ordered the military to temporarily refrain
from awarding the largest security contract in Iraq.

The order followed an unusual series of events set off when a U.S.
Army veteran filed a protest against the government practice of hiring
what he calls mercenaries, according to sources familiar with the
matter.

The contract, worth about $475 million, calls for a private company to
provide intelligence services to the U.S. Army and security for the
Army Corps of Engineers on reconstruction work in Iraq.

The case, which is being heard by the U.S. Court of Federal Claims,
puts on trial one of the most controversial and least understood
aspects of the Iraq war:

the outsourcing of military security to an estimated 20,000 armed
contractors who operate with little oversight.

Brian X. Scott, a 53-year-old Colorado man, filed the complaint in
early April.

He argues that the military's use of private security contractors is
"against America's core values" and violates an 1893 law that
prohibits the government from hiring quasi-military forces.

Scott's challenge set off a domino effect, prompting the Government
Accountability Office to dismiss protests brought by two major private
security contractors the Army had removed as potential bidders --
Erinys Iraq, a British firm, and Blackwater USA of North Carolina.

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Harry