ProPublica ran a lengthy invetigative series on how contracting companies and the government dole out medical care to employees wounded in combat. The numbers are bleak and staggering. When we talk about how our country failed to care for veterans of these wars, we should include civilians in the dialogue. If we did, I think we'd be compelled to look at things in a different way.

Yes contractors are not treated that well. They look like they're in a good position with a lot of lattitude on gear etc. They get big paychecks. But medical etc is a whole other issue.

Fuzzy math - interesting how we are going to gut the uniformed services because they are too expensive. It will almost certainly lead to a boom in contractor costs and our politicians will tell us they're saving so much money on defense. But in real dollars we likely won't save much, if any at all.

What happens when we stage a few thousand of these contractors in Baghdad, or some location in Lybia, Syria or elsewhere to support a new govt or protect a group from genocide or one of the other scenarios we are likely to get involved in? Who's on the hook if they commit atrocities? Who's coming to their rescue if they are in danger of being overrun and killed to last man? They're still Americans - are we not going to rush to their defense? Will we not dedicate assets when they go MIA, when they need extract, MEDEVAC, etc?

Contractors should be very limited. They have their place. As it is, they need to get scaled back from current levels. Getting unwieldly.

Overall it's a good concept that's been hindered and screwed up by a lot of bad ideas, not the least of which will be the contribution from our uniformed force downsizing.

Nobody likes a mercenary; there seems something offensive about being merely a hired gun whose loyalty is seemingly for sale. Hessian mercenaries though probably much more strictly disciplined than Washington’s own Continentals and certainly his unruly militia’s offended American’s sense of fair play by their presence as foes yet having no stake in the war for American independence other than their pay.

Some would say that our volunteer military are nothing more than hired guns but of course that is not only foolish but also untrue. Persons joining the military take an oath to protect and defend the Constitution binding them to obey lawful orders from their superiors. To my knowledge ‘contractors’ (a polite name for a mercenary) do no such thing and thus are not bound by the Uniform Code of Military Justice?

My view would be that as long as mercenaries are going to be part of our future and in perhaps even in greater numbers they must serve within the confines of a legal framework. If bearing arms and within a war zone that legal structure should be the UCMJ. Contractors should be required to sign a contact submitting themselves to military justice and held accountable for their actions in the same manner as unformed personnel.

As far as medical and psychological support it would seem to me that company’s like XE Services (the old Blackwater) have that responsibility not the U. S. Government. If a mercenary signs up with XE without understanding or caring about the benefits package (or lack of) who’s the fool? When the DOD contracts with Raytheon to make a missile here in Tucson its Raytheon’s responsibility for the health and welfare of their employees not the government.

And I am, of course, no different. Shifting just a little though, the whole issues revolving around contractors are all related to mission creep. I have seen commanders at several levels use the availability of contractors to extend their unit's mission set. Commanders want to do something new, don't have enough organic forces, so they simply contract out. And right, wrong or indifferent this is occurring right now.

And it will keep occurring so long as commanders are allowed to extend their mission set through contracts. Cut them off and we eliminate the majority of the issues surrounding contracting.

Certainly not an all-encompassing solution that leaves everyone feeling good. But it would reduce all lot of the problems we have in this arena.

this is the one blog where hopefully most of the commenters aren't completely clueless about who contractors are (everywhere else everyone thinks they're all American mercenaries).

we have:

1. LNs..who are the largest single group. in every organized war in history, LNs have always been contracted by foreign forces...every single one. things like laundry and cooking and translating have always been contracted out to locals. always. there is nothing new about this. and it often has a pragmatic purpose. locals (and their families) that are being paid by you are hopefully going to be friendlier towards you.

2. TCNs performing non-armed services. I'd rather have as many of these as possible being LNs.

3. armed TCNs....I found much of this strange...though some of it is necessary (DoS and USAID and so forth can't use American military for most roles for a variety of what should be obvious reasons)

4. armed Americans (mostly working for DoS and USAID...like I said, USAID can hardly roll out with uniformed American military...it defeats the purpose)

5. unarmed Americans (which is most American contractors). we have these for a variety of reasons. some because they're frankly cheaper. when people compare the salary of an E-6 to an equivalent American contractor they're missing a lot. it's not that simple. first, you have to compare the salary of one contractor to three American soldiers (one deployed, one returned from deployment and one getting ready to deploy)...second, you have to account for the cost of training, death benefits, dependents and so forth. the cost of one service member to the DOD is massively larger than their salary. easily equivalent to a couple hundred grand in garrison, and a million deployed. so, yes, contractors are often cheaper. I've met guys who had been Iraq for 5 years straight maintaining EOD robots...you'd have to replace one with who knows how many service members over that period. finally, contracting is often used for skillsets that we otherwise can't get because we don't pay enough.

the above is not to say that there aren't problems with contracting bloat etc...poor contract writing, etc...there definitely are. but there's a lot of misinformation out there too. comparing the costs is nowhere near as easy as people think, the vast vast majority of contractors aren't armed, LN contractors can be a force multiplier, etc.

Also, JPWREL, you need to look up MEJA.

Richard:

Great piece, but, like Staff Guy, I believe the inherent problems lie somewhere else.

It is an unending effort to feed vitamins to a dead horse, then minutely analyze the results as if such an exercise will improve the horse's load-bearing capacity.

The murky area of our vast reliance on contractors for Iraq and Afghanistan traces to the equally murky issues of the goals and strategies. No effective contracting, contract management efforts, or forensic auditing can bring clarity and effectiveness to a process where the goals are ill-defined and the mission misunderstood.

The common feature of both wars was (1) a publicly-acceptable limited military engagement to remove one leadership group and replace it with another. From there, the mission crept exponentially into (2) an under-resourced and unplanned semi-occupation, followed, in fits and starts, by serious problems extending from (1) and (2).

As the mission continued and widened, organizational effects began to overwhelm the effort, one of the most serious of which was (a) leadership and staff rotations; and (b) on-the-fly mission restatements in Washington, many of which were unreconcilable at the ground level, and by and through the organization, staff and resources there.

The "core competencies" lacking in the US D,D,D structure is the wisdom to understand how a country/society functions, and how (including with actual limitations) how to integrate vast military technical and force superiority, overwhelming amounts of cash and civilian technical expertise into a viable "nation change" process.

Staff Guy's observation of military leaders expanding their reach through contracting dovetails directly into the CNAS observation of their lack of training and competence in these areas, and both crash into the obvious problems of leadership and mission rotation against an ill-defined and ever-changing objective.

Following the link, I read the regular pablum ( more use of Lessons Learned, better contracting, more staff and training), but nothing that addresses the actual problems.

The contractor rebuilding the sewer system in Fallujah was contracted to do so by a military leadership which designated that effort as an essential one which would bring peace and stability. As employees were shot, field conditions constantly changed, and war continued to destroy the original system and anything newly constructed or planned to be constructed, the military contract never changed, and the contractor continued to march forward. Like Disney's Sorceror's Apprentice, the problem was not with the ever-multiplying mops and buckets, but with the one controlling the wand.

Inherent in our system are the organizational realities of agency stove-piping among obviously competing agencies and cultures with very different mindsets and objectives. These are the organizational features of our system, Imagining them away is not any more of a credible answer than insisting that someone else do it. They are realities that must be understood, addressed, and managed through against an overall strategy.

The lack of Core Competencies for this type of endeavor (begging the more fundamental strategic questions) should be the biggest Lesson Learned. A wise civilian leadership would have asked the basic question: How are we going to meaningfully transform the conduct or course of those countries to our desired end state?

After answering that question, the appropriate roles of D, D, and D can be identified, along with requisite role of contracts, contractors, private sector (internal and external), and the costs and budgets to accomplish the end state. In big letters comes the sub-question: What is the role and function of the "host" country itself, its leaders, and its society and economy?

An analysis that does not include the hypothesis that there is, perhaps, (i) no effective DoD or DoS strategy (except advise and assist) to accomplish the intended mission, or (ii) that the mission and tasks are primarily indigenous to the "host" nation, is not a complete and relevant analysis.

Feeding more vitamins to the US contingency contracting system will not fix the core problems, which lie elsewhere.

What can we do about the numerous contracts on FOBS I visited who seem to always be eating the last of the ice cream in the DFAC and chilling in their room? Oh yea the few hard building rooms because their contracts say that, so screw the Soldiers.

Can we do something about the contractors that when work ends for them at 1630 screw mission they need to get to the DFAC

Can we do something about FOB Fenty or Bagram, my GODD, check out the MWR at 1400, alot of work going on there.

Dont even get me started on the ones who grow beards to try to look like SF either...

Please, what a joke.

hunter they chose their career choice. We all know and heard the typical E-5 who moans about the Army and how he cant wait to get out and fix trucks for sooo much more money. They are big boys and should know job insecurity goes along with it. As for protection? We do more then enough to secure their nice FOBS. I would not want to interrupt a contractors two hour skype fight with his ex wife while mortars are landing ya know?

I've played both sides of that fence. Generally, I think that outside-the-wire contractors are the only hope for the US to ever get a workable (read: neocolonial) foreign policy. See Free Range International for details.

In brief: the only parts of the US military which are not completely pussyfied generally spend their time outside the wire in big groups schwacking people or holding meetings to enable themselves to schwack people, with an occasional presence patrol, which is nice but doesn't amount to governance.

Everybody else is so wrapped up about career and casualties (or answering to a boss with these priorities) that they will not leave the FOB in groups of less than 20, with at least three MRAPs and reflective belts wrapped tightly around their necks to prevent evil local bacteria from infiltrating their lungs. The whole exercise takes more planning and approval than Operation Overlord, so it can only happen once every couple of weeks. As a result, the majority of their organizational interactions are internal. Coordination meetings, briefings, reports, etc.

The only organizations that are off the radar enough that they can give their employees enough latitude and initiative are contracting firms. The only guys who are on the ground long enough to develop a good Who's Who on the locals in their area and to have serious working relationships with them are contractors. When you look at the heyday of the West occupying violence-torn foreign dumps and imposing law, order and infrastructure on them, the groundwork was always done by guys living and operating either alone or in small groups, with minimal oversight and total latitude, taking risks incomparable with anything you see downrange. No comms, no MEDEVAC, no QRF, local chow, providing their own security in tandem with local hires. The only people capable of doing this in sufficient numbers to administer an occupied country today are contractors.

When you operate with this little of a safety net, you make damn sure not to fall. In the process, you build a net of local guys that you know are trustworthy enough. You keep your ear to the ground and make sure that the friends you make and the people you hire will have your back if the shit hits the fan (which is easier than it sounds-people in third world dumps usually admire the balls it takes to get down in the weeds and LIVE there.) The overhead is minimal, and the return-on-investment is huge. This is what Nicholas Nasseem Taleb refers to as a robust model, meaning not just resilient but suited to taking advantage of unforeseen systemic disruption. The military model is fragile, and responds to every unforeseen crisis by becoming more rigid and fragile.

P.S. Right now, China is undertaking the great and noble task of recolonizing subsaharan Africa. I am certain that there are Chinese guys living in the jungles today whose memoirs would tell you more about how to make money and infrastructure in while thriving in anarchic third world hells than any US military manual or Eating Soup With A Leafblower book. If I spoke Chinese and were heading in an academic direction, that is what I would research over the next decade.

You know for such a perceived 'bad idea', the US government sure does like using us 'evil contractors'? And for the last ten years to boot! Maybe if folks started pumping us up as a good idea, that the government would finally stop using us? lol

Personally though, I like being a security contractor. Not because of the pay or benefits, but because of choice. I have more choice and control as a contractor, than I had in the military.

The contracts are better as well. I have worked in the US military, but the contract I signed for said US military unit was for four years, with another four years attached called 'inactive ready reserve'. I have yet to work for a private company that has presented me with a contract that size and filled with that much commitment. Even the lowest level commitment in the US military, is far greater than anything private industry has.

But here is the true irony. As a contractor I have given more of my personal life and time in war zones and under the service of companies, than I have to the service of a government military. I had more choice and control as a contractor, but I still gave more in terms of time and service to my country. Interesting, don't you think? Especially since I did not swear to uphold and defend the Constitution as a contractor, and that according to our critics, that contractors do not have the same level of commitment to the cause as the military.

On top of that, I have actually met TCN's whom have literally lived in the war zones and have worked there for years, and for a very minimal salary. They have chosen to give that much service to the effort and for that price. These are the guys that built the chow halls, cleaned the bathrooms, cooked the food, operated the crapper trucks, etc. They too have incurred losses, because a mortar or rocket could care less whom it hits. But the come, they stay, they work, and they keep the war machine running.

Also, let us not forget the interpreters. The local nationals or even US citizens or TCN's that work and have died as interpreters in the war. It is the leading group of KIA contractors, and these are the guys that have been side by side with the soldiers in the field. They are the ones that made COIN possible to conduct. It's a little hard to protect a population, and win their hearts and minds, if you can't talk with them to find out what is on their minds.

Just some thoughts on the matter, and I will leave now so you guys can continue to talk about my industry in a thoughtful and informative manner....wink wink...lol

I think Steve 358 got it right. You could argue the merits of use or overuse of contractors but its all a moot point if you don't have a good strategy founded in reality. When I was responsible for contracting in Iraq I attempted to find strategic linkages between contracting and the Joint Campaign plan and the Economic Lines of Operation but it was fuzzy. And the commander's in the field only cared about their tactical mission and not as much about strategic effects. So shipping in thousands of TCNs from other Third World countries was OK, even though the Iraq unemployment rate was over 40%. As long as the DFACs were well stocked and the FOB was secure from any untrustworthy LNs then life was good. Nevermind the fact that most of the Iraqi's planting IEDs weren't Al Qaeda but simply men in need of cash to feed their family or get married. In summary, I think there were disconnects between the strategy and the tactics, and disconnects between the strategy and reality because strategic plans were developed by planners who rarely stepped outside of the FOB or fully understood the culture and history of the country they were attempting to stabilize.

I find the comment on including how we deal with contractors, or even TCNs as an annex, or formally part of an order. We do have an annex (Per JOPES) that addresses Interagency, and an appendix for outside agencies, however, rearly is there one on private contractors or TCNs (although sometimes addressed in ROE).
On another note, has anyone ever seen contractors on the battlefield briefed in Mission analysis, as part of JIPOE?
In additon, when reading the NMS, the JOE, etc...they are hardly addressed, I would think all a J3, or commander would have to do is ask a staff to analyze it during Mission analysis, the job would start to get done.

I observed the Chinese, the Germans, and the French development efforts in one country - Cameroon. The differences were tangible and had lasting impact.

The Chinese built a huge education center that was simple with modest air-conditioning and occupying a dominating hilltop. They left a stay-behind maintenance force to keep the building functioning and neither let it get looted nor deteriorate. They rotated those civilians every year or so (not sure). They kept to themselves and ate simple Chinese meals in a group. If a lecture or class was going on, they often strolled by and listened from the corridor. The French, BTW, often sent an embassy geek with a Cameroonian counterpart to listen to a class by overtly sitting in the back of the class.

The Germans built a TV station on a hill with SOTA equipment. They trained a Cameroonian production and technical staff - and left. The station worked fine with decent programming - mostly government.

The French maintained the local telephone and postal system and made sure that it remained 3rd world quality. Somehow they controlled external trade and ensured that most technical products had to be routed through French entities in France. They provide equipment to the military and the general who was the president.

The airport was allegedly built with US foreign aid. Many of the electrical and other fixtures had been looted, Oh, only God and the CIA know what the Russians do, but everyone laughs about the drunk who rammed his truck into the Russian embassy front gate at 0200 and was surrounded by numerous armed men who poured out of the embassy compound. They weren't contractors.

Finally, the key to contractor performance is contract writing, contractor selection, and contractor performance monitoring by a competent COTR. Selection is often out of your hands and unless asked to comment, so is writing the contract requirements and performance standards. That leaves the performance monitoring by the COTR. If nobody provided that an Army vet check the DFAC meat and that a Seabee check the wiring; then you are screwed. The name and number of the person overseeing the DFAC, for example, contract should be posted on the wall. If service or food quality is unsatisfactory, then your unit commander or SGM ought to complain to that person and, if necessary, that person's superior until you find someone who gives a shit. However, I'll bet that the no-bid contract was poorly written and you don't have a leg to stand on.

By the way, local national contractors in your camp are spies or forced to spy. At the minimum, they have drawn maps of your FOB or COP showing where every key facility is and they have paced it off. At least that's what happened in RVN. Funny, our installations in Afghanistan don't seem to receive accurate Taliban or foreign fighter IDF as we did in RVN. You have to wonder how good these guys really are. The IED seems to be the poor man's IDF. BTW, did you see the article about contractor casualties far exceeding uniformed casualties in Afghanistan?

is the number 98,000, as in that was the original force cap President Obama emplaced when he surged in Afghanistan. If Woodward's book is to be believed there was a disagreement from GEN McChrystal and his staff with the President over force multipliers. McChrystal wanted carte blanche to bring them in and wanted that 98K number to apply mainly to trigger pullers, the President and his staff disagreed. Guess who won the argument? Hence about six months later a whole bunch of us sat in this massive, empty building in Qatar trying to figure out how to get all the force multipliers we needed without circumventing the President's mandated force cap. Easy solution, tap into the reservoir of GWOT money and hire a bunch of contractors to run DFACs, augment intelligence analysts and shephard all those neat JIEDDO programs that were being force fed down the warfighter's throat.

Kilgore, the same thing happened in Iraq which is why Gen Odierno started a monthly contractor census system and a mandate to draw down contractors by 5% each quarter. The monthly census was briefed to Gen Odierno at the BUA each month and he paid attention to it...so his commander's did as well.

The views expressed here are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government

I think the most valid point made by this article is the following: "America should also begin to consider the broader implications of relying on contractors for future wars, both its own and those of other countries. It should determine with greater precision when to contract out a given activity and when to require that only the government perform it." The issue with contractors is far bigger than safety concerns and disproportionate ratios to government employees in combat environments. The real issue is defining what the role of the contractor is in modern warfare and understanding the true impact on the military and it’s overall readiness.

I’ve been deployed to Iraq on three separate occassions; 1st in 2004 then in 2007 and my last deployment was in 2009. In each deployment I encountered contractors at progressively more intrusive and authoritative levels, initially as the people who signed me in and out at the computer lab and most recently as the people who controlled my return flight home with the power of a stamp. I’ve had both amazing and horrendous experiences involving contracted civilians in combat environments and I believe I can provide an unbiased view on what I believe is a systemic problem in our military. The problem is this; there is no clearly defined role for contractors that provides both contractors and military personnel a common operational understanding of who does what, when, why and how. Contractors do everything from laundering clothes to providing mission essential equipment and there is not a published standard for any of it, nor does there seem to be any left or right limits. The Government throws billions of dollars at these companies to perform both menial and essential tasks arguing that it is less expensive than the alternative of providing the services internally. Meanwhile, according to this post, the U.S. Commission on Wartime Contracting estimated losses in excess of $60 BILLION, with a “B”, due to waste and fraud. Obviously the point of diminishing returns has been crossed, but what happens next. I understand the Department of Defense’s model of live and learn and can truly appreciate the value of saving a buck and still meeting mission requirements, however, I struggled daily with trying to understand how the role of the contractor expanded so quickly with what appeared to be little to no military oversight.

The other equally significant issue is the impact of the use of contractors on the military and it’s personnel and readiness. In my opinion, one of the biggest impacts of contractors on the military was the attrition of specific skill sets internal to the military. Some may not be aware of it but before contracted Dining Facilities (DFAC) became the norm, green suiters ran the DFACs, before Theater Provided Equipment (TPE) and Leave Behind Equipment (LBE) Contractors brow beat unit commanders about equipment, green suiters did it, before contractors transported logistical support to maneuver units and forward operating bases, green suiters did it. I understand the issue with Force Caps and maximizing the use of green suiters for “combat operations”, however, my point is that some of these skill sets internal to the military are perishable. As a result of our heavy reliance on contractors over the last six years the military as a whole will see an overall attrition of internal self sustaining capabilities.
Lastly, and in addition to the attrition of specific skill sets, contractors also seem to inherently provide a nonstandard recruiting tool for these contracting companies. This also impacts overall military readiness. I can’t recall how many conversations I had to have with my soldiers come Re-up time trying to argue the logic of staying in the military versus getting out and getting a contracting job that’s paying at least twice as much as what he’s making now, minus the grooming and height / weight standards….real tough sale!

Bottom line, contractors are not going away. However, I would hope that if we should ever find ourselves in this or a similar situation again, that as a military, we take a long hard look at what we want contractors to do and how we can best use them to accomplish the mission without being an overall detriment to our profession.

MAJ Wallace C. Nicholson
ILE Student