Tuesday 25 July 2017

Privatizing the war in Afghanistan

Kathy Sullivan: Privatizing the war in Afghanistan | New Hampshire:

In May, Erik Prince, the former owner of the notorious Blackwater private security company, wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal. He suggested hiring a corporation to provide logistics and aviation support, monitor an effort to exploit Afghanistan’s natural resources, and oversee an aggressive air campaign to target the Taliban. In addition, a viceroy should be appointed to oversee the effort.
“In sum”, writes Perry, “Prince’s plan would turn Afghanistan over to an American version of Britain’s famed East India Company, which, as Prince wrote, ‘prevailed in the region’ for 250 years by relying on private military units.”
Most of us only know the East India Company as the owner of the tea that the Sons of Liberty dumped into Boston Harbor in 1773, a precursor to the American Revolution. The effort to coerce the colonists to buy East India’s tea was one of the least offensive acts in the company’s history.

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