David IsenbergAuthor, Shadow Force: Private Security Contractors in Iraq
Posted: December 17, 2010 11:17 PM
Will the Real Hillary Clinton Please Step Forward?
It appears that the old Hillary Clinton, the one who ran for president of the United States has managed to travel forward in time and merge with the current Hillary Clinton, the one who is Secretary of State.
For those who don't remember, the old Clinton vowed to ban the use of private security contractors. As perennial PMC critic Jeremy Scahill of The Nation reported back in July, “”These private security contractors have been reckless and have compromised our mission in Iraq,” Clinton said in February 2008. “The time to show these contractors the door is long past due.” Clinton was one of only two senators to sponsor legislation to ban these companies.
Scahill was upset that Clinton had since moderated her views and that she was “presiding over what is shaping up to be a radical expansion of a private, US-funded paramilitary force that will operate in Iraq for the foreseeable future–the very type of force Clinton once claimed she opposed.”
But on Wednesday the State Department and the US Agency for International Development (AID) unveiled the much-awaited Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review entitled “Leading Through Civilian Power.”
The report seeks to put some distance between State and the private sector.
