Blackwater To Set Up Training Camp In California
A controversial private security contractor is planning to expand to California, sparking outrage among local residents and lawmakers.
North Carolina-based Blackwater USA, which provides security personnel and training services to the U.S. military in Iraq and elsewhere, plans to set up an 800-acre training camp dubbed "Blackwater West" in a rural community east of San Diego, pending the San Diego County Board of Supervisors' approval.
Local residents of Potrero where the facility is to be built are outraged.
Depending on the location of the camp, in respect to surrounding homes, I cannot see why people would object. I can understand if it close to homes. I wouldn't want to constantly hear gunshots. If their motives for objecting is nefarious, such as being a dirty liberal scumbag, than they deserve it.
Here is some of the ridiculous mentality of tree huggers in the form of comments to the above article:
why are these people opposed to the facility????.... c'mon thats a no brainer
- the real question is why do we need to train so many soldiers in the US?.... or even why is there not enough opposition here to stop the momentum of this destructive consciousness and behavior?... the death side of life
its not as if blackwater is creating an organic farm or building a solar powered generator or something that just may contribute to the life side of death
clearly there is an agenda here that is born in violence and can only end in violence - would you want that in your community?
Posted by: homeboy | Apr 20, 2007 3:29:14 PM
["posted by" link removed because of fake email addy]
It's clearly evident here that the person that wrote the above comment is useless to society. He's more concerned about organic farms and solar powered generators than the safety of Americans in war zones. They also want to pick and choose what businesses operate and where. This is kind of like when a strip club wants to open. Everyone has a fit about it, but those same people will either enjoy it, or benefit from it (i.e. taxes). I will come back to this in my thoughts on the last comment.
And the difference between these facilities in the US and terrorist training camps in the middle east, besides a bigger budget, is what?
Whose side they're on?Posted by: Zach | Apr 20, 2007 10:38:31 PM
The short answer, YES. It's no secret we have used terrorist groups and/or opposition groups for proxy wars against various enemies.
And the best one of all
Military posts are closing down all over the place.
Instead, paid to hire mercenaries are expanding operations openly in order to provide "security personnel and training services to the U.S. military in Iraq and elsewhere".
It has always been my understanding that the US military was our nation's security personnel and also happened to be the best trained military in history.
When did our security require security?
These "contractors" are in the field autonomously, accountable to no one, able to disregard all and any internationally recognized conventions or accepted rules of engagement and basically carry out their missions with the same zeal and wrong-headedness as any other terrorist group from anywhere at all.
Why are people opposed to this training facility?
Maybe it's just wrong and unsafe in the long run.
And then there's the possibility that our next Bin Laden could very well come from one of these special ops contractors, stateside.Posted by: Zach | Apr 21, 2007 6:31:52 PM
Blackwater is more than a "mercenary" organization. They provide security for contractors building schools, hospitals, various infrastructure projects, and oil pipelines/production facilities. I'm sure they also do the jobs that our enlisted military doesn't really need to do. Does our military really need to man checkpoints, or is it something that could be left to a military trained organization? The people who started and are employed by Blackwater did not just fall out of bed one day and decide they were better than the military. Blackwater requires applicants (exception of support staff) to be honorably discharged and a copy of their military records. So, if you take members of the military, which are "the best trained military in history", and they go to work for Blackwater, how does Blackwater automatically become a lesser organization? The only difference would be the bureaucracy associated with the U.S. Military.
They are also held accountable. The government pays them to do a job, if they fail to that job, they lose the contract. Following rules and regulations would not only be the moral thing to do, but also economically the best choice.
Enough of my opinion, you can read the facts from Blackwater USA:
Blackwater was founded in 1997 from a clear vision developed from an understanding of the need for innovative, flexible training and operational solutions to support security and peace, and freedom and democracy everywhere.
Our founder is a former U. S. Navy SEAL. He created Blackwater on the belief that both the military and law enforcement establishments would require additional capacity to train fully our brave men and women in and out of uniform to the standards required to keep our country secure.
Blackwater USA consists of nine separate business units: Blackwater Training Center (the largest private firearms and tactical training center in the U. S.), Blackwater Target Systems, Blackwater Security Consulting, Blackwater Canine, Maritime Security, manufacturing of custom Armored Vehicles, Parachute Jump Team, Aviation, and Raven Development Group. We also have relationships with our strategic partners, Aviation Worldwide Services and Greystone Ltd.
We are not simply a "private security company." We are a professional military, law enforcement, security, peacekeeping, and stability operations firm who provides turnkey solutions. We assist with the development of national and global security policies and military transformation plans. We can train, equip and deploy public safety and military professionals, build live-fire indoor/outdoor ranges, MOUT facilities and shoot houses, create ground and aviation operations and logistics support packages, develop and execute canine solutions for patrol and explosive detection, and can design and build facilities both domestically and in austere environments abroad.
Blackwater lives its core values of excellence, efficiency, execution, and teamwork. In doing this, we have become the most responsive, cost-effective means of affecting the strategic balance in support of security and peace, and freedom and democracy everywhere.
Wouldn't this be part of the solution to our military being stretched too thin?
