ABSTRACT
When President George W. Bush launched ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom’ (OIF) on 20 March 2003, he could not have envisaged that American and British troops would eventually be joined by the largest private security force in recent times. At the height of the insurgency, private security companies (PSCs) represented the second-largest foreign security group in the country. Only the American military had, and still has, more men on the ground in Iraq.1 Such a large number of armed contractors reflects the uncertain, and frequently hostile security environment that was, and still is being encountered in Iraq. At the same time, it has never been part of the US military’s stated mission to provide protection for agencies and contractors, unless they are Department of Defense (DoD) civilian personnel and contractors directly supporting the military’s mission.2 Instead, it is written into the contracts of the reconstruction contractors that they provide for their own security. They do so by sub-contracting out the responsibility to PSCs. The cost of providing this security in economic terms is estimated to be 10-15 cents of every dollar spent on reconstruction, according to the Inspector General for the Coalition Provisional Authority.3
