Fortress America, Coming To A Country Near You

This story tells us the following…

Victor Ashe (the resigning U.S. ambassador to Poland, appointed under Bushco) is calling on U.S. authorities to reassess policies put in place after 9/11, which require equally tight security standards in both hot spots and places deemed much safer. He said there should not be a "one size fits all" approach.

"The type of embassy you might build in Pakistan has a different set of security needs – which in that case would be substantial – than an embassy you might build in Reykjavik, Iceland, or in Warsaw, Poland," Ashe told The Associated Press.

…

Ashe made his argument in a newsletter sent out to more than 7,000 people this week – unusually outspoken statements for a diplomat still in office. He said they were "personal observations which reflect only my own views."

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"The cost to the taxpayers if these standards are implemented worldwide will be huge," Ashe wrote. "The design of many of these buildings quite often creates a fortress-like atmosphere and the impression given to host nations can be less than friendly; not the warm, welcoming impression we should offer as Americans."

The situation in Britain's capital is a good example.

Its U.S. Embassy will be moved from the leafy, upmarket Mayfair district of central London to a safer building in a less prestigious neighborhood south of the River Thames. The move, announced in 2008, is part of American efforts to improve the safety of its staff.

It would have cost more than $600 million to renovate and upgrade the embassy's current concrete and glass building in Grosvenor Square, and even then it would not have met security standards without obstructing traffic in surrounding streets.

Residents living near the embassy will be happy to see it go. They have complained in the past about the temporary concrete blast barriers and other security measures introduced around the building after the 9/11 attacks.

I think Ashe deserves some credit for highlighting some of what is going on at our embassies, in our name and on our dime (and by the way, there’s some real tawdry stuff out there concerning Ashe and a certain 43rd President of the United States, as noted here).

However, given the fact that rockets were fired near both the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan and in Iraq (noted here), I’m not sure that enhanced security is unwarranted (but not in the United Kingdom, Iceland or Poland, of course)

And speaking of our embassy in Kabul, this letter from the Project on Government Oversight to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton notes the Kabul rocket attack, as well as the following…

(POGO) initiated an investigation after nearly one-tenth of the U.S./ex-pat 6 guards individually contacted us to express concerns about and provide evidence of a pattern of blatant, longstanding violations of the security contract, and of a pervasive breakdown in the chain of command and guard force discipline and morale. This environment has resulted in chronic turnover by U.S./ex-pat guards. According to the State Department, "nearly 90% of the incumbent US/Expats left within the first six months of contract performance."7 According to POGO sources, the U.S./ex-pat guard turnover may be as high as 100 percent annually. This untenable turnover prevents the guard force from developing team cohesion, and requires constant training for new replacement recruits. The guards have come to POGO because they say they believe strongly in the mission, but are concerned that many good guards are quitting out of frustration or being fired for refusing to participate in the misconduct, and that those responsible for the misconduct are not being held accountable.

And for more information on the “misconduct” in question, this CBS News story tells us of James Gordon, former Director of Operations for ArmorGroup (the firm contracted to provide security for the embassy), who told of the following…

Gordon reports a wide range of shocking conditions: storing of illegal weapons, a guard force that is severely understaffed and overworked, guards and supervisors frequenting brothels on duty. There are even allegations that some guards moonlighted in human trafficking (audio). According to the State Department, Afghanistan is known as a center of trafficking of women and girls for sex.

Gordon says one recruit was overheard discussing his contacts in the human trafficking business in Afghanistan. He allegedly wanted to purchase a girl for $20,000 and believed he could begin earning profits on her within a month. Gordon says the recruit was terminated and the incident reported to the State Department and ArmorGuard senior management. But he says the issue of human trafficking, and possible guard involvement in it, was never fully investigated. He calls the company's attempt to look into it, "pathetic."

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ArmorGroup's financial records show its operating profits were falling as it was trying to cut corners on the U.S. Embassy security contract in Kabul. AmeriGuard's financial statement for 2007 reports: "Operating profits before head office costs fell to $16.8 million (from $20.3 million)" due in part to "the losses on the U.S. Embassy contract in Kabul."

On September 6th, 2007, Gordon notified a State Department official, whose employees work at the Embassy, about the strain on guard staffing.

"If one person gets sick or slips on a banana peel, the whole thing falls apart like a cheap suit," Gordon emailed. The State Department's reply: "Lock up the banana supply."

Cute (by the way, the CBS story makes references to ArmorGroup, ArmorGuard and AmeriGuard, but I couldn’t find out how they’re related to one another…I know that Armor Group was once Armor Holdings based on this, but that’s the only relationship I could define).

Also, a link at the bottom of the Source Watch page on ArmorGroup takes you to the blog Media Infidel, which has pictures of some of the antics at Kabul.

And believe it or not, there’s more (from the POGO letter)…

Guards have come to POGO with allegations and photographic evidence that some supervisors and guards are engaging in near-weekly deviant hazing and humiliation of subordinates. Witnesses report that the highest levels of (ArmorGuard) management in Kabul are aware of and have personally observed—or even engaged in—these activities, but have done nothing to stop them. Indeed, management has condoned this misconduct, declining to take disciplinary action against those responsible and allowing two of the worst offending supervisors to resign and allegedly move on to work on other U.S. contracts. The lewd and deviant behavior of approximately 30 supervisors and guards has resulted in complete distrust of leadership and a breakdown of the chain of command, compromising security.

Numerous emails, photographs, and videos portray a Lord of the Flies environment. One email from a current guard describes scenes in which guards and supervisors are "peeing on people, eating potato chips out of [buttock] cracks, vodka shots out of [buttock] cracks (there is video of that one), broken doors after drnken [sic] brawls, threats and intimidation from those leaders participating in this activity…." (Attachment 2) Photograph after photograph shows guards—including supervisors—at parties in various stages of nudity, sometimes fondling each other. These parties take place just a few yards from the housing of other supervisors.

Again, all in our name, people (though the following should be noted, from here)…

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department will review its use of private contractors at overseas embassies after a scandal over sexual hazing by security guards at the U.S. embassy in Kabul, an official said on Monday.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asked both the State Department and USAID, the government's foreign assistance arm, to take an "across the board" look at how contractors are used and prepare to do more of the jobs themselves, department spokesman Ian Kelly said.

"She has made it a priority to build up the capacities of both agencies to, when appropriate, take on tasks that are now being outsourced," Kelly told a news briefing, adding that the review would be part of a larger, four-year assessment of diplomatic strategies and operations.

(It should also be noted, though, that ArmorGuard's contract was renewed in June...peachy.)

And based on this story, it appears that the plans to expand our U.S. embassy in Pakistan are not going over well there either.

I realize that this is a consequence of the “permanent war” mentality of Bushco, but again, I believe Ashe is right. It’s silly to prepare for the same threat in a friendly nation as we would in a place where we have troops on the ground (to say nothing of cost-inefficient).

And though I honestly believe President Obama when we claims that he wants to use diplomacy to prevent the type of hostilities that his predecessor would send troops into first without consideration of any other means of problem solving, I think the “one size fits all” mentality of embassy preparedness is nonetheless part of the vision (or lack thereof) that has allowed the following to occur (noted by Tom Engelhardt of Mother Jones here)…

What kind of a world do we inhabit when, with an official unemployment rate of 9.7% and an underemployment rate of 16.8%, the American taxpayer is financing the building of a three-story, exceedingly permanent-looking $17 million troop barracks at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan? This, in turn, is part of a taxpayer-funded $220 million upgrade of the base that includes new "water treatment plants, headquarters buildings, fuel farms, and power generating plants." And what about the U.S. air base built at Balad, north of Baghdad, that now has 15 bus routes, two fire stations, two water treatment plants, two sewage treatment plants, two power plants, a water bottling plant, and the requisite set of fast-food outlets, PXes, and so on, as well as air traffic levels sometimes compared to those at Chicago's O'Hare International?

What kind of American world are we living in when a plan to withdraw most U.S. troops from Iraq involves the removal of more than 1.5 million pieces of equipment? Or in which the possibility of withdrawal leads the Pentagon to issue nearly billion-dollar contracts (new ones!) to increase the number of private security contractors in that country?

What do you make of a world in which the U.S. has robot assassins in the skies over its war zones, 24/7, and the "pilots" who control them from thousands of miles away are ready on a moment's notice to launch missiles — "Hellfire" missiles at that — into Pashtun peasant villages in the wild, mountainous borderlands of Pakistan and Afghanistan? What does it mean when American pilots can be at war "in" Afghanistan, 9 to 5, by remote control, while their bodies remain at a base outside Las Vegas and then can head home past a sign that warns them to drive carefully because this is "the most dangerous part of your day"?

And as we learn from here, the military-industrial complex is definitely a growth industry amidst the ashes of the economic ruin from which we are trying to rebuild, so it’s highly unlikely that these circumstances will change anytime soon.

God Bless America.