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© 2007 Marc Lindemann
Over the course of its efforts to stabilize Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States has increasingly relied upon the work of civilian contractors. By theUS Central Command's count at the end of 2006, therewere nearly 100,000 contractors operating in Iraq alone.1An estimated 30,000-more than the number of non-US Coalition forces in Iraq-provide armed military services such as personal and site security.2 The insertion of fivewords into Congress's fiscal year 2007 defense authorization act may now subject every civilian contractor operating in a combat zone to the discipline of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). This legislation ostensibly brings long-overdue regulation to contractor behavior, but it also raises a number of questions regarding interpretation and enforcement. By drawing on the lessons of past efforts to control contractors, the military should be able to craft a workable standard for the exercise of its expanded UCMJ jurisdiction.
Expertise for a Price
Civilian contractors have frequently played an important role inAmerican military operations. George Washington hired civilians to haul the Continental Army's equipment; supply vendors followed the Union and Confederate armies during the Civil War. Indeed, today's military recognizes the use of civilian contractors as a forcemultiplier in stabilization efforts.3Although sometimes expensive, contractors are capable of supplying immediate expertise and manpowermuchmore rapidly than themilitary can growsubjectmatter experts.
In the second half of the twentieth century, a combination of technology, budget constraints, and personnel shortages forced the military to rely heavily on contractors for support services and even low-intensity combat skills. Technological innovation increasingly required the presence of contractors on the battlefield to maintain and repair their companies' sophisticated equipment, leading BusinessWeek to label Vietnama "war by contract" in March 1965.4 The contractor facilities that exist on military installations today are legacies of that development. Even greater reliance on contractors came as a direct result of downsizing following the ColdWar. This was a period when the military outsourced many of its basic support operations to civilian contractors.
Even as the military turned over its support services to civilians, companies such as Blackwater USAbegan to offer more combat-related specialties. Brookings Institution fellow P.W. Singer has ably chronicled the rise of private military firms (PMFs), private-sector organizations that provide military services to people, corporations, and governments. Singer...