Posted on 09/14/2001 11:15:24 PM PDT by Uriel1975
I repeat. Intel would be the largest cost. Second best is Most expensive. That's true for doctors, lawyers, and spooks (and PBI).
/john
Well, if the intel product offered gratis by Uncle Sam were insufficient, then you'd be on your own. Probably want to hook-up with meta's idea of private venture capital, and go after significant targets, i.e. $3 mil in private capital for intel to bring in a $10 million-bounty UAE sheik who's funneling cash to Bin Laden (for example). The investors get double their money back ($6 mil), the team clears the net $4 mil as a labor cost (again, just as an example).
Yup. The best that US Intel, UK intel, and Israeli Mossad/Shin-Bet can put together, as certified by Dep't Defense.
See clause 2.
All French paramilitary come pre-packaged with white flags. It's a culturally-conditioned response.
1.) They'd just start new terrorist organizations of their own (assuming they hit the right guys)
2.) Americans want righteous vengeance. Let's keep the payola in the family. Tell you what -- You can slip the Afghan bribes-aplenty to act as travel guides on your way in.
As far as righteous revenge, hell I'd do that part for free!
Please remit one fresh, new, un-spewed keyboard to kd5cts. Thank you. SNERK! LOL! Surrender Monkeys. LOL.
/john (except for Legion Estranger, for them I have respect, sorta)
Thanks for all the kind words.
If you really think so, Murray Sabrin (national Vice Chair of the Republican Liberty Caucus) is an old personal friend of mine. I haven't talked to him in a year, but I could call him Monday and ask him to pass it along to Ron Paul, or get me a phone conversation with Rep. Paul and his fax number. (No guarantees).
This was the key point for me. Righteous vengeance....
You folks might want to research the history of that song, and why it's called a Battle Hymn, and why it was the last thing that was sang at prayers today (nationally). Give your heart to the Good Lord, because your @$$ belongs to a Texan. (This is aimed at the terrorists, and not any particular poster)
To be cold-blooded about this, that means that if, using your pay scale, you manage to kill Bin Laden, you could kill 99 innocent people who were legitimately in the way, and still make $1M before expenses. This seems like a reasonable, but not extreme, incentive to get a clean kill. If you just go around killing people in the hopes that one of them is Bin Laden (say with area weapons), but no attempt to avoid killing innocents, then that would be reckless and malicious, and you could be charged in the US.
Count me in. Not as an investor, but as a contractor. Put a team together, and I'll be more than happy to prove my worth.
It is a modern libertarian free enterprise answer to the islamic fatwa. I think it may be a little too radical for some of our allies but I hope someone introduces this in congress.
Respectfully, NO. I am just an imaginative civilian with a little Constitutional knowledge, but it seems to this civvie that the last thing you want to do is diminish the efficiency of these operations by hamstringing your contractors. If the contractor is 90% certain that he has a specified Target in his sight, you want him to take the shot if he believes it to be a clean kill... not be so worried about being in the hock for a million bucks over that last 10% uncertainty that he practically has to walk up and ask the target for his photo ID and birth certificate.
For this to be done right, you have to trust Market Forces combined with your contractor's best military instincts to do the job. Think about it -- These guys will not be looking to kill civilians for which they get paid nothing (and after all, Letters of Marque and Reprisal do not protect them against getting caught and tried by a hostile court), and they will be looking to hit the right Target, and get Paid. Killing civilians will only draw attention to them in a hostile environment -- it puts not only their payola at risk, but their lives, as it calls unfriendly notice to their operation. That's a pretty strong disincentive if you ask me.
This is not going to be perfect. Nothing in the real world is. But the natural disincentives operating here -- a military man's aversion to unnecessarily killing civilians if he doesn't have to, a mercenary's desire to hit targets for which he gets paid, not targets for which he doesn't get paid, and an in-country operator's desire not to draw undue attention to himself in hostile territory -- these disincentives are going to be enough to keep these contracts focused, as well as can possibly be expected without trying to micro-manage their operation.
IMHO, this is the deal -- You let them choose their target or targets; You provide them the armaments, gear, and supplies they request (if any); provide them with the best US Intel available on the suspected training-camps/safe-houses etc, in the region in question (additional intel purchases up to the contractor); provide them with whatever forged papers and local currency they require; take them as far as Peshawar or Dushanbe or Tel Aviv or Kuwait city or Lake Van, tell them that upon successful completion they can deliver their kills/captures for confirmation and payment at whatever US embassy they can get to, and turn them loose to do their jobs.
That is how a Letter of Marque and Reprisal is supposed to work. Simple, direct, and uncomplicated.
At least, that's what seems to me. I'll defer to any of the ex-military for comment.
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