We don’t really know what Blackwater did. We know what various government officials SAY they did, we also know that official government estimates of how many people Blackwater had in country were full fledged lies.
And technically no we were not openly at war. War was never declared.
The Russian economy has been ravaged by falling oil prices. Protest movements appear to once again be gaining steam.
Projecting Russian military power can be a balm to a restive populace, as Mr. Putin doubtless understands from past adventures in Ukraine and elsewhere.
~ Sean Gordon
“We don’t really know what Blackwater did.”
I served in Iraq and regularly interacted with Blackwater.
They did nothing like Wagner/Russia just attempted, with a battalion-sized mechanized/armor unit, supported by artillery and engineer bridging units to seize territory from other standing conventional military forces. Wagner was conducting regular warfare, while attempting to deny that that they were conducting war for Russia.
“And technically no we were not openly at war. War was never declared.”
Semantics. Congress authorized it the UN voted on it, we flew US flags over the forces conducting it - even embedded journalists with the units. It was not an attempt to mislead the public that someone else was responsible. It was conducted openly under the laws of war as a nation state.