Free Republic

January 21, 2022 With inflation at a record high, millions of its citizens fleeing the country, and a political opposition recognized by most Western democracies as the legitimate government of Venezuela, the regime of Nicolás Maduro seemed to be on the brink of collapse in 2019. But Maduro regime survived, thanks to a number of factors — among them the external support it received from malign state actors such as Russia and China. Moscow and Beijing never wavered in their political support of the Venezuelan regime, or of Maduro himself, including by refusing to recognize the constitutionally mandated interim presidency...

A U.S. Army soldier guides 6th Iraqi Army Division soldiers through correct preventive maintenance checks and services (PMCS) on a humvee during a driver’s training class. The PMCS training was part of a three-day driver’s training course taught by 16th Engineer Brigade soldiers throughout the month of August. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. 1st Class Tracy Ballog Iraqi Army Soldiers Get Behind the Wheel Iraqi Army soldiers attended classes to gain experience in maintaining andoperating humvees, which will eventually be fielded to Iraqi army units. U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class Tracy Ballog CAMP LIBERTY, Iraq, Aug. 28, 2006 --...

The crisis has taken another turn for the worse in the Darfur region of western Sudan. On April 26, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) warned that the security situation has so deteriorated that international aid agencies are no longer able to gain access to some 700,000 internally displaced people who thought they were "safe" because they had managed to get inside UN-managed camps. The latest attacks by government forces, Human Rights Watch reports, occurred on April 24 on a village in South Darfur state called Joghana, which is about 6 miles from the town of Gereida, where about 80,000...

Once called mercenaries, highly trained killers have offered their deadly services for a price--from ancient Rome to the War on Terror. Today, they've marched from the back pages of "Soldier of Fortune" to form vast corporations with the power of the most advanced militaries. The payday for these private soldiers has reached $100-billion annually! Unregulated by governing forces, they wage war for those who can afford it. Find out if they are the future of conflict resolution in our 2-hour special.

The security business employs between 15000 and 20000 armed civilians to protect installations or escort convoys March 31 , the American news chains took pains to explain the four killed, charred Americans in Faludja. They had the profile of military officers and had besides gone through the army, but were employed, as civilans, by Blackwater, a security business to some, a private army to others. Blackwater currently employs 450 persons in Iraq, with a contract of 21 million dollars, to assure the security of Paul Bremer, the American administrator in Iraq, and personnel of the Coalition Provisional Authority. From protection...

Private commandos shoot back on the Iraq firing line 49 minutes ago Add Politics - AFP to My Yahoo! WASHINGTON (AFP) - Ex-military commandos armed with M4 rifles are fighting insurgents in Iraq (news - web sites) as part of a private contracting force, many of them hired by the US-led coalition, raising some deep concerns. About 15,000 personnel from private military firms (PMFs) were operating in Iraq, making them more numerous that even the biggest US ally, Britain, estimated Peter Singer, author of "Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry." At least 30 to 50 had been...

Although the media repeatedly refers to the men killed in the recent attack in Iraq as "civilian contractors,? they were in fact mercenaries used as part of the U.S. government's outsourcing of jobs, reports the Progressive Review. Firms overseeing the specialized contractors include Blackwater, the one involved in the recent incident, as well as Dyncorp and the Steele Foundation. The Steele Foundation, the third largest supplier of mercenaries, has 500 troops in Iraq and recently distinguished itself by -- depending on who's telling the story -- failing to protect Haitian president Aristide from kidnapping by the U.S. government or participating...