Don't blame Blackwater

The security firm acts according to its contract with the State Department.

from the November 2, 2007 edition

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The State Department's responsibility, however, is much more straightforward than that. The Diplomatic Security Services' Regional Security Office maintains direct operational control of each mission performed by Blackwater. As Blackwater CEO Erik Prince described to CNN, "They [State personnel] dictate the missions, they dictate the vehicles, they provide the weapons, they tell us where to go and what to do."

The State Department contract requires that protective security details are trained in some of the very behaviors that Blackwater teams have been criticized for, particularly tactical motorcade operations that include offensive driving techniques such as ramming other vehicles.

It is doubtful that replacing Blackwater with another contractor, or even with diplomatic security officers, would make a difference in how the contract is performed. Aligning the Mission Firearms Policy with Central Command's guidelines for contractors is a good first step.

Transferring oversight of contractors from the State Department to DoD will allow DoD to monitor their previously unknown whereabouts – a longtime irritant to commanders in the field. But the change will have little effect on the instructions that firms receive from their State Department contracting officers. It would also worsen accountability: DoD's dismal record of vendor oversight includes Halliburton and the contractors involved in Abu Ghraib.

One of the gravest dangers of the government outsourcing $400 billion of its services is that it can shift responsibility for its actions to the private sector even if the blame is unwarranted. The State Department has launched internal reviews and let its chief of diplomatic security go. But the Bureau of Diplomatic Security's granting immunity to the contractors involved in the shootout is a troubling precedent, particularly since that bureau contracted with Blackwater and has been responsible for its contract monitoring.

Contractors need to be held accountable to the same standards and legal codes as federal employees are. Otherwise it becomes too easy for the government to outsource its own responsibility, then absolve the contractor when it gets caught. If there was any wrongdoing at the Blackwater shootout in Baghdad, the guilty should be held accountable.

However, the American public and Congress should not be distracted by the fact that the State Department's grittier work was outsourced to a contractor. They should not allow the government to let a contractor take the fall while it sidesteps accountability for a cold calculus that its diplomats and aid workers have to be protected at all costs – costs that may include some innocent Iraqi lives.

R.J. Hillhouse is a political scientist who writes the national security blog, www.TheSpyWhoBilledMe.com. She's the author of the espionage thriller "Outsourced."

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