U.S. Pays Millions In Cost Overruns For Security in Iraq

August 12, 2007
U.S. Pays Millions In Cost Overruns For Security in Iraq

The private security industry has surged in Iraq because of troop shortages and growing
violence. After the March 2003 invasion, hundreds of foreign and Iraqi companies, many of them
new, signed contracts with the U.S. and British militaries, the State Department, the Iraqi
government, media and humanitarian organizations and other private companies.

The size of this force and its cost have never been documented. The Pentagon has said that
about 20,000 security contractors operate in Iraq, although some estimates are considerably
higher. Private security contractors have been used in previous wars, but not on this scale,
according to military experts. Several lawmakers have recently sought to regulate the private
security industry and account for billions of dollars spent on outsourcing military and
intelligence tasks that once were handled exclusively by the government.

Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), a member of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee who was briefed by Aegis and the Corps of Engineers during a February visit to Iraq, said lawmakers are only now realizing the scope of private security there. "We're in the wake of this speedboat. We
can't even catch up to the contracts," said Kaptur, who opposes the use of private forces and
initiated an audit of Aegis by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, the second
the agency has conducted.