By Mike Whitney

Al-Jazeerah, September 17, 2005

The deployment of mercenaries in New Orleans is a grave breach of
traditional policy and a serious threat to the American people. The decision
to use these corporate warriors has been accompanied by the equally
provocative order to strip the remaining survivors of their “legally
registered firearms”, thus depriving them of the 2nd amendment rights.
Who appointed Bush as God?

The safety and security of the city’s people is now in the hands of armed
militias who have no allegiance to the Constitution and whose relationship
to the government is uncertain. These hired goons are not required to
conform to “The Military Code of Justice” or to the legal restrictions that
govern the conduct of military personnel.

There is no set of circumstances, neither natural disaster nor terrorist
attack, which justifies the use of paid killers on the streets of America’s
cities.

None!

The presumption that these units are assisting in the relief effort is
patently false. The order is clearly intended to militarize a critical
American port and establish a precedent that could place the nation under
military rule.

The appearance of the Blackwater mercenaries in New Orleans has produced
the effect for which it was designed; to strike fear into the hearts of the
local people and to convey a feeling of pervasive repression in the wake of
a major disaster. They have apparently succeeded on both accounts.
Blackwater’s record in Iraq is a grim testimonial of criminal excess.
They have been directly connected to the abusive treatment of prisoners at
Abu Ghraib, the random killings and brutalizing of Iraqi civilians, and the
extortion of information from resistance-suspects. They operate secretly and
with complete impunity, guided by no principle other than the insatiable
desire to increase profits for themselves and their investors.

Blackwater represents the globalization of repression; a free-market
progeny that is transforming the people’s army into privately-owned militias
for multi-national corporations. The deployment of these armed-units is a
clear threat to public safety and personal liberty.

The decision to send Blackwater mercenaries to New Orleans was not made
haphazardly. A recent Washington Post article indicated that Donald Rumsfeld
would use the military more extensively within the US if there was another
terrorist attack on American soil. It’s clear now that the use of
mercenaries was integral to that plan and that Rumsfeld wants Americans to
acclimate to the idea of seeing troops deployed within their cities.
The danger of this strategy cannot be overestimated. If, for example,
organized resistance sprung up in New Orleans in response to Bush’s
disarmament orders or to FEMA’s blundering evacuation plan, we could see
skirmishes that could explode into city-wide fighting.

Or, if peaceful protests broke out in New Orleans, and dissenters were
shot by trigger-happy mercenaries, as they were in Falluja, Najaf and
Baghdad, the situation could quickly escalate into massive riots and open
rebellion.

The deploying of mercenaries is a flagrantly provocative and hostile act
intended to incite widespread violence. We should not allow Rumsfeld or Bush
to thrust the nation towards greater turmoil by applying their iron-fisted
theories of social order within the country.

The nation has never been more polarized. Rumsfeld’s reckless move could
provide the spark for violent conflagration.

Is that what he wants; a second American Revolution?