Slandering Erik Prince

In this week's Newsweek, Erik Prince accuses those who call his company, Blackwater, 'mercenaries', of slandering the company.

According to the International Convention Against the Recruitment, Use, Financing, and Training of Mercenaries, a mercenary is

Article 1

For the purposes of the present Convention,

1. A mercenary is any person who:

(a) Is specially recruited locally or abroad in order to fight in an armed conflict;

(b) Is motivated to take part in the hostilities essentially by the desire for private gain and, in fact, is promised, by or on behalf of a party to the conflict, material compensation substantially in excess of that promised or paid to combatants of similar rank and functions in the armed forces of that party;

(c) Is neither a national of a party to the conflict nor a resident of territory controlled by a party to the conflict;

(d) Is not a member of the armed forces of a party to the conflict; and

(e) Has not been sent by a State which is not a party to the conflict on official duty as a member of its armed forces.

Article 2

Any person who recruits, uses, finances or trains mercenaries, as defined in article 1 of the present Convention, commits an offence for the purposes of the Convention.

Blackwater clearly meets four of the five conditions in Article 1, so the only thing keeping this definition from applying to Erik Prince's sorry ass is if his employees are all U.S. citizens or residents. Unfortunately for Prince, the Guardian reported years ago on his company's practice of recruiting, training, and using foreign nationals. The president of Blackwater, Gary Jackson, told the Guardian, "We scour the ends of the earth to find professionals". Recent events have shown what Blackwater means by the word "professional".

This Manila Times opinion piece mentions Blackwater's recruitment of Filipinos.

In an interview at R.J. Hillhouse's blog, Jackson says "Blackwater’s deploying professionals, both US and TCN, undergo extensive training in core values, leadership, and human rights before they deploy". ('TCN' means Third Country National).

So while not all Blackwater employees meet the definition of mercenary, Blackwater is involved in training mercenaries.

If one is going to use the common meaning of mercenary, instead of the technical definition from international law, then Blackwater qualifies under that criterion as well.

Blackwater also has an 'affiliate' called Greystone that markets military services internationally. If that is not mercenary then the term has no meaning.

Thanks to the Wikipedia page on Blackwater for reference to the Guardian article.