DoS reveals its plan to secure their personnel in Iraq after the troops come home:
The State Department is preparing to spend close to $3 billion to hire a security force to protect diplomats in Iraq after the U.S. pulls its last troops out of the country by year’s end.
In testimony Monday before the Commission on Wartime Contracting, Patrick Kennedy, undersecretary of state for management, said the department plans to hire a 5,100-strong force to protect diplomatic personnel, guard embassy buildings and operate a fleet of aircraft and armored vehicles…
A large U.S. diplomatic presence will remain, however, and the departments of state and defense are wrestling with how to provide security for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad—which is a target of rocket attacks—and diplomatic outposts in the provinces.
As the military withdraws, Mr. Kennedy said, the State Department will rely on contractors to carry out a range of military-style missions that he said were “not inherently governmental,” including providing emergency medical evacuation, operating systems to detect and warn against incoming rocket or artillery fire, or rescue diplomatic personnel under attack.
The contract security force slated for Iraq would far outstrip the State Department’s in-house diplomatic security force. Mr. Kennedy said the State Department currently employs around 1,800 diplomatic security personnel around the world.
That’s $588K per contractor, for those keeping score at home. The size of the US mission in Iraq was forecast to be roughly 3000 souls, or 1.5 contract support personnel per DoS employee. The sums spent on contract support are nearly double the entire amount spent by State in Iraq in 2010, and represents nearly 18% of the entire FY10 budget. 5,100 contractors is roughly the size of a reinforced brigade.
Which, wow.
Are they hiring pilots?
At $588K per contractor, one wonders if the Army or Marine Corps couldn’t do it cheaper.
Especially since those contractors already received their training from the military, at military expense….
@Mike M.: Sure, they could maybe do it cheaper, but the military pilots will be going away along with the rest of the military presence, so the suggestion is a non-starter.
Helos for sure Lex, and probably some King Air/CASA 212-class stuff as well.
What happened to Marine Security Dets at U.S. Embassies? And State’s own Diplomatic Security Personnel? Also, a staff of 3000? For one embassy and maybe four “outposts” WTF?
@Ernie: DOS will be continuing all the “reconstruction” work that’s been going on ever since 2003, only without DoD support once the pullout happens. That kind of makes the embassy mission over-huge.
I wonder if they pay taxes on that?
Yeah, contractors still have to pay taxes, though if they’re overseas for more than 330 days in a year they can deduct something like $90k.
According to the Congressional Research Service, the “Operational Costs Per Troop in Afghanistan” average was $525 from FY05-09. The latest for FY2011 is $694 per troop.
Maybe a bit of apples to oranges, still a comparison, FWIW. LINK(pdf)
[BTW, Our host and readers may remember I have long complained for years here about very expensive, under-regulated and mostly unaccountable contractors.]
Sorry. I forgot to put 3 zeroes after those above numbers.
$525,000 per troop, per year.
$694,000 per troop, per year.
My browser is telling me Navy Times is Malware…
But NT is saying that the CO of USS Connecticut was relieved.
That’s 12. About 2 a month…
My malware program just gave me the same warning, so I think I’ll take their advice and stay off the site until they fix whatever they’ve got floating around. Fricking hackers.
mishandling of classified documents: http://www.navy.mil/search/display.asp?story_id=60852
If they are hiring Pilots, Lex, I’d strongly recommend you stay away. That’s one gig the possibility of coming home may not be high.
Lex, State is indeed hiring pilots, but mainly rotary wing. I understand they now contract out a number of the fixed and rotary wing jobs to fly their in-house little air force.
Not sure that all they need are rotary….State Dept. Has a DC-3 that files from Kandahar to Kabul about three times a week….Talk about doing it OLD SCHOOL…plenty of people getting on the old girl and flying out of KAF…..weird juxtaposition of seeing a DC-3 lined up next to Predator Drones….
Marine Security Force is only responsible for security inside the embassy walls. DSS (Diplomatic Security Service) doesn’t want to have anything to do with an environment as hot as Iraq. Ergo, contractors.
And Flit, I understand that “contractors” produce a Palin like Pavlovian response on your side. But there is NO authorization for US combat troops in Iraq, and DSS doesn’t want the job. What would you propose?
The Bureau of Diplomatic Security doesn’t happen to have a spare aviation company and a bridage combat team just collecting dust in a warehouse somewhere, and never will. Thus the contracted support.
That’s “brigade,” not “bridage.”
Think state will have some contracted gunships? Little Birds or something similar?
O/T … another one bites the dust..
USS CONNECTICUT
Commander of Bremerton-based submarine relieved of duties
The commanding officer of the fast attack submarine USS Connecticut was relieved of command Monday as a result of an investigation into the mishandling of classified information.
Methinks they need to hire Ripple Creek. Wait, they’re in a different universe! (As it happens, my copy of “Better to Beg Forgiveness” was lying on my lap as this page loaded.)
Just finished reading a good book titled “Licensed to Kill” by Robert Young Pelton about the proliferation of contractors and other “guns-for-hire” – companies like Blackwater, Executive Outcomes, DynCorp, Sandline, etc. that have already replaced military security for private security details, convoy security (esp. for other contractors, like KBR and Halliburton). In the “good ol’ days” they could make $600/day for a 90-day contract, though now it’s probably down to $400 or so. And as Flit rightly notes they are largely unregulated, which makes me wonder what State Dept. plans to do in that regards if they hire such large numbers to do force protection work.
Yup. You need to read the Williamson book. It has a lot of thinly-disguised tuckerizing of current players in the “nation-building” and security-contracting business. It also has lots of explosions, most of them provided by a borderline-psycho Czech female demo expert who sleeps with her combat shotgun, because she loves it so much.
Just make sure that the bill for the DOS security mission gets sent to and paid by DOS, and NOT DOD!
Many of our problems around the world have their root cause in the leftist philosophies rampant in the DOS, and DOD should not be made to pay for whatever DOS wants now, after having hosed up US Foreign policy badly. DOD already paid. In blood.
Just where is the outrage about MPRI? Oops no mention, cuz they worked for the Clintons…
I’ve got a buddy making VERY GOOD money on a one year contract flying a Huey for DynCorp in A-stan. It’s a DoS gig.
What I said. Read Williamson’s book. It’s a hoot. Even though it takes place in a different, science-fictional universe, I guarantee you’ll recognize characteristic personality types. Williamson has deployed to Iraq a time or two, and observed the people he met.
Three thousand “souls” is a huge-ass country mission. Many of these folks will be from tenant agencies, some will be contract hires brought aboard solely to work in Iraq, and there’ll probably be at least that many more (more like two times as many) in locally engaged staff (LES) employees.
Still and all, if it seems like it’s going to take a major and costly effort to support our diplomatic/civilian mission in Iraq, that’s because it is a major and costly effort. Except, until now, that fact has been masked considerably by the fact that State has been able to “piggy back” on the U.S. military establishment in Iraq.
The U.S. military deployment, and its support infrastructure, are going away. Real. Soon. Now. The diplomatic deployment (i.e., embassy, consulates, regional offices, and PRTs) aren’t going away. (At least not yet.) And the need for support services of all types, that simply aren’t to be had “on the economy” in Iraq, persists nonetheless.
I’ve quoted you and linked to you here: http://consul-at-arms2.blogspot.com/2011/06/re-personal-army.html