One: The U.S. military has launched miniature kamikaze drones against Taliban targets and plans to deploy more next year for U.S. special operating forces, according to documents and an Army official. The tube-launched “Switchblade” drone, made by Monrovia, California-based Aerovironment Inc. (AVAV), was secretly sent to Afghanistan for the first time last year. “Under a…
Showing all posts tagged privatisation
Private companies will clearly keep detainees warm at night
Despite a company such as G4S having a shocking human rights record in Britain and globally, this clearly has little impact on the firm receiving new contracts. After all, failure is rewarded in disaster capitalism. Privatisation will make everything more “efficient”, haven’t you heard? The Guardian reports on the latest British experiment in vulnerable people’s…
Rewarding failure in the privatised asylum seeker world
The death last year of Jimmy Mubenga by private contractor G4S, as he was being forcibly removed from Britain, revealed the largely hidden and unaccountable world of outsourced horror in a supposed democracy. One year on, justice remains elusive. This letter appeared in the Guardian a few days ago: Jimmy Mubenga died one year ago…
How to make money on the back of failure in the 21st century
Here’s how the war economy works. Get in the military. Learn about “terrorism”. Preach “counter-insurgency” tactics to a gullible establishment and media. Talk about understanding local cultures while at the same time backing kill/capture methods that routinely fail/murder innocents/kidnap the wrong person (hello Afghanistan, latest report here and here). A perfect example of this person…
Switzerland to ban mercenary companies?
What an important move, if it happens, and an acknowledgement that such firms are increasingly operating on a global scene without any real checks and balances: Switzerland wants to banish mercenary firms and tighten the rules for private security companies based in the country in a bid to safeguard its tradition of neutrality, the government…
Protesting the proposed dirty tar sands from Canada to Obama’s US
Now that’s imaginative civil disobedience: Occupy Wall Street take note: when garnering headlines that don’t have anything to do with NYPD brutality, nudity—or more specifically, orgies—may be the way to go. At a meeting between British and Canadian officials yesterday in London, to discuss the UK’s purchase of Canada’s sweet sweet tar sands oil, two…
When disaster capitalism strikes, Papua New Guinea is on front line
Barely a day goes by when another report emerges of locals in PNG not gaining anything from multinationals pillaging the vast natural resources of the country. This week’s Guardian features a story on the subject and explains how the PNG government is more than happy to allow rapacious corporations to extract the valuable assets from…
Who says you can’t buy New York’s finest?
Yet more evidence of the pernicious effect of private interests corrupting the public sector (via Counterpunch): Videos are springing up across the internet showing uniformed members of the New York Police Department in white shirts (as opposed to the typical NYPD blue uniforms) pepper spraying and brutalizing peaceful, nonthreatening protestors attempting to take part in…
Afghan war failure opens door to predatory firms looking to make killing
Afghanistan Today writes: Exploding bombs and gunfights will harm the economy of any city, either by causing direct damage or through the wider impact on trade and services. But for security equipment companies working the market in Kabul, business is, for want of a better word, booming. That war means big business is a lamentable…
What privatisation does to immigration detention
This is almost comical but sadly true (via the Canberra Times): The Commonwealth Government is suing its former immigration detention operators for failing to protect it against lawsuits lodged by people kept in detention facilities. The case will be heard in the South Australian Supreme Court on November 21. It is part of a long-running…