June 09 2011
The unrest stalking the Middle East has spurred a security rush by leaders in the region who long have worried about the loyalty and professionalism of their own armed forces.
On the heels of the refusal by troops in Tunisia and Egypt to fire on their fellow countrymen earlier his year, Libya’s embattled Muammar Gaddafi put mercenaries (already on his payroll) on the front line – fighters from Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan.
And on realising that he faced a long struggle as some in his security forces defected, Gaddafi’s agents reportedly were flashing their chequebooks in Polisario-controlled southern Algeria – offering hundreds of rebel fighters as much as $10,000 to fight for the Tripoli regime for just two months. According to a high-level defector from Tripoli, Gaddafi was also recruiting from the ranks of rebel movements in Mail and Niger.
Even before the start of the revolt in Bahrain in February, the principality’s rulers had been quietly stacking their security forces with foreigners – chiefly Pakistanis, but Jordanians, Iraqis and Yemenis too.
Still it came as a surprise when, after the first clashes in Manama, the protesters complained that their uniformed attackers spoke only Urdu, a Pakistani dialect.
Already embarrassed by having to call on Saudi Arabian forces to quell the unrest, the Bahraini royals put their foreign recruiting campaign into overdrive.
Such is the demand, Pakistan’s army has established a commercial recruiting agency, Fauji Security Services, to enlist thousands from the ranks of the various Pakistani armed forces for service in Bahrain – retired officers and men from the ranks.
More than 90 per cent of the recruits are destined for Bahrain, according to Pakistani press reports. But some are also bound for Saudi Arabia, which in the past has relied on Pakistani pilots to fly its fighter jets.
By one estimate, Pakistanis are signing up at a rate of as many as 1500 a month to the Bahraini packages, which include a monthly salary of $1100 and perks such as health insurance and lodging. More than 12,000 Pakistanis are said to be serving in Bahrain.
Mercenaries are hardly new to the battlefields. But in the past decade the private element of war has leapt as Washington has sought to drive down the huge cost of its wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. In both theatres the ratio of private security contractors to government forces is almost one-to-one and contracting has become a $100-billion-a-year industry.
Two aspects of the Bahraini deal are in need of clarification.
First, given the high levels of sympathy that exists in the Pakistani services for al-Qaeda and the Taliban, such a recruitment drive would seem to be a perfect avenue for al-Qaeda to infiltrate the service of a regime on its list of enemies.
Second, recruiting Pakistani Muslims fails to address the concern that Middle East rulers have over the Islamic objection to Muslims inflicting violence on fellow Muslims. This concern is being addressed in a spectacular bid by the rulers of the United Arab Emirates to buy a new, Western-trained and foreign-recruited fighting force.
Abu Dhabi, according to The New York Times, is putting up $500 million for a company connected to Erik Prince, the founder of the controversial Blackwater global security organisation, to set up an American-led mercenary force, mainly Colombians and South Africans, to conduct special operations at home and abroad, to defend the emirates’ oil facilities and to put down revolts. Prince reportedly has a cardinal rule of recruitment – no Muslims.
His companies have made billions from the American war machine in the post September-11 world, but he worries about any reluctance by Muslim recruits to kill fellow Muslims. Seemingly, the Emirati princes agree.x