Page 2 of 2 DISPATCHES FROM AMERICA The Pentagon's merchants of war By Nick Turse
Navy MH-60R helicopters to their host ships. It also supplies the navy with
advanced computers that provide the "highly sophisticated moving maps and
critical mission information via cockpit displays" used by flight crews.
In the first six months of this year, Harris has continued its hard work for
the complex. In January, the company was "selected by the US Air Force for the
Network and Space Operations and Maintenance (NSOM) program" for "a base
contract and six options that bring the potential overall value to $410 million
over six-and-a-half-years" to provide "operations and maintenance support to
the 50th Space Wing's Air Force Satellite Control
Network at locations around the world."
In May, the company was "awarded a three-year, $20 million contract by [top 10
Pentagon contractor] L3 Communications to provide products and services for a
next-generation Tactical Video Capture System (TVCS)" - a system that
integrates real-time video streams to enhance tactical training exercises -
"that will support training at various US Marine Corps locations across the US
and abroad".
That same month, Harris was also "awarded a potential five-year, $85 million
Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract from the US Navy for
multiband satellite communications terminals that will provide advanced
communications for aircraft carriers and other large deck ships".
In addition, Harris is now hard at work in the homeland. Not only did the
company pick up more than $3 million from the Department of Homeland Security
last year, but national security expert Tim Shorrock, in a 2007 CorpWatch
article, "Domestic spying, Inc", specifically noted that Harris and fellow
intelligence industry contractors "stand to profit from th[e] unprecedented
expansion of America's domestic intelligence system".
4. Navistar Defense
Its total DoD dollars in 2007 were $1,166,805,361. Still listed in Pentagon
documents under its old name, International Military and Government, LLC,
Navistar is the military subsidiary of Navistar International Corporation - "a
holding company whose individual units provide integrated and best-in-class
transportation solutions".
While the company has served the US military since World War I, it's known, if
at all, by the public for making some of the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected
(MRAP) vehicles designed to thwart Iraqi roadside bombs. As of April 2008, the
US military had "ordered 5,214 total production MaxxPro MRAP vehicles" from
Navistar and, that same month, the company was awarded "a contract valued at
more than $261 million ... for engineering upgrades to the armor used on
International MaxxPro MRAP vehicles".
But Navistar makes more than MRAPs. Just last month, the company signed a
"multi-year contract valued at nearly $1.3 billion" with the US Army "to
provide medium tactical vehicles and spare parts to the Afghanistan National
Police, Afghan National Army and the Iraqi Ministry of Defense". This followed
a 2005 multi-year army contract, worth $430 million, "for more than 2,900
vehicles and spare parts".
Obviously, the company is significantly, profitably, and proudly involved in
the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. As Tom Feifar, the Global Defense and
Export general manager for Navistar Parts, put it late last year, "It's an
honor to be a part of the effort to support our troops."
5. Evergreen International Airlines
Its total DoD dollars in 2007 were $1,105,610,723. A privately held global
aviation services company, it has subsidiaries in related industries such as
helicopter aviation (Evergreen Helicopters, Inc), as well as a few unrelated
efforts like producing "agricultural, nursery and wine products" (Evergreen
Agricultural Enterprises, Inc).
Evergreen has been on the Pentagon's payroll for a long time. In 2004, Ed
Connolly, the executive vice president of Evergreen International Airlines,
stated, "Evergreen has flown continuously for the [US Air Force] Air Mobility
Command since 1975 and is proud to continue its long-standing history of
supporting the US armed forces global missions with quality and reliable
services."
Not surprisingly, Evergreen has been intimately involved in the occupation of
Iraq. In fact, in 2004, the company received "approximately 200 awards for its
support of international airlift services during the Iraq war" from the air
force's Air Mobility Command. An air force general even handed out these medals
and certificates of achievement to Evergreen's employees.
In Amnesty International's 2006 report, "Below the Radar: Secret Flights to
Torture and 'Disappearance'," the human-rights organization noted that
Evergreen was one of only a handful of private companies with current permits
to land at US military bases worldwide.
That same year, the company even airlifted FOX News personality Bill O'Reilly
and his TV show crew to Kuwait and Iraq to meet and greet troops, sign books
and pictures and hand out trinkets. And just last year the company was part of
a consortium, including such high-profile commercial carriers as American,
Delta and United Airlines that the Pentagon awarded a "$1,031,154,403 firm
fixed-price contract for international airlift services ... [that] is expected
to be completed September 2008".
Under the radar
All told, these five stealth corporations from the military-corporate complex
received more than $8.9 billion in taxpayer dollars in 2007. To put this into
perspective, that sum is almost $2 billion more than the Bush administration's
proposed 2009 budget for the Environmental Protection Agency. Put another way,
it's about nine times what one-sixth of the world's population spent on food
last year.
Tens of thousands of defense contractors - from well-known "civilian"
corporations (like Coca-Cola, Kraft and Dell) to tiny companies - have fattened
up on the Pentagon and its wars. Most of the time, large or small, they fly
under the radar and are seldom identified as defense contractors at all. So
it's hardly surprising that firms like Harris and Evergreen, without name
recognition outside their own worlds, can take in billions in taxpayer dollars
without notice or comment in our increasingly militarized civilian economy.
When the history of the Iraq war is finally written, chances are that these
five billion-dollar babies, and most of the other defense contractors involved
in making the US occupation possible, will be left out. Until we begin coming
to grips with the role of such corporations in creating the material basis for
an imperial foreign policy, we'll never be able to grasp fully how the Pentagon
works and why the US so regularly makes war in, and carries out occupations of,
distant lands.
Nick Turse is the associate editor and research director of
Tomdispatch.com. His first book, The Complex: How the Military Invades
Our Everyday Lives, an exploration of the new military-corporate complex in
America, was recently published by Metropolitan Books. His website, Nick
Turse.com has been newly revamped and expanded.
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
