Blackwater Worldwide - Non-Iraq Services

Non-Iraq Services

According to a company press release, Blackwater provided airlift, security, logistics, and transportation services, as well as humanitarian support. It was reported that the company also acted as law enforcement in the disaster-stricken areas, for example securing neighborhoods and confronting criminals. Blackwater moved about 200 personnel into the area hit by Hurricane Katrina, most of whom (164 employees) were working under a contract with the Department of Homeland Security to protect government facilities, but the company held contracts with private clients as well. Overall, Blackwater had a "visible, and financially lucrative, presence in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina as the use of the company contractors cost U.S. taxpayers $240,000 a day."

Academi (then Blackwater USA) was one of five companies picked in September 2007 by the Department of Defense Counter-Narcotics Technology Program Office in a five-year contract for equipment, material and services in support of counter-narcotics activities. The contract is worth up to $15 billion. The other companies picked are Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, OHI, and Arinc Inc. Blackwater USA has also been contracted by various foreign governments. The DEA and DoD counternarcotics program is supported by Blackwater Worldwide in Afghanistan as well. “Blackwater is involved on DoD side” of the counter-narcotics program in Afghanistan says Jeff Gibson, vice president for international training at Blackwater. “We interdict. The NIU surgically goes after shipments going to Iran or Pakistan. We provide training to set up roadblocks, identify where drug lords are, and act so as not to impact the community.” In 2008, about 16 Blackwater personnel were in Afghanistan at any given time to support DoD and DEA efforts at training facilities around the country. Blackwater is also involved in mentoring Afghan officials in drug interdiction and counter narcotics. As Richard Douglas, a deputy assistant secretary of defense, explained, "The fact is, we use Blackwater to do a lot of our training of counternarcotics police in Afghanistan. I have to say that Blackwater has done a very good job." The Obama administration awarded Academi a $250 million contract to work for the U.S. State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency in Afghanistan.

In 2005, Blackwater worked to train the Naval Sea Commando regiment of Azerbaijan, enhancing their interdiction capabilities on the Caspian Sea. In Asia, Blackwater had contracts in Japan guarding AN/TPY-2 radar systems.

In March 2006, Cofer Black, vice chairman of Blackwater USA, allegedly suggested at an international conference in Amman, Jordan, that the company was ready to move towards providing security professionals up to brigade size (3,000–5,000) for humanitarian efforts and low-intensity conflicts. The company denies making this claim.

Mark Manzetti, writing in the New York Times on August 19, 2009, reported that the CIA had hired Blackwater "as part of a secret program to locate and assassinate top operatives of Al Qaeda." Newly appointed CIA director Leon Panetta had recently acknowledged a planned secret targeted killing program, one withheld from Congressional oversight. Manzetti's sources, which tied the program to Blackwater, declined to have their names made public. The CIA was acting on a 2001 presidential legal pronouncement, known as a finding, which authorized the CIA to pursue such efforts. Several million dollars were spent on planning and training, but it was never operationalized and no militants were caught or captured. Manzanettie notes that it was unknown "whether the C.I.A. had planned to use the contractors to actually capture or kill Qaeda operatives, or just to help with training and surveillance in the program." Jeremy Scahill reported in The Nation in November 2009 that Blackwater operated alongside the CIA in Pakistan in "snatch and grab" operations targeting senior members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The report cited an unnamed source who has worked on covert US military programs, who revealed that senior members of the Obama administration may not be aware that Blackwater is operating under a US contract in Pakistan. A spokesman for Blackwater denied the claims, stating that they have "only one employee in Pakistan."