Book Recommendations: Mercenaries, Security Contractors & Paramilitary Organizations

May 19, 2009 9:17 AM

What are the best books and articles about Security Contractors/Modern Mercenaries/Paramilitary Organizations?

I'm looking for books or lengthy articles that cover modern mercenaries, security contractors and paramilitary organizations (for example Blackwater) especially from the prospective of the "soldiers" and their daily tasks, rather than macroscopic policy overview.

Doesn’t have to be about Iraq or the Middle East and I would prefer the books or articles be journalistic rather than sensationalistic.

posted by 2bucksplus to media & arts (7 comments total)

Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army (Jeremy Scahill) is very good, in that it covers the business growth and also the shady political sleeping arrangements that let the company get so impossibly wealthy and unchecked.

(No Amazon link for tacky MeFi referrer-jacking here, nosirree.)
posted by rokusan at 9:20 AM on May 19

Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army
posted by odinsdream at 9:25 AM on May 19

I immediately thought of Maurice Magnus, though I expect he is a little too old for your purposes.

That said, I did find this link to a whole slew of French Foreign Legion titles, which would probably repay perusement. (You might also want to look into the Spanish Foreign Legion - less well known, but still out there.)
posted by IndigoJones at 9:47 AM on May 19

Nearly everything I know about this comes from Kathryn Cramer's investigations and blogging. Her posts are rich in links and sources, and the comment threads often include people who represent themselves as contractors or former contractors, often vetted as such. Cramer recommends Robert Young Pelton's book Licenced to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror, which I've meant to read but haven't yet.
posted by cgc373 at 10:48 AM on May 19

I'm not sure if this qualifies as an article or a book, but Eeben Barlow, the guy who ran the extraordinarily controversial Executive Outcomes, has a blog. It's ... interesting ... to say the least, but many of its entries certainly fit the bill. It also leans heavily towards using PMCs, for obvious reasons.

The address is http://eebenbarlowsmilitaryandsecurityblog.blogspot.com/.

He also has an autobiographical book out, Executive Outcomes: Against All Odds, but I haven't read it.
posted by oostevo at 11:21 AM on May 19

you should check out the work of Peter W. Singer - his 2003 book Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry is an excellent piece of work

you can get it direct from Cornell University Press
posted by jammy at 12:55 PM on May 19

upon re-reading your question i saw your request for soldier perspectives...

you could try Big Boy Rules then - NPR did a piece on it here - and a review here
posted by jammy at 1:02 PM on May 19