About Damned Time: New Law Could Subject Mercenary Military Contractors to Military Trial

One of many humungous problems in Iraq, as well as Afghanistan, is that groups like Blackwater and others go in with their independent contractors, do whatever they damned well please - including killing civilians (and from reports, often without any real justification for doing so) and endangering our troops - and get off scot free because the Pentagon insists they are not subject to any punishment. With the Bush Administration Pentagon, extremely egregious behavior that results in the death of innocent parties is probably cause for promotion, more no-bid contracts, and hell, maybe a Medal of Freedom.

But the Washington Post reports that this free - and most lucrative mercenary - ride may be coming to an end (OK, I see lots of problems with it, too, but something must be done to curb what has gone down over there):

Private contractors and other civilians serving with U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan could be subject for the first time to military courts-martial under a new federal provision that legal scholars say is almost certain to spark constitutional challenges.

The provision, which was slipped into a spending bill at the end of the last Congress, is intended to close a long-standing loophole that critics say puts contractors in war zones above the law.

But the provision also could affect others accompanying U.S. forces in the field, including civilian government employees and embedded journalists.

The Pentagon has estimated that there are 100,000 government contractors operating in Iraq, doing such jobs as serving meals, guarding convoys and interrogating prisoners.

Critics have long complained that, unlike soldiers, contractors are rarely prosecuted for their actions, even after evidence surfaced that contractors mistreated prisoners or fired on U.S. troops.

Now, the embedded journalist provision is one of the specifics that bothers me. However, the way the Pentagon classifies them, this includes not just real journalists but not-even-clever-fakes such as Jerry Brooks (you know him as Geraldo Rivera but he was born Jerry Brooks) and Malevolent Michelle Malkin. Plus reporters in Iraq face much greater danger from the troops because the Pentagon seems to indoctrinate soldiers with the idea that the journalists are there to hurt them.