Feral Jundi

Friday, May 7, 2010

Legal News: Navy SEAL Found Not Guilty Of Assaulting A Suspected Terrorist

Filed under: Iraq,Legal News — Tags: , , , , , , — Matt @ 1:38 AM

   This is awesome news and I wanted to get this out there.  Bravo to Matthew McCabe and his team mates for fighting the good legal fight, and winning! –Matt

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Navy SEAL Found Not Guilty of Assaulting a Suspected Terrorist

Military jury found a Navy SEAL not guilty on charges of punching a suspected Iraqi terrorist.

May 06, 2010

Matthew McCabe

A Virginia military jury found a Navy SEAL not guilty Thursday on all charges he punched an Iraqi suspected in the 2004 killings of four U.S. contractors in Fallujah.

“I’m really happy right now,” Matthew McCabe, the Navy SEAL, told Fox News shortly after hearing the outcome of the court martial. “It’s an amazing feeling. I’m on cloud nine right now.”

McCabe, a special operations petty officer second class, called the proceedings “troubling at times,” adding “having your career on the line is not an easy thing to handle.

McCabe was the third and final Navy SEAL to be prosecuted in the case. He had faced charges of assault, making a false official statement and dereliction of performance of duty for willfully failing to safeguard a detainee. McCabe was accused of punching last year is Ahmed Hashim Abed, the suspected mastermind of the grisly killings six years ago.

After the court martial, the 24-year-old from Perrysburg, Ohio, thanked the public for its continued support.

“It’s been great everything they’ve done,” he told Fox News. “But, don’t worry about it anymore. We are putting this all behind us. It’s done and over with. I’m going to try not to think about this ever again.”

(more…)

Maritime Security: Seychelles To Establish Regional Court To Prosecute Pirates

Filed under: Legal News,Maritime Security — Matt @ 1:28 AM

This is great news and I hope they can establish a few other places to prosecute these guys. We must square away the legal process for dealing with pirates, and end this stupid ‘catch and release’ game we keep playing. I also think that we should put these pirates to work once they are convicted.

I am sure there are quite a few boats in these navies that are doing the job out there that need their hulls cleaned, and a bunch of former pirates scraping barnacles off of those ships all day long, year after year, would be a great use for that prisoner resource. Do something with them, because they definitely need to pay back society for taking the path that they have taken. Plus, these navies wouldn’t probably mind hanging out in the Seychelles for a bit (and diving…), while their boat gets worked on. –Matt

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Seychelles to Establish Regional Court to Prosecute Pirates

Michael Onyiego

06 May 2010

In an effort to combat piracy off of the East African coast, the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime and the government of the Seychelles have announced the establishment of a regional center to prosecute suspected pirates on the tiny island nation.The establishment of the center will allow the European Union Naval Force Somalia, which patrols the Gulf of Aden, to transfer captured pirates to the Seychelles for prosecution. This is the second such institution of its kind, the first residing in Kenya. In addition to U.N. support, the new center will receive funding from the European Union, Australia, Canada and Germany aimed at strengthening the nation’s jurisdictional and procedural capacity to prosecute pirates arrested in the region.The European Union Naval Force Somalia and the Vienna-based U.N. Office of Drugs and Crime already operates a counter-piracy program based in the Seychelles which will train and assist the nation’s coast guard, police and prison officials to properly receive and detain suspects.Piracy has become a large problem for the small nation over the past year. Increased international patrols in piracy hot spots around East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula have forced pirates to operate farther afield. In March, Somali pirates hijacked a ship near Indian waters, more than 1,600 kilometers off the Somali coast, and pirates now regularly prey on shipping lanes near the Seychelles.The Seychelles began prosecuting piracy in March, when 11 pirates were arrested off its coast with assistance of the European Union. A further 11 pirates were transferred to Seychelles authorities after being captured by the French Navy near Somalia the same week.The country has amended its criminal code to allow its courts to prosecute suspected pirates under universal jurisdiction, and many hope the new institution will ease the burden currently placed on Kenya.But a Horn of Africa analyst for London-based think tank Chatham House, Roger Middleton, says the nation’s capacity is too small to solve the problem.”It is so tiny. It has got two courtrooms in the whole country and something incredible like 100 capacity in all of its prisons. It is really tiny, so it is only going to be able to deal with a very small amount of the pirates that are captured,” said Middleton. “There is a huge shortfall and western countries still do not want to take pirates home to deal with them, so they are going to have to find somebody else or other way of get them prosecuted. There are a lot of pirates out there, and no enormous amount of space to send them.”Pirates captured in the region are supposed to be prosecuted in Kenya. The government has separately agreed with the US, EU, Britain, Canada, Denmark and China to accept Somali pirates but in March the country refused to take any more, arguing that the burden should be equally shared among the international community.

Jobs: Project Manager/Site Manager/PSS/DM-WPS, OCONUS

Filed under: Jobs — Tags: , , , , , , , — Matt @ 1:20 AM

   I am not the POC or recruiter and please use the email provided below in order to submit your resume. Now if this is another ‘notional opportunity’ thing, who knows, but it doesn’t hurt to get in the ring and submit anyways.  I noticed that Wakenhut was advertising as well for WPS guys. (I am sure all of the big companies are in on the bid) So we will see.

   A couple of things about this.  First, I mentioned yesterday that the requirements for security is pretty high right now in Afghanistan, and this drive to up the numbers of WPS folks is a part of that process.  The worldwide requirements for securing government employees out there is tremendous. So the WPS program will need some folks, and it will be interesting to watch that evolve and grow.  Although the one thing I continue to hear from contractors on this program, is that the rules and policies can get pretty ridiculous, and it is filled with typical government bureaucracy. But work is work.

   The other thing I wanted to mention, is that EODT has a great company website.  What makes it so cool is the RSS it has for company news.  Now if they could do the same for jobs, and if all the companies could set up RSS for their jobs and news, well then all of us would be happy.  I might have to do a post on this. –Matt

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Project Manager/Site Manager/PSS/DM

EOD Technology, Inc. (EODT), a global provider of professional support services to a broad range of Federal markets, is presently seeking qualified candidates for the Worldwide Protective Services (WPS) Program. This Department of State program will satisfy anticipated and unanticipated personal protective, static guard, and emergency response team security service requirements worldwide.

Some general requirements and information for these positions are:

• Projected start dates commence in the Summer/Fall of 2010

• 12 month contracts with various rotation schedules

• Must be at least 21 years of age

• Must have valid, current driver’s license and passport

• In the case of military service, all military discharges must have been under honorable conditions

• No impediments to traveling overseas to and within countries that are considered dangerous or unhealthy

• Must pass detailed medical evaluation and physical fitness test

• Must be able to qualify and remain current in weapons normally carried by law enforcement officers, e.g., semi-automatic pistol, rifles, sub-machine guns, and shotguns

• Must be able to obtain and maintain a Personnel Security Clearance and/or Public Trust Certification

Some of the positions we are seeking are:

Project Manager

·         Must have a Bachelor’s degree by an accredited institution

·         Fifteen (15) years of experience

·         Ten (10) years of the fifteen years must have been working on or overseeing personal protective, static guard and emergency response team assignments

·         At least three (3) of the ten years must have been in a management or in-charge capacity

·         The remaining five (5) years of experience shall be generalized experience

Complex/Site Manager

·         Ten (10) years of military service as an Officer or Senior NCO, or similar police/local guard force supervisory experience

·         Experience and/or service shall include physical security, access control and force protection, and must be similar in complexity and scope to the specific requirements of the Task Order

Protective Security Specialist (PSS)

·         Three (3) years of experience

·         One (1) year of the three, shall include experience in protective security assignments

PSS/Designated Defensive Marksman

·         Three (3) years experience as a military sniper or police sharpshooter

·         Completed or served at least three (3) years in military, law enforcement, or executive commercial protection

(more…)

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Publications: GAO Report On Afghanistan Security Environment

Filed under: Afghanistan,Publications — Tags: , , , , , , — Matt @ 8:45 AM

   Let me summarize this thing for you, because this is the message I got.  We sent all of these government folks over to Afghanistan, but we don’t have enough military escorts to take them around the country to implement their projects.  In other words, there is a high demand for security. Where is the surge of security contractors needed to get this stuff done?

   They also talk about an increase in attacks and casualties, but that is largely contributed to the idea that there are more targets for the Taliban to go after and we are now in the fighting season (spring, summer).

   Now for my suggestion. If you want security and there are not enough military folks to do the job, then contract it out. Obviously security forces are at a premium there, and soldiers are kind of busy taking the fight to the enemy.  If you want to get more security in that country in order to cover down on all of these projects, and do it quickly, then contract it out.  I know security contractors are not the most favored choice of government these days, but honestly, they don’t have much choice in the matter if they want to do what they gotta do in Afghanistan.  It’s either that, or just send all of these government employees back home because they are waste of space.

   I would also recommend using expats, as opposed to using corrupt local security companies.  Or combine expat companies with local security companies for security operations.  Where there is a will, there is a way. Hell, you could contract out the security of an entire town if you wanted, and contractors could actually be a huge contributor to the ‘hold’ and ‘build’ portion of the COIN strategy.  Leave the ‘clear’ portion of the strategy to the military, and assign what you can to the ‘hold’ forces.

   One last thing, and I hate to beat a dead horse.  There are plenty of reports, lessons learned, SOPs, experienced contractors, expert input, blah blah blah out there to get this done properly.(man is it tiring to continue to read about how poor government is at learning anything. pfffft)  Either way, there should be no excuses for mismanagement of this ‘surge of security contractors’ into Afghanistan that I am talking about. Or we can continue to read about these people who are sitting around and doing nothing because of a lack of security for their operation. –Matt

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GAO Report On Afghanistan Security Environment

May 5, 2010

(one portion of the report below, follow link to read the rest)

Agencies Cite Security Challenges to Stabilization Efforts in Afghanistan 

   State’s January 2010 Afghanistan and Pakistan Regional Stabilization Strategy cites reconstruction and development as key elements of the overall effort to stabilize Afghanistan and reduce the strength of the insurgency. However, the strategy acknowledges that the success of such civilian programs in Afghanistan is contingent on improved security. In November 2009, we reported that while U.S. and international development projects in Afghanistan had made some progress, deteriorating security complicated such efforts to stabilize and rebuild the country.

(more…)

Paracargo: New Uses For UAV’s–The K-MAX Dropping LCLA Or JPADS Paracargo

Filed under: Aviation,Paracargo,PMC 2.0 — Tags: , , , , , , , , , — Matt @ 3:12 AM

     This is cool.  To be able to drop paracargo like this, would be a very interesting capability, and especially dropping JPADS.  The K-MAX is such a work horse as well, and can totally handle high elevations a lot better than others in it’s class.  So for unmanned cargo missions, this might be the helicopter/UAV we will see more of in the near future.

     Some other interesting uses for this helicopter, would be SPIE operations or moving around people with a long line. Although that would probably be for only special incidents where survival would depend on having a means of getting out of a spot quickly (medevacs, attacks, etc.), and manned helicopters are not available.  Weaponizing it would be cool too, and to have a dual use helicopter UAV for anything that pops up would be a nice little tool to have in the battlefield tool kit for a commander.

     Having a robotic cargo hauler like this, will probably inspire many innovative uses for the thing as troops utilize it on the battlefield.  Especially if they could harden up this bird a little to give it some more combat survivability. Kind of like the A 10 Warthog of UAV helicopters.  Interesting stuff. –Matt

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K-Max Drops ‘Em in Cargo Demo

by Graham Warwick

5/5/2010

No sign yet of an RFP from the US Navy for umanned cargo resupply of Marine Corps units in Afghanistan, but team-mates Lockheed Martin and Kaman continue to develop the capability of their unmanned version of the K-Max external-lift helicopter. In late April, they demonstrated the ability to airdrop supplies, which would improve the helicopter’s survivability in combat zones.

The 11 drop tests from 300-400ft altitude used the US Army’s LCLA low-cost low-altitude parachute, a one-time-use aerodynamic decelerator that costs just $375 and can be used with loads up to 600lb, the team says. Loads were dropped from the K-Max’s four-hook carousel. Kaman says future tests could include the JPADS precision airdrop system, a GPS-guided steerable parachute that would allow loads to be dropped from higher altitudes and take advantage of the K-Max’s ability to lift 4,300lb to 15,000ft.

The airdrop tests were conducted with a safety pilot on board, but the K-Max operated unmanned during a cargo resupply demonstration for the Marine Corps earlier this year. Boeing’s A160T Hummingbird unmanned helicopter participated. Both teams are now waiting for an RFP from the Navy. Inside Defense, meanwhile, is reporting the Army is pushing for an unmanned cargo demonstration.

Story here.

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