The US should discontinue its use of private military contractors

My opponent never argues against having a military, period. We need a military for our collective defense, to combat terrorism, and to project power and maintain stability throughout the world, extending our soft power. If I prove that contractors are no worse than our own military (and are in fact better), then I should win that we should not discontinue their use. C1) Force multiplier For decades now, our government has been outsourcing various jobs within the military to private contractors, so that our troops can focus on their mission. According to David Kilcullen, a senior advisor to General Petraeus, currently only 40% of troops deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan perform combat duties; the rest are tasked to base support. [1] Kilcullen continues that because they are on a 2:1 rotation schedule, at any given time, only one third of the combat forces can be deployed on missions. The rest are resting and re-equipping. So currently, at any given time, only 20% of troops deployed abroad can be put in the field. Without the force multiplier effect of contractors, that ratio would be even smaller. According to the Congressional Research Service, 55% of PMC's are tasked with base support, 8% are interpreters and translators, 3.9% do logistics and maintenance, 2.3% do construction, 1.9% do transportation, 1.1% do communication, and 1.0% do training. [2] Getting rid of PMC's would rob our troops of their chefs, laundry workers, translators, and handymen. The vast majority of what PMC's do is not related to combat. C2) Oversight has improved significantly The same Congressional Research Service report continues, "According to officials at the Department of Defense, the Blackwater shooting incident that took place at Nisoor Square on September 16, 2007, was a watershed event that highlighted the need for improved management and oversight of all U.S. government private security contractors . . . According to these officials, DOD initiated a number of steps to improve contractor oversight, including establishing an Armed Contractor Oversight Division and significantly increasing the number of Defense Contracting Management Agency personnel performing contractor oversight . . . Since the institution of measures to manage [private security contractors] better, the Department of Defense reports that incidences where weapons were fired by [private security contractors] have decreased by about 67%." [3] C3) The Draft The CRS report continues, "Without private contractors, the U.S. military would not have sufficient capabilities to carry out an operation of the scale of Iraq . . . without contractor support to the U.S. military, policy makers would probably need to contemplate increasing the number of U.S. troops, perhaps . . . re-instituting the draft." The US would need so many more troops if we did not use contractors that Congress would need to re-institute the draft whenever we engaged in any sort of military operation abroad. C4) Cost According to the General Accountability Office, contractors are $15,000 cheaper per person than hiring a military equivalent. [4] And the Congressional Budget Office, studying a 20-year period, found that contractors are 90% cheaper at supplying logistical support. [5] Wars would be significantly more expensive if we did not employ contractors. C5) PMC's are essential to humanitarian assistance operations After the Black Hawk Down incident in Mogadishu, the US developed "Somalia Syndrome," which is the name that scholars give to the American reluctance to deploy our troops abroad to stop genocides. Somalia Syndrome forced Clinton to impotently watch the Rwanda genocide unfold. James Pattison writes in "Outsourcing the Responsibility to Protect" that PMC's allow political leaders to overcome Somalia Syndrome and intervene to stop genocide. According to the Yale Journal of International Affairs, the US was able to hire MPRI to train Croatian forces in 1994; the training of Croatian forces allowed a successful counter-attack against Serbia, finally bringing them to the bargaining table. [6] The US would not have been able to deploy our own forces on the ground and without training, the Serbs would have slaughtered the Croatians in their struggle for independence. According to Rouba Al-Fattal in "The Privatization of Peace," PMC's acted as a "force equalizer" in Bosnia, preventing one side from gaining a force advantage and thus bringing both sides to the negotiating table. [7] Blackwater has expressed a keen interest in acting as the United States rapid reaction force to genocide and other humanitarian disasters around the world. [8] C6) Security Guards Someone needs to guard our diplomats and other State Department officials as they stay in Iraq and Afghanistan and help them build up their civil society. In Iraq, with the US withdrawal, the State Department is relying completely on 7,000 private contractors to protect them. [9] Say what you will about Blackwater, but not a single person has died while being guarded by this PMC. [10] The CRS points out that contractors are superior for protection because most contractors are locals, who blend in and speak the language, so they are less likely to arouse attention. [11] C7) Air support According to think tank Senlis Afghanistan, having fewer boots on the ground will lead to an over-reliance on air support, which empirically kills far more civilians and turns people against us. [14] ==Rebuttal== R1) Undermine US credibility 1. The new Armed Contractor Oversight Division has decreased "firing incidents" by 67% meaning because of new DOD oversight post-2007, contractors only use their weapons for clear and legitimate purposes, obeying the rules of engagement. 2. Our own military doesn't always have clear rules of engagement. One Iraq war vet describes the US rules of engagement during the Bush presidency as "We Were Told to Just Shoot People, and the Officers Would Take Care of Us." [12] 3. Turn, there is more oversight over PMC's than our own military. There are multiple oversight branches, and the DOD and Congress can always refuse to renew contractors for PMC's that misbehave, creating huge incentives to crack down on employees. This is way more oversight than for our own military, which was able to cover up its murder of two Reuters journalists, until Wikileaks exposed the incident. Rape My opponent provides 4 examples of rape. When you send a bunch of young men overseas, unfortunately, some percentage of them will be rapists. The Pentagon estimates that 15,000 women WITHIN our military are raped or sexually assaulted each year. [13] If you include our military raping natives, the number becomes much larger. Rape is a systematic problem within our own military; 4 incidents is small in comparison. In addition, contractors who do not deal with rape allegations will not be rehired, whereas our own military has shown no accountability for the rape epidemic in its ranks. Kill Civilians Oversight has improved dramatically since the Blackwater incident my opponent cites. Our military is no better: "4 soldiers gang raped a 14-year-old girl in the town of Mahmoudiya, Iraq." [15] "Photographs taken by a Marine intelligence team have convinced investigators that a Marine unit killed up to 24 unarmed Iraqis, some of them ``execution style," in the insurgent stronghold of Haditha." [16] Given the difficulty of presenting a case and refuting at the same time, I will offer the rest of my rebuttal in the next round. [1] The Accidental Guerilla, page 270 [2] http://tinyurl.com... [3] Ibid [4] http://tinyurl.com... [5] http://tinyurl.com... [6] http://tinyurl.com... [7] http://tinyurl.com... [8] http://tinyurl.com... [9] http://tinyurl.com... [10] http://tinyurl.com... [11] Ibid [12] http://tinyurl.com... [13] http://tinyurl.com... [14] "Stumbling into Chaos: Afghanistan on the Brink", November 2007