With Blackwater founder and former CEO Erik Prince making the rounds in the US advocating the idea of “privatizing” the US war in Afghanistan, Afghan government officials are quickly issuing a flurry of statements ruling out such an idea.
The Prince plan is to replace the current US troops with military contractors, and he has argued that they could continue the 17-year-long war much more cheaply than has the Pentagon. There has been substantial resistance to the idea.
Afghanistan’s National Security Council not only ruled out the idea, but said they would consider such a move a violation of Afghan sovereignty. They added that they would use all legal avenues open to them to prevent a privatization of the war.
Centcom commander Gen. Joseph Votel also seemed to put the idea to rest in his own comments, saying of the plan simply that it “isn’t happening” despite how many meetings Prince has been having with officials.
