Shadow Company

This is the first documentary that I've watched that was completely and 100% dedicated to discussing mercenaries. They were pretty even handed and fair to all sides, but there were still things I noticed that they dropped the ball on.

They initially go through a history of how these groups came to exist all the way to its current incarnation specifically with how the government is allowing "private military companies" to come into Iraq. They give an interesting look at the history and smartly don't dawdle on it to long because frankly as interesting as that is, I'd rather know more about whats happening today.

The psychology of the people who do this is interesting, they are willing to put their lives on the line for causes they don't necessarily care about for the sake of money. To me it seems they are destined to fail because an Iraqi will fight so much harder than they will since they have an actual stake in the outcome. The men though are trained and well manicured. They really know what they are doing, just like the military, some of them are actually ex-military. But, and they discuss this in the doc. there is a big disconnect between the two, in the military if your told to do something you do it because you have to, as a private contractor you don't have to do a mission if you don't want to.

They show some rather disturbing footage in this, specifically charred and mutilated bodies of mercenaries in Fallujah, Iraq. They are very grisly, so if you watch this be warned. Now the problem I have with there being mercenaries in Iraq is accountability. The mercenaries can't be charged with any laws they break in Iraq, and the military has no power over them. I'm set to believe that a lot of these men are good people, for the most part, but there are certainly people over there right now who are committing legal murder. Shooting women and children, and civilians as a whole.

The company spokesmen that they have interviewed in this as well as the Lobbyists were just making me laugh, they are trying to justify a business based solely on killing and blunt violent force. These men, and women are really snakes in the grass. As much as they say that they only hire the best and they are very careful just further emphasises my point. They hire the best to kill efficiently and they are careful because they want to stay in business. Iraq is the first American war that has used mercenaries like this and it really makes me sick. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the whole lot of them are responsible for this, of course they would find a way to make this war as profitable for private interests as they could.

Another thing they didn't hit on enough, or at all was that these mercenaries are also hired not only for these body guard missions but also for interrogation. Again though, they exist outside the law and the military. The military doesn't "torture" under their definition of it, but these private companies can do whatever they want. So they interrogate some of these detainees to the point that they kill them with their interrogation "tactics" Its sickening.

It was a very well done documentary, I only wish they had not sugar coated some of it as much as they did, or not bury some of the more upsetting facts of the situation over there. They don't idolize these men, but they also don't ask them the hard questions. 7/10 stars.

Directors: Nick Bicanic, Jason Bourque