Blackwater caused many Marine casualties

Hammerin' Hank's Committee on Oversight and Government Reform faults Blackwater for the Fallujah ambush that left four mercs as hangin' crispy critters and ultimately caused the deaths and woundings of many Marines in the first and second battles of Fallujah in '04.

The details of the events leading to the incident are disturbing, revealing an unprepared and disorderly organization operating in a hostile environment. Mistake apparently compounded mistake. [...]

And from Left I on the News:

Blackwater USA triggered a major battle in the Iraq war in 2004 by sending an unprepared team of guards into an insurgent stronghold, a move that led to their horrific deaths and a violent response by U.S. forces, says a congressional investigation released Thursday.

Not only are these un-oversighted mercs trigger-happy and not accountable for their actions, they're also incompetent. I believe in the magic of superior firepower as much as any Marine, but planning is basic and necessary to try to minimize casualties.

Recently I read No True Glory by Bing West, that detailed the two battles for Fallujah that were precipitated by the dumb-ass mercs. I highly recommend this book. The Marines had just about cleaned the city out when they were called off by Baghdad and Washington for political reasons, which let the insurgents re-arm and solidify so that the Jarheads had to go back in a few months later and do it all over again.

I don't give a shit if the mercs get their asses in a crack and get them blown off. They know the score and they get a lot of money to do what they do. They're making a pile by making a failed policy fail even more. Fuck them.

What I do give a shit about is that regular ol' underpaid actual soldiers and Marines had to go in and get their asses blown away in response to the stupid mercs' actions.

Why didn't big brave Blackwater go into Fallujah and avenge their own? Because they might get shot back at instead of just blowing away unarmed people?

It's a lot more complicated than that, but the mercs pretty much asked to get blown away, and they did. The Marine offensive was a political response from on high, sort of telling the insurgents, "You can't do that to the employees of big Repuglicant contributors without repercussions. We got real fighting men who'll see to that!"