Did Security Contractors Kill Colonel Westhusing?
By Larry Johnson on November 25, 2007 at 8:17 PM in Current Affairs
His formal title was director, counter terrorism/special operations, Civilian Police Assistance Training Team, Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq. He liked working closely with his Iraqi counterparts and seemed to get along well with the contractors from Virginia-based U.S. Investigations Services, a private security company with contracts worth $79 million to help train Iraqi police units that were conducting special operations.
Although the article linked above and here strongly imply that Westhusing killed himself, I have it from a source with firsthand knowledge that some military officers who were on the ground with Westhusing believe he was murdered to keep him from blowing the whistle on the corruption he witnessed. I have confirmed that these individuals are willing to tell all they know to Congressman Henry Waxman’s committee. Stay tuned.
Article from March 2007
http://www.texasobserver.org/article.php?aid=2440
Torture Incorporated
Oliver North Joins the Party
by John Stanton and Wayne Madsen
www.dissidentvoice.org
June 14, 2004
The U.S. Army has employed as many as 27 contractors to run its interrogation operations, according to media reports. But while CACI and Titan are getting all the mainstream media play, it appears that far more than 27 contract employees were involved in recruiting and placing interrogators in various locations. Some of the firms involved in the Bush administration’s “TortureGate” include an odd assortment of telecommunications companies and executive placement firms that have jumped into the lucrative torture business in Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan, Iraq and at secret locations throughout Central Asia and North Africa.
Interrogators can earn up to $120,000 per year plying their trade and most are former military and law enforcement personnel. More ominously, these so-called “private military contractors” are nothing of the sort. They are paramilitary organizations that are funded by the US Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of State, and assorted other agencies through contract vehicles known as Basic Ordering Agreements or “BOAs” hidden throughout the vast US government bureaucracy. It now is well known that CACI got its money through a BOA with the Department of the Interior.
Ollie -- He’s Baaack!
On January 12, 2004, United Placements ran an advertisement for Army Interrogators.
“Job State: IRAQ, Job Number: 8. Interrogators: 30 Positions. Compensation to $120,000. Individuals must be trained Interrogators with at least five years of experience in interrogation. Individuals must be knowledgeable of Army/Joint interrogation procedures, data processing systems such as CHIMs and SIPRNET search engines. Knowledge of the Arabic language and culture a plus…Candidates must have documented in their resumes five years of Humint collection and/or interrogation experience. This is a requirement of the client. Some locations require individuals to work and live in a field environment with minimum medical facilities. Must possess the ability to work extended work hours in difficult surroundings for up to one year.”
United Placements’ lists none other than Oliver North -- a member of Ronald Reagan’s NSC and focal point of the Iran-Contra scandal in the 1980’s -- as one of its two “Industry Associates.” North is currently the host of Fox News Channel’s “War Stories.” United Placement’s second “Industry Associate” is Intelligencecareers.com run by former intelligence analyst Bill Goldman.
While TortureGate festers, it is noteworthy that as late as May 7, 2004 the same posting for interrogators was listed through Design Staffing LLC. Evidently, a new batch of interrogators is needed to replace those now under criminal investigation. “Job
Nr 85832--Conduct interrogations. Conduct pre-brief and debrief preparation which includes researching, compiling, and preparing supporting material; prepare all-source target overview/summaries to include cultural, religious, and sociological factors; and identify information required for immediate processing and dissemination including support to ongoing and planned operations and force protection. This listing opened 07-May-04 and is valid for 90 days.” The listing goes on to say that the openings will be available “until filled.” It was listed under the categories “Analyst (Intelligence) & Knowledge Specialists.
Another company, ZKD, Inc. ran advertisements for interrogators on February 4, 2004. “This listing opened 10-Feb-04 and is valid for 180 days. The company's closing date comments for this listing are: "Open Till Filled. Category: Military Arts, Operations and Science. Send resume to careers@zkdinc.com.” It seems interrogators are not only knowledge specialists but artists too.
Who Are Those Guys?
Just who are these people? It shouldn’t be a surprise that Oliver North is back in the war crimes business, but some of the organizations getting into the act seemingly don’t belong in the murky field of recruitment for the US military’s shadow paramilitary force. But, then again, some of these groups have some of the trademarks of CIA or other intelligence agency cut-out operations. Flush with seed money from existing government contracts, small and medium-sized government contractors and recruiting firms were able to launch major drives to draft language-capable interrogators from the ranks of America’s ex-military, law enforcement, and intelligence cadres and the immigrant community.
ZKD, Inc., located in Fairfax, Virginia, bills itself as a veteran-owned, minority owned and women owned firm that provides “Staffing Solutions, Security and Language Services.” It’s President and CEO is Zachary K. Duck. The May 2004 issue of Black Enterprise states that ZKD, “as a staffing agency, analyzes current labor market trends and matches qualified applicants with employment opportunities. After 9-11, the company doubled its efforts to provide security services to meet increased demand. ZKD also offers a comprehensive communications service.” ZKD has seen a meteoric rise in profits thanks mostly to the Pentagon and Transportation Security Administration. Black Enterprise states that ZKD was founded in 2001 with only two employees but now has more than 250 people with revenues totaling more than $ 10 million in 2003.
ZKD has a growing roster of clients, including the Transportation Security Administration and McNeil Technologies. In January of this year, ZKD was awarded a five-year, $ 53.7 million contract from the Department of Defense. The company now enjoys a solid
$34.5 million in contracts for 2004 with another $13 million in the contracting queue.
It is noteworthy that according to The Washington Post, CACI and McNeil Technologies are the recipients of Federal contracts to process Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for Federal agencies, including the Pentagon and Homeland Security and Justice Departments. In what could be a major conflict of interest, any FOIA request from the public or the media for information on Pentagon or intelligence agency contracts with CACI or ZKD on their interrogation/translation work abroad could be handled by employees of CACI, an interrogation contractor, or McNeil, a client of ZKD, another interrogation contractor.
Design Staffing, LLC is located in Boyds, Maryland has all the trademarks of an operation run by an ex-military or intelligence agency veteran. The language is classic military gangland style “Beyond [the] core categories, we also assist companies with those hard-to-fill positions that do not fit in the traditional molds. Our method, which we call the Design Staffing Approach, DSA, is critical to the success of our business ‑- and yours. The DSA model is an innovative systematic, seven-tier approach…”
A search of the U.S. Business Directory reveals Design Staffing, LLC is an “employment agency & opportunities firm” and has one employee, an unknown credit status, and a business address at 14024 Clopper Road, Boyds, Maryland. Its principal--listed by email as mpoage@designstaffing.com --is very particular about what he/she is looking for in an interrogator.
“For interrogators I look for experience conducting interrogations, conduct of personnel screenings of local nationals and conduct of tactical debriefings.” He/she goes on to imply that embellishment of experience may not be a bad idea to make the resume look stronger to the customer.
If North is There, the Carlyle Group Can’t be Far Behind
Then there’s CalNet, a Vienna, Virginia-based company that says it provides “Agile Solutions for the New Customer Economy.” It is run by President and CEO Kaleem Shah. The U.S. Business Directory provides the following sketchy information on CalNet: its description is “Computer-Systems Designers and Consultants,” and it has four employees. A CalNet Ltd., also listed as a “computer related” company and located in West Yorkshire, England, was dissolved on March 20, 2001.
According to its website, “Since 1989, CalNet has used its business and technology consultancy to help many of the largest telecom, financial, public sector, high-tech and services organizations remain agile by obtaining explicit business results through the rapid application and delivery of advanced information and telecom solutions.” That may be so, but CalNet posted the same interrogators-wanted ad that United Placements ran in January of 2004. Interested parties are encouraged to apply for a position with the Iraq Survey Group. “…please send resume to bcoleman@CALNET.com. Reference job number DISG2.”
USIS, or U.S. Investigations Services, bills itself as “one of the largest Intelligence and Security Services companies in North America.” Hoover’s Company Capsules has a very unusual descriptive background for the firm. “Formally a US government agency, USIS was spun off as a private company in 1996.” A recent job fair it hosted in Falls Church, Virginia, sought “Interrogators, Strategic Debriefers and Protection
Specialists for Overseas Assignments.”
One of the USIS investors is the omnipresent Carlyle Group, a multibillion-dollar venture capital firm with close ties to George H. W. Bush, former British Prime Minister John Major, and former Secretary of State James Baker, and past ties to the Saudi Bin Laden Companies, which has its tentacles into many of the Bush administration’s major foreign adventures. USIS also owns a subsidiary, Total Information Services, Inc., of Tulsa, Oklahoma, which ironically is similar to the name of the defunct Pentagon program to glean personal information from databases on U.S. and foreign citizens. That program, called the Total Information Awareness (TIA) system was headed by Iran-contra felon retired Admiral John Poindexter before he resigned. TIA, according to media reports, is alive and well in the offices of DARPA in Northern Virginia.
Since the US Congress, the Pentagon, the White House and US Department of Justice seem determined to sweep the entire TortureGate disaster under the rug before the November 2004 elections, the only check on their power appears to be the financial markets. As was recently reported by the Washington Post, directors of one of CACI’s pension funds, the California Public Employees' Retirement System, or Calpers, planned to meet with CACI in early July “…to discuss concerns about [CACI] management controls, training and legal procedures at the Arlington-based government contractor… What the management of this company owes [shareholders] is a full explanation of exactly what has occurred, exactly who was responsible and a full accounting of what will be done to reform its practices."
Maybe if the money talks, Bush--and the Gordon Gecko’s of the defense contracting world--will walk.
John Stanton is a Virginia-based writer specializing in national security and political matters. He is the author of the forthcoming book, A Power, But Not Super. Reach John at cioran123@yahoo.com. Wayne Madsen is a Washington, DC-based investigative journalist and columnist. His forthcoming book is titled: Jaded Tasks: Big Oil, Black Ops, and Brass Plates. Reach Wayne at wmadsen777@aol.com. Stanton and Madsen authored America’s Nightmare: The Presidency of George Bush II released in May 2003.
WAR IN IRAQ
Officer's death leaves questions
Suicide finding troubles family of colonel who was working on a corruption case
Los Angeles Times
WASHINGTON - One hot, dusty day last June, Col. Ted Westhusing was found dead in a trailer at a military base near the Baghdad, Iraq, airport, a single gunshot wound to the head.
The Army concluded that he committed suicide with his service pistol. At the time, he was the highest-ranking officer to die in Iraq.
The Army closed its case. But the questions continue.
Westhusing, 44, was no ordinary officer. He was one of the Army's leading scholars of military ethics, a professor at West Point who volunteered to serve in Iraq to teach his students better. He had a doctorate in philosophy; his dissertation was an extended meditation on the meaning of honor.
So it was only natural that Westhusing acted when he learned of possible corruption by U.S. contractors in Iraq. A few weeks before he died, Westhusing received an anonymous complaint that a private security company he oversaw had cheated the U.S. government and committed human rights violations. Westhusing confronted the contractor and reported the concerns to superiors, who launched an investigation.
In e-mail to his family, Westhusing seemed especially upset by one conclusion he had reached: that traditional military values such as duty, honor and country had been replaced by profit motives in Iraq, where the U.S. has come to rely heavily on contractors for jobs once done by the military.
His death stunned all who knew him. Colleagues and commanders wondered whether they had missed signs of depression.
His friends and family struggle with the idea that Westhusing could have killed himself. He was a loving father and husband and a devout Catholic. He was an extraordinary intellect, having mastered ancient Greek and Italian. He had less than a month before his return home.
On the Internet and in conversations with one another, Westhusing's family and friends have questioned the military investigation.
A note found in his trailer seemed to offer clues. Written in what the Army determined was his handwriting, the colonel appeared to be struggling with a final question: How is honor possible in a war like the one in Iraq?
In the top tier
Westhusing graduated third in his West Point class in 1983 and became an infantry platoon leader. He received special forces training, served in Italy, South Korea and Honduras, and eventually became division operations officer for the 82nd Airborne, based at Fort Bragg, N.C.He loved commanding soldiers. But he remained drawn to intellectual pursuits.
In 2000, Westhusing enrolled in Emory University's doctoral philosophy program. He returned to teach philosophy and English with a guaranteed lifetime assignment. He settled into life on campus with his wife, Michelle, and their three young children.
But amid the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, he told friends he felt experience in Iraq would help him in teaching cadets. In fall 2004, he volunteered for duty.
In January, Westhusing began work on what the Pentagon considered the most important mission in Iraq: training Iraqi forces to take over security duties from U.S. troops.
Westhusing's task was to oversee a private security company, Virginia-based USIS, which had contracts worth $79 million to train an elite corps of Iraqi police to conduct special operations.
In May, Westhusing received an anonymous four-page letter that contained detailed allegations of wrongdoing by USIS.
The writer accused USIS of deliberately shorting the government on the number of trainers to increase profit margins. More serious, the writer detailed two incidents in which USIS contractors allegedly had witnessed or participated in the killing of Iraqis.
Westhusing reported the allegations to his superiors but told one of them, Gen. Joseph Fil, that he believed USIS was complying with the terms of its contract.
U.S. officials investigated and found "no contractual violations," an Army spokesman said.
But several U.S. officials said inquiries into USIS were ongoing. One U.S. military official, who, like others, requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case, said the inquiries had turned up problems.
The letter shook Westhusing, who felt personally implicated by accusations that he was too friendly with USIS management, according to an e-mail in the report.
"This is a mess ... dunno what I will do with this," he wrote to his family May 18.
The colonel began to speak to colleagues about "his dislike of the contractors," who, he believed, "were paid too much money by the government," according to one captain.
Others began worrying
By June, some of Westhusing's colleagues had begun to worry about his health. His family was becoming worried. He described feeling alone and abandoned. He sent home brief, cryptic e-mail, including one that said, "(I) didn't think I'd make it last night." He talked of resigning his command.His wife recalled a phone conversation two weeks before his death that chilled her.
"I heard something in his voice," she told investigators, according to a transcript of the interview. "In Ted's voice, there was fear. He did not like the nighttime and being alone."
On June 4, Westhusing left his office in the Green Zone of Baghdad to view a demonstration of Iraqi police preparedness at Camp Dublin, the USIS headquarters at the airport.
At a meeting the next morning to discuss construction delays, he seemed agitated. He stewed over demands for tighter vetting of police candidates, worried it would slow the mission. He seemed upset over funding shortfalls.
Uncharacteristically, he lashed out at contractors in attendance, according to an Army Corps official. "He was sick of money-grubbing contractors," the official recounted. Westhusing said that "he had not come over to Iraq for this."
The meeting broke up shortly before lunch. About 1 p.m., a USIS manager went looking for Westhusing because he was scheduled for a ride back to the Green Zone. After getting no answer, the manager returned about 15 minutes later. Another USIS employee saw through a window Westhusing on the floor in a pool of blood.
The manager rushed into the trailer and tried to revive Westhusing. The manager told investigators that he picked up the pistol at Westhusing's feet and tossed it on the bed.
"I knew people would show up," that manager said to explain why he handled the gun. "With 30 years from military and law enforcement training, I did not want the weapon to get bumped and go off."
The official ruling
After a three-month inquiry, investigators ruled Westhusing's death a suicide. A test showed gunpowder residue on his hands. A casing bore markings indicating it had been fired from his service revolver.Then there was the note on Westhusing's bed. The handwriting matched his.
The first part of the four-page letter lashes out at Gen. David Petraeus, commanding officer of the Iraqi training mission, and Fil. Both men later told investigators that they had not criticized Westhusing or heard negative comments from him. An Army review undertaken after Westhusing's death was complimentary of the command climate under the two men, a military official said.
Most of the letter is a wrenching account of a struggle for honor in a strange land.
"I cannot support a msn (mission) that leads to corruption, human rights abuse and liars. I am sullied," it says. "I came to serve honorably and feel dishonored.
"Death before being dishonored any more."
Under so much pressure
A psychologist reviewed Westhusing's e-mail and interviewed colleagues. She said that Westhusing had placed too much pressure on himself to succeed and that he was unusually rigid in his thinking. Westhusing struggled with the idea that monetary values could outweigh moral ones in war.Westhusing's family and friends are troubled that he died at Camp Dublin, where he was without a bodyguard, surrounded by the same contractors he suspected of wrongdoing. They wonder why the manager who discovered Westhusing's body and picked up his weapon was not himself tested for gunpowder residue.
Mostly, they wonder how Col. Ted Westhusing — father, husband, son and expert in doing right — could have found himself in a place so dark that he saw no light.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/3487227.html
FOIA Documents Regarding The Death of Col. Ted Westhusing
Amid the myriad tragedies and heartache caused by the Second Iraq War, the death of Col. Westhusing is among the saddest and most senseless. I have been asked by a number of people who knew Col. Westhusing for some of the documents that I obtained from the Defense Department via the Freedom of Information Act over the course of my year-long inquiry into his suicide. Rather than distribute paper copies, it makes sense to make them available in electronic form. Herewith, a batch of the key documents, in PDF:
1. Anonymous letter sent to Col. Westhusing in May 2005 regarding alleged misconduct by contractors working for the U.S. military in Iraq.
2. June 17, 2005 interview of Westhusing's widow, Michelle, by Army investigators.
3. Sworn statements from people who knew Col. Westhusing.
4. Bulk of the report done by the Army's Inspector General.
5. Bulk of the report done Army Criminal Investigation Command.
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