Modern Adventurers in War Zones; war correspondents and mercenaries

[Crakkerjakk]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Yes, but how does one get to a position where foreign recruiters know to get in contact with you for freelance mercenary work?

After all, if they approach the wrong person, they risk exposure. So how does someone become a safe person to approach and bring up the idea that he might like to fly abroad and take money for illegally fighting as a mercenary?

Professional networking from previous short term jobs?

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Yes, but how does one get to a position where foreign recruiters know to get in contact with you for freelance mercenary work?

After all, if they approach the wrong person, they risk exposure. So how does someone become a safe person to approach and bring up the idea that he might like to fly abroad and take money for illegally fighting as a mercenary?

Same as all other criminal contacts?

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Crakkerjakk

Professional networking from previous short term jobs?

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Same as all other criminal contacts?

I suppose.

My problem is that sociological graduate students and researchers have done plenty of quality studies on organised crime in America and some other countries. I am not, however, aware of any such quality resources for the sociological substrata involved with mercenary work.

When it comes to Mexican cartels, prison gangs, drug distribution networks and organised crime in the Western world, I have enough information so that I can introduce characters with backgrounds that feel consistent and plausible to me and my players.

I don't have that background of information with illegal mercenaries in the Middle East and I can't find any research that allows me to develop it.

All I can find is mostly concerned with US or other Western PMCs/PSCs and it mostly confirms that these companies are not in any sense what I am looking for. They are not mercenaries in the international law sense of the word and they are not going to provide the kind of services that any self-respecting evil mastermind needs.

I have some sort of vague idea that it would presumably be much safer and less likely to lead to jail sentences for everyone involved if Mexican cartel jefes, Russian mob bosses and Middle Eastern sheiks involved in less-than-legal businesses could arrange to have their personal gunmen registered as part of a Private Security Company and thereby certify their arsenal of weaponry as legitimate tools of bodyguards, as opposed to highly-illegal felonies that get their bodyguards jailed every time they run into a non-bribed law officer.

This would demand that there exist countries where the oversight of PSCs is either non-existant or very flexible depending on financial inducements, but in principle, I see nothing very unlikely in this. I do not, however, know which countries do register such phony PSCs or whether this sort of arrangment exists in the real world.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Icelander

I do not, however, know which countries do register such phony PSCs or whether this sort of arrangment exists in the real world.

If you pick a place that is corrupt enough, and have enough money, it can happen. The Global Corruption Barometer may help in making a selection: obviously being registered in a place that is famously corrupt will detract from your credibility, so it's a question of compromise.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Sword-dancer

Local Guys, Nepali with Nasty Knives for example or other third world Country, Cooks, Laundry...

I found a lot of information about TCNs working for PMCs and PSCs, mostly in service roles, but also as security professionals. What I did not find is information on less-respectable PMC/PSC that would do work for criminal organisations.

If an Afghan poppy grower wants to travel abroad, say to the UAE, for example, but still wants his personal security to be extensive, experienced and armed with fully-automatic weapons, can he hire anyone for that?

Are there real-world Private Security Companies that work for criminals and would be persuaded to turn a blind eye to their criminal activities?

Those are the kinds of companies my entirely-innocent-NPCs need to be recruiting their personal security from. And I'm wondering if they really exist or not.

Originally Posted by Sword-dancer

NGOs,

That's an interesting idea. What are the effects on NGOs when the United States Forces - Iraq leave?

What are NGOs mostly doing in Iraq?

Who oversees their work?

If one happened to be, for example, a front for antiquities thievery, smuggling and even less savoury things, who would find out and how?

Originally Posted by Sword-dancer

You will also find a few german Reporters,

What about Polish? Would there be any Polish-language news organisations buying articles from Iraq?

Or French? Aside from AFP, which news organisations are most likely to buy articles in French on Iraq?

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by johndallman

If you pick a place that is corrupt enough, and have enough money, it can happen. The Global Corruption Barometer may help in making a selection: obviously being registered in a place that is famously corrupt will detract from your credibility, so it's a question of compromise.

Alas, what percentage of people paid bribes has only a vague relation to the Corruption Rating in GURPS terms. The latter, combined with the place's CR, would be more indicative of what is achievable for a group of very motivated villains or heroes or greyhats.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Or French? Aside from AFP, which news organisations are most likely to buy articles in French on Iraq?

I thought French is reasonably common as a third or even second language in the near-Arabic world. That might indicate people can just happen to know Broken/Accented French.

[Sword-dancer]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Are there real-world Private Security Companies that work for criminals and would be persuaded to turn a blind eye to their criminal activities??

would somebody to surprised if Blackwater did it or members of the US Forces.

Wasn´t that that the case with drug smuggling in Nam?

That's an interesting idea. What are the effects on NGOs when the United States Forces - Iraq leave?

What are NGOs mostly doing in Iraq?

Who oversees their work?

http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I thought French is reasonably common as a third or even second language in the near-Arabic world. That might indicate people can just happen to know Broken/Accented French.

Just so.

On the other hand, I don't know French even at Broken, so I don't know the names of any news organisations other than AFP to drop as someone who has bought stories from a freelancer NPC.*

So I need to know what French newspapers, magazines and other publications would be likely to buy articles and publish them from a freelancer in Iraq. Who does their own foreign reporting these days?

Most news organisations just repost, translating if necessary, stuff that other media has already reported. This applies especially with foreign news. It's only the biggest and most image-conscious news outlets that would even consider the outlay that it involved with gathering their own news from foreign locations.

Which news organisations are these, in the French-speaking world?

I know Icelandic and English-speaking media well enough to be plausible when inventing stuff about them, but I don't know anything about French media.

*When the PCs have his background investigated, perhaps, because they are skeptical that he is just a journalist.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Sword-dancer

would somebody to surprised if Blackwater did it or members of the US Forces.

Wasn´t that that the case with drug smuggling in Nam?

There's no such thing as Blackwater at the time the game is set, in 2011. And Academi, the successor company, doesn't really have much of a presence in Iraq at that time, either.

The United States Forces - Iraq are leaving and the security for the State Department is mostly done by Triple Canopy.

And, yes, it would be a considerable surprise if serving members of the armed forces of any Western country contrived to be absent from their duties while on deployment in a war zone, for months, while they served as the private mercenaries of a criminal organisation.

Any high-profile PMC or PSC is also subject to far too much oversight for that to be plausible. If a shooting incident involving a couple of employees can cause an international incident, it's pretty clear that it's not possible for such companies to conceal the existence of a dozen or more employees who openly commit hundreds of crimes over a period of months, without it becoming the sort of scandal that leads to corporate ruin.

I did find an interesting publication SALW and Private Security Companies in South Eastern Europe: A Cause or Effect of Instability, which suggests that Bulgarian and Serbian PSC might be able to do that sort of thing on an international scale and that Albanian, Bosnian, Moldovan and companies from several other countries could do it inside their own borders.

I'll continue looking, see which other countries in the world have poor regulation over their PSC or PMC sector and where connections to organised crime might plausibly exist.

Originally Posted by Sword-dancer

http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/

Thank you. That's great.