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From the article: "Did you know, for example, that there was a time when being called a "war profiteer" was a bad thing? But now our war zones are dominated by private contractors and mercenaries who work for corporations. There are more private contractors in Iraq than American troops, and we pay them generous salaries to do jobs the troops used to do for themselves ­-- like laundry. War is not supposed to turn a profit, but our wars have become boondoggles for weapons manufacturers and connected civilian contractors."

I agree with a lot of the article. However, with respect to the military, I must say this. What did everyone think would happen when the word 'soldier' became synonymous with 'baby-killer?' Did they really think that people would continue to enlist? No. They probably didn't think about it at all. However, we need a military. The armed forces had to become competitive in order to attract people. No one was going to enlist and risk public ostracizing and being spit upon in order to do laundry, peel potatoes, and clean toilets. The budget cuts meant that the military had to become more reliant on technology which meant they needed more educated people to join. Who wants to get a degree and endure basic training to do laundry? No one. Those tasks had to be done, so, in order to save money, the military had to outsource the care and feeding of our military to private companies.

I had a class with a guy who was operations manager for a military base in Iraq. He worked for a mulitnational and was responsible for the approximately 550 people required to operate that base. He was also responsible for the purchasing necessary to keep it running. Outsourcing base operations relieves the military of the day to day details and costs required. We the taxpayers didn't pay those salaries, fringes, and bonuses directly, the MNE did. It's no different from any other company that chooses to outsource part of their operations in order to save money, time, and resources. 
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