Well? Does any of this bring legal action or criminal prosecution against the Energy Transfer Partners?
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Looks like a white-chinned doofy tiger with its tongue out.
Makes sense when you consider that there are cops out there who act as if they’re themselves mercenaries.
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emphasis mine. are they going to be investigated for the legality of their tactics? is anyone going to hold them accountable for operating in states where they weren’t licensed?
the story - to me - is not that security firms are hired by companies to protect what the company feels is their property. that’s to be expected.
the line gets crossed when there’s a two way information flow between them and public law enforcement, and when they are operating in ways that private citizens would be arrested for.
the intercept didn’t clearly address the legality of it all. though it sounded like they plan to do more investigation and reporting still.
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This is their website’s logo:
Mercenaries? No, Terrorists, and well paid terrorists at that on US soil.
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Even if it was a DJI Phantom, there are problems. The protestors, if they were careful, were flying under the recreational/hobby rules. The mercenaries were flying under the commercial rules, which requires a stack of paper larger than the drone. Did they file it for each flight?
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So, the Intercept had two big scoops recently. This one, and The Malta Files. One wonders if there is a certain kind of leaker that goes first to WikiLeaks, and another that goes first to The Intercept.
I’m only being slightly sarcastic here. Is there really a pattern, or am I imagining things? I’m also being slightly lazy and asking others to check up on this.
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If it is accurate that the firm was conducting activities that it was not licensed to do, They should face appropriate prosecution. I had a look through the ND PISB code, and there are several exemptions that might apply.
But the big rule when performing security work internationally or on any sort of large scale is to absolutely know and obey the applicable laws. When you see little violations, like not having current permits and licenses, that is a sign that big violations are probably waiting to be discovered.
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No. You are little people and little people don’t get to do that. And the worst part is there is nobody you can vote for who’ll do a damn thing about it. Trump could have lost and nothing would have changed here.
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A good question, and I have no doubt that there are a great many ex-soldiers who will fall on the side of the people. But do we really think it is time to start bringing private armies to our political actions? Sooner or later that leads to public armies getting involved.
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Well, if you have the kind of money it takes to buy a primate army/pay for extended mercenary services, it’s probably more cost effective to directly buy the relevant politicians and police forces. I mean, why bother paying for a third party when the other two are also on the market?
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My comment was more tongue in cheek, and this question is one the companies who did hire mercenaries should think about. If they keep militarizing problems like this, sooner or later they will get response in kind. The only winners in that case will be the mercenary companies.
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You nailed it. Remember it took a lot of blood for the first unions to be formed. There may be blood again.
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Mercenary deployment means military operations under the radar. Mercenaries are hired to do work regular military forces cannot do, e.g. because the mission objectives are against the law or because deployment of regular forces is not possible. I was told by a Serbian mercenary, on a night train in Egypt, that the US employed his company to locate and kill Uday and to locate Saddam in Tikrit.
In this case it’s likely these mercenaries had off the record permission for their operation from the state government which of course means highest-level collusion between Energy Transfer Partners and the state. Obviously law enforcement present was also cooperating with the mercenaries. It all makes ‘sense’ too. This was covert warfare/terrorism against the population on behalf of the oil companies. They regularly do this overseas too, e.g. in oil-rich African countries. And paramilitary law enforcement comprised of ex-soldiers cooperating with people they actually sympathize with is no huge surprise either.
If true, it’s all cynical in the extreme.
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The headlines continue to make it difficult for me to not repeatedly refer to John Shirley’s Eclipse series. Private militia that has been taken over by the Nazi-fascist forces that support a certain side of the US political system, leading to a major European war w/ Russia, maybe a decade or two into the 21st Century, is exactly what it was about. And it’s exceptionally frightening.
Edit: Released in 1985, mind you.
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OK, here’s the problem.
Everyone looks at the blue/red maps and chunks “Flyover” territory into the Red bin, and the coasts into the blue bin.
But, if you look closer… there were few places where the mix was lower than 40% of either party. There is not a big red swath devoid of blue people. Nor vice versus. Just areas with slightly more of one or the other.
Take Ohio. Three large metro areas as blue as any on the coast. Big swaths of red with few people. But even then, the state is close to 50/50, and is up for grabs.
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I went ahead and read all the leaked documents. I suggest everyone contemplating a modern protest against a well funded target should read them.They will give you an idea of the sorts of surveillance you can expect in such a situation. They are going to photograph and identify you, and look at your internet footprint. They will observe the tactics your people use, and try to identify the leaders , and listen in to any radio communications… They will put a lot of effort to see if you have weapons and of what type. They will attend and record any public meetings, and the private ones that they can get into.
In this case, they did list among their priorities pulling resources from groups that were there only for legal protest, so that they could focus on those likely to commit violent or illegal acts.
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THIS. And this is worth remembering every day. There are many people in “red states” who can’t stand the GOP agenda. And many people in “blue states” who are totally aligned with the GOP. Which is on one hand hopeful, and on another, makes for a very tough scenario to unwind and hopefully improve.
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