Civilian Warriors: The Inside Story of Blackwater and the Unsung Heroes of theWar on Terror (42 page)

While a student at Hillsdale College, I became a rescue diver, an emergency medical technician, and, in 1989, joined the local fire department.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

Joan, my father, and I celebrated my commission upon graduation from Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island, in 1992.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

When we began building Blackwater it didn’t take many walks—like this stroll in 1997 with my daughter—through the muddy bog of the Great Dismal Swamp for the name of our future training center to become self-evident.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

For Al Clark (left) and me, as well as the other original members of the Blackwater team, scoping out the property in Moyock, North Carolina, often meant tangling with the local wildlife. Rattlesnakes like this were everywhere.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

I admired Ken Viera’s intensity from the moment I met him. He quickly made the transition from first-rate Special Operator to first-rate businessman and is shown here (left) escorting a leader of the FBI Hostage Response team during their first training event at Blackwater in 1998.

COURTESY OF KEN VIERA

Gary Jackson came to work for Blackwater in 1998 and quickly rose to the rank of company president. In 2006,
Fast Company
named him one of the fifty business leaders “writing the history of the next 10 years.”

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

On the edge of the Great Dismal Swamp, Blackwater Training Center sat on a seven-thousand-acre campus complete with an airstrip, dozens of shooting ranges, a tactical driving track, a mock school building, a manmade lake, fighting cities, briefing facilities, floating ship simulators, a 350-seat dining hall, and lodging for four hundred. It was built to accommodate one thousand operators per day.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

During the building of Blackwater bears left claw marks on our utility poles, providing the inspiration for our logo. The logo went through a few cosmetic upgrades over the years, but the original elements—a bear paw inside of a crosshair—remained.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

Part of the Blackwater Baghdad State Department personal security team, whose mission it was to protect diplomats, dignitaries, and reconstruction officials.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

Prior to the beginning of Blackwater’s involvement in the War on Terror, Joan was fighting her own personal war against cancer. Here she is seen visiting the Holy Father John Paul II in May 2001, asking for his prayers while showing off her kids she loved so much.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

For our first security contract Blackwater’s men safeguarded Ambassador L. Paul Bremer III until the handover of power to the Iraqis in June 2004.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

Blackwater’s nimble four-man helicopters flew countless missions over Baghdad and beyond, scouting transportation routes, protecting convoys, and rescuing soldiers and dignitaries. My men unloaded the first one under blackout conditions because of mortar and rocket activity from insurgents.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR