Civilian Warriors: The Inside Story of Blackwater and the Unsung Heroes of theWar on Terror (43 page)

Blackwater is most well known for our extensive work for the State Department in Iraq under multiple iterations of the Worldwide Personal Protective Services contract.

AHMAD AL-RUBAYE / AFP GETTY IMAGES

A Blackwater State Deptartment personal security detail protecting the ambassador on a community walk.

COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

LEFT:
Former Army Ranger Wes Batalona, forty-eight, led Blackwater Team November 1, which was ambushed in Fallujah in March 2004.
CENTER:
Scott Helvenston, a former Navy SEAL, was on Team November 1 when it was attacked in Fallujah. Our staff remembered him for his unflinching optimism.
RIGHT:
Ohio native Jerry Zovko, thirty-three, also a former Army Ranger, was one of four Blackwater contractors killed in Fallujah in March 2004.
NOT PICTURED:
Mike Teague, thirty-eight, a former pilot with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, who had signed up with Blackwater “to try to help more people,” according to a friend, and was also killed. Ironically, the greatest criticism Blackwater faced regarding the Fallujah tragedy was that we had not provided them with overwhelming firepower.

AP PHOTO

Nicknamed the Brooklyn Bridge by American troops, the old iron bridge across the Euphrates was the scene of a grisly attack against Blackwater’s men. Marines with the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment reopened the bridge in November 2004, and left this appropriate message.

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Once mocked as Ayatollah Atari for his love of video games, Muqtada al-Sadr, a radical Shiite, became a ferocious rebel leader and violent opponent of American efforts to stabilize Iraq.

AP PHOTO/ALAA AL-MARJANI

Blackwater contractors on the roof of the Coalition Provisional Authority building in Najaf, Iraq, defend their positions, April 4, 2004.

AP PHOTO/GERVASIO SANCHEZ, FILE

Blackwater contractors sprint for cover during a firefight with Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi army in Najaf, Iraq, April 4, 2004.

AP PHOTO/GERVASIO SANCHEZ

In September 2005, Blackwater contractors responding to the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina helped move eleven tons of supplies around the region, and rescued 121 stranded people.

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Our pilot Eric Humphries, one of the pilots who flew in the Blackwater rescue of special forces in Mali in 2006, checks out the lion providing unrequested airport security for this CASA 212.

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The former CIA station chief responsible for capturing The Jackal, Cofer Black came to work for Blackwater in 2005, expanding my company’s reach into corporate intelligence.

AP PHOTO/CHARLES DHARAPAK, FILE

A tragic shoot-out in the traffic circle in Eastern Baghdad known as Nisour Square turned the world upside down for Blackwater in September 2007. In contrast to complaints that we didn’t give our men enough firepower in Fallujah, we were accused of responding with too much force.

AP PHOTO/KHALID MOHAMMED