On September 25, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held a press briefing at the United Nations and asserted that Mali has asked a Russian private military company to help the government in the fight against rebels.
The remarks revived the talk about the growing role of private security and military companies in conflict zones.
Although international law defines recruitment of mercenaries as a crime, the new mercenaries and contractors found a haven in entities so named ‘companies’ to engage in civil wars and conflicts. It was only natural that this phenomenon becomes more visible in the most fertile environment that supports its growth, i.e. the unstable security situation in fragile and failed states. But the role of these companies grew amid the United States’ war on terrorism, where the US expanded the use of private businesses to run its war in both Iraq and Afghanistan. The result was that private military and security companies evolved to play a transformative role in modern warfare. Additionally, wars, and civil wars in particular, turned into an arena for interactions between the markets of these companies.
Reasons for Expansion
A number of factors are behind the growing role of private military and security companies in conflict zones.
1. Structural weakness of national armies and security services:
Some developing countries failed to establish well-established security agencies or turned into corridors for smuggling, organized crime and hotspots for terrorism. The rise of terror groups such as Boko Haram in Nigeria, Harakat al-Shabaab al-Mujahideen in Somalia, ISIS in the Sahel Region and Central Africa, coupled with the recurrent spread of inter-ethnic tensions, has forced the governments of these countries to seek help from private security firms.
It should be noted here that Russian private security group Wagner is highly active in African conflict zones. In 2018, the mercenary company spread deep into the Central African Republic to secure gold and diamond extraction operations of Lobaye Invest, a Russian company, protect state institutions and train the country’s presidential guard and the army. Wagner deployed its contractors in North Mozambique in 2019 to secure oil and gas-rich areas and fight ISIS. The mercenary company is also active in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia and Mali. After Malian Prime Minister Choguel Kokalla Maiga, on September 25, 2021, accused France of abandoning his country by pulling its Barkhane force. Amid the increasing jihadist threat in this region, Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, stressed that Mali has approached Russian private security companies. According to recent reports, the Malian government is close to hiring some 1000 Wagner paramilitaries, a move that drew criticism from Europe and France in particular.
2. Highly lucrative tool for states and non-state actors:
The private military industry has a fast-growing international market offering significant profit opportunities. The biggest clients of the private security business are being multi-national companies, and especially those in the mining industry which became dissatisfied with reliance on the government security forces of host countries. Moreover, private military companies are working to secure their own economic interests. Russian companies Lobaye Invest and M-Invest, two sister companies belonging to the Wagner Group, gained a license to extract gold, diamond and uranium in the Central African Republic in 2017, and carried out operations for Russian mining company Miro Gold in Sudan in the same year.
It should be noted that western private military companies are legally listed on international stock markets.
3. Local companies prosper in conflict-hit countries:
In this context, some refer to the situation in Syria, where private security companies emerged to take over from militant groups that are loyal to the Syrian regime after they were disbanded under pressure by Russia in 2017. In Afghanistan too, the US Army and Western security companies used Afghan private security firms run by former warlords to provide security or logistic services.
4. Reflection of regional and international competition:
Military companies became one of the tools of dominance that some great powers utilize for interference in the internal affairs of other countries. Their presence represents an extension of competition for areas of influence.
In this context, Wagner is a tool used by Russia to bolster its expansion in Africa. Turkey too expanded the use of Sadat Inc, which has direct links to President Recep Tayyib Erdogan, to move mercenaries and support militia groups affiliated with the former Government of National Accord in the fight against the Libyan National Army. Ankara also used Sadat to move Libyan and Syrian mercenaries to take part in the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia in 2020.
5. Filling a shortage of jobs in high-risk environments:
Some private military and security companies provide highly-professional services that attract even the most professional armies. For example, after the invasion of Afghanistan, the US Army expanded the hiring of former Soviet pilots who participated in the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan war from 1979-1989 because of their extensive experience in flight paths and the complex geography of the country. In Haiti, the assassination of President Jovenel Moise in July 2021 exposed the extensive role Columbian mercenaries are playing in political conflicts in South America and other regions. Columbian contractors are hired for comparative advantages such as low contracting cost, extensive experience gained in long-running conflicts with rebels and drug and organized crime cartels.
6. Low political cost of hiring:
This is considered as a main cause of increasing demand on services provided by private security and mercenary companies. That is, involved governments can easily disavow any responsibility for the actions of these companies or avoid any political fallout they cause. For example, Russia used the Wagner group and the so-called ‘little green men’ against Ukraine during the conflict in the Crimea. It also managed to deny having any military presence on the ground in the country. The United States too attempted to play down the crimes committed by its army against civilians in Iraq by keeping the focus of the media on crimes committed by private contractors, mainly Blackwater, now known as Academi.
Serious Repercussions
The following stand out among the repercussions of the growing role of private military and security companies.
1. Human rights violations:
This aspect of the private security business became even more evident when violations committed by Blackwater against civilians in Iraq. Currently, Russia’s mercenary firm Wagner Group is being dogged by accusations of human rights abuses in the Central Africa Republic and other countries. These accusations include mass executions, arbitrary arrests, torture and forced displacement of civilians, the indiscriminate targeting of civilian facilities and humanitarian aid workers. The violations reflect persistent ethical risks of using private security contractors because it is hard to enforce legal accountability for these crimes.
2. Commodification and intensification of conflicts:
This means the transformation of a conflict into a commodity subjected to market logic. By flooding the market with mercenaries, their cost of services decreases prompting new clients to hire them to fight new private wars. In other words, private wars increasingly intensify because of their economic nature. In 2017, Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater, proposed that the Donald Trump Administration pull out American troops from Afghanistan and, to fill the gap, hire private security companies funded by mining operations and mineral resources to enforce security and end the Taliban insurgency. Prince’s proposal was dismissed on grounds of high political cost.
3. Loss of control and difficulties in monitoring contractors:
Because private military and security companies are independent entities, their behavior should be kept under control, a task that poses a challenge to local agents. For example, the Wagner Group maintained its own margin of independence and free movement that was exposed when its mercenaries, in February 2018, attacked a Conoco gas plant in Deir al-Zour in Syria, which was then under the control of Kurdish troops loyal to Washington. The US Army replied with a fierce attack killing an estimated 200 Russian mercenaries, much to the anger of Moscow. The incident highlighted the need for keeping the actions of such companies outside their countries under control.
4. Weakening the sovereignty and independence of states:
The use of private security companies exposes weaknesses in some states as well as detailed information about their security entities and state institutions. They become intelligence-gathering tools as they carry out the agendas of the states that run them. They even dictate their own terms and conditions on weak governments and impose military plans that serve their own goals, which undermines the sovereignty of the involved state which monopolizes the use of violence.
5. Draining the resources of states:
Very often, private security companies take hold of undeserved privileges, such as licenses for mining and oil production. Moreover, they spark competition between involved corporations scrambling for economic privileges and business deals.
Overall, the return of mercenaries in the form of private security companies reflects a profound shift in the nature of conflicts and the modern state, especially in developing countries. Certainly, this phenomenon has emerged, or rather made, to last. That is, it represents a revival of long standing mercenarism materializing into more destructive and violent forms. With the narrow interests of state and non-state actors being the only regulatory legal or ethical framework for these companies, conflicts are highly likely to intensify and get prolonged to enhance the interests of involved companies and political and economic elites.
