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contractors make up the second-largest armed force there, after the US military. Although this "army" is mostly on the Pentagon's payroll for now, it doesn't fly any flag or belong to any state. It's a multiethnic, for-profit, postnational force, and its sole agenda is to mind the bottom line. It has no incentive to stand down as long as there's money to be made. It's not afraid of terrorists, and whatever passes for an Iraqi government in the future will likely live at its mercy

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.07/view.html?pg=4

If wars for oil are bad and terror is worse, this Coalition of the Billing is a logical blend: global free-marketing at gunpoint. It's above the law, beyond the law, and worst of all, irreplaceable and utterly necessary to power the planet's nations, cities, and homes. We've suffered terror without a country. Welcome to war without flags.