Here is an Est. on US Civilian/Contractor casualties in Iraq

[E-Nice]

I was always curious to these numbers due to the way the administration pimped this war out to contractors (@ 80k+ annually) to make manpower and logistics demands of the conflict seem lesser.

Civilian Contractors Face Perils in Iraq
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/11/26/cbsnews_investigates/main2209058.shtml

Thousands of American civilians are deployed in Iraq — a shadow army that provides logistical support to the troops, but one that puts their lives on the line as well. Most of them seek the mission for patriotism and high pay — often double what they earn at home. But the opportunity is fraught with risk, and many contractors complain they fight a new battle when they come home for medical help and compensation for their war wounds.

As of mid-November — more than 3½ years after Operation Iraqi Freedom began — 7,987 civilians employed by U.S. companies have been injured on the job in Iraq, and 679 have been killed, according to the latest Labor Department statistics.

Retired Army Sgt. Sam Walker is one of the many civilian contractors who suffered injuries due to an insurgent attack and has struggled to get help since coming home. His problems began a few days before Christmas 2004.

Walker had sat down with friends for lunch in a military dining tent in Mosul. As he popped a french fry in his mouth, a suicide bomber was only steps away.

"The next thing you know, there is a bright explosion coming — a bright light coming toward me," Walker says. "I am picked up and thrown over the table at that time, from the explosion."

The blast burned the side of his head, and shrapnel wounded his elbow and knee. Copper wire from the bomb's detonator stuck to his clothes, as did human flesh. Twenty-two people were dead.

One of the victims wore a wedding band. "His arm was laying on a stretcher, but his hand was hanging off," Walker says. "I could see blood running down his finger from his wedding band."

In his nightmares, Walker relives the horrible experience over and over. Bad memories are triggered by odors like the smell of french fries and sights as common as that wedding band.

Walker was in the Mosul mess tent on Dec. 21, 2004, because immediately after leaving the army, he had gone to work for Kellogg Brown and Root, known as KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton, the main private company hired by the Pentagon to help rebuild Iraq and support the troops. Walker earned a six-figure salary for running a recreational facility for soldiers.

After the bombing, Walker went home to Georgia. He couldn't work, developed a short temper and became socially withdrawn. Walker says KBR just forgot about him.

"They didn't call and say, 'Hey, how ya' doin'? Is everything OK?' Didn't hear anything from them," he says.

Walker's health care needs fell to KBR's insurance carrier, AIG Worldwide. Medical records show AIG's doctor and Walker's diagnosed him as suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.

"I had heard people in the military, in the old days, people called it 'shell shock.' Person was shell-shocked, you know, hey, you think they’re crazy. Now I’m shell-shocked," Walker says.

Yet AIG denied his claims, challenging "the nature and extent of the disability," according to documents. The company contests about 30% of all Iraq claims.

Unable to keep a job and with his debts mounting, Walker contacted an attorney to help him get reimbursed for counseling and physical therapy for his back and leg injuries.

Houston-based attorney Gary Pitts represents soldiers afflicted with Gulf War Syndrome from the first U.S. invasion of Iraq and more than 150 civilian contractors hurt in this war. Pitts eventually filed a complaint with the Labor Department. hoping for an order forcing AIG to pay Walker's medical bills.

The Labor Department administers a federal law called the Defense Base Act that requires all U.S. employers to insure all workers sent to work on government contracts in hazardous areas like Iraq and Afghanistan. When costly injuries occur as a result of hostile action — bullets and bombs, as opposed to accidents — a second law, called the War Hazards Act, allows the employer's insurer to be reimbursed by the government.

To date, insurance companies such as AIG have received $3.2 million in reimbursements for medical and workers compensation claims paid to 114 civilian contractors injured in Iraq, according to the Labor Department. Another 15 reimbursement requests are pending.

KBR, with its fleet of drivers, has suffered more casualties in Iraq than any other company. It has seen more than 50 employees killed and 420 wounded by insurgent attacks or improvised explosive devices, known as IEDs.

In 2004, Kansas truck driver David Meredith, the son of an Army colonel, saw Operation Iraqi Freedom as a chance to serve his country — and his income. He stood to make $80,000 a year, and like all American civilian contractors, it would be tax-free if he stayed in Iraq at least 330 days. Meredith signed up for a year with KBR and wasn't naïve about the risks. By the summer of 2005, he had become the driver who would typically bring up the rear of a convoy.

"If one of my drivers was injured or his truck broke down for any reason, I was to get that driver out of that truck and get him out of there," Meredith says. "I was their last hope or chance. I took my job very seriously."

On Aug. 12, 2005, Meredith, nicknamed "Scout," saw chaos on the road from Fallujah to Ramadi. An IED blew up next to a truck in his convoy. Then the convoy leader's voice crackled on the radio.

"Scout, I don't care what you have to do, you get up there and get that man out of his truck," Meredith recalls hearing. He proceeded to the damaged truck.

"His windshield was blown out, laying in the middle of the street. His passenger door was blown open, and I knew at the very least the man was hurt," Meredith says. "I climbed up the side of the passenger side of the truck ready to pull him out. There was nothing left. There was nothing left of him — nothing at all."

Meredith was so stunned he didn't realize he was being shot at. Soldiers escorting the convoy yelled at him to take cover behind their tank. After a 45-minute firefight, Meredith led the convoy out of the kill zone. Back at the base, he broke down in tears.

"I had days where I contemplated suicide," Meredith says.

When he came home at the end of 2005, truck driving was fraught with flashbacks.

"I was seeing the IED blasts going off in front of me, the mushroom clouds," Meredith says.

Meredith was irritable and depressed. His wife called KBR's headquarters in Houston, and the company offered to find him a local doctor, who later diagnosed him as having PTSD.

Meredith says an adjuster for AIG, KBR’s insurer, pressed him about why he had waited five months to file a claim.

"From insomnia to depressed feelings and thoughts; I figured it was a phase. I would get over it on my own. I didn't need help. I didn't think I needed help," Meredith says.

Documents reveal AIG rejected his claims because of "late reporting" and lack of "medical evidence." To make matters worse, the antidepressant his doctor prescribed makes Meredith too drowsy to drive a truck.

"I hope someday that I won't have to take medication. Truck driving is all I have ever known," Meredith says. "I feel like KBR has pretty much disposed of me. I did my year. I met my one-year requirement to them. They don't need me anymore. There is someone else that'll take my place and do my job. You know what you were getting into when you went over there. Deal with it. That’s how they have made me feel."

KBR says all recruits are informed about the medical benefits and dangers of the job. "During the training process, we spend most of our time giving recruits all the reasons they should not accept this job," spokeswoman Melissa Norcross says.

AIG, which covers about 80% of civilian contractors working in Iraq, would not discuss the cases of Walker and Meredith.

"It is our policy not to discuss the specifics of individual claims with the media," said AIG spokesman Chris Winans. "Some claims can be more contentious than others, and post-traumatic stress disorder is often not as immediately obvious as, say, a physical injury."

Winans also rejected the notion that rejecting claims was profitable. "An insurance company that looks for ways to deny claims as a way to fatten the bottom line will be looking at a very small business," he said.

In the end, Winans said, AIG pays benefits on 90% of the Iraq claims "when appropriate documentation is received" — the same rate paid out on domestic claims. Nevertheless, plaintiffs attorneys like Pitts argue, the insurer drags its feet on certain claims that should be paid right away.

Nineteen months after the Mosul bombing, Pitts won Walker's claim at an administrative hearing, when a judge awarded Walker the maximum disability payment of $1,067 a week dating back to the attack, plus "reasonable and necessary" care for the rest of his life. Pitts is now handling Meredith's case.

"It’s about seeing help, getting help, in order to stop your mind from trying to revert back to where you been," Walker says. "If I can do that, they can keep the money."

[KING SIZE]

contractors more than anyone.. know the risks of being there. and they chose to be there primarily for cash, i don't think you can choose to kick the gift horse in the mouth just because it bucks sometimes when you chose to ride it in the first place. troops on the other hand have to go/be where they're told.

[Dionysos]

Originally Posted by boobie f baby

contractors more than anyone.. know the risks of being there. and they chose to be there primarily for cash, i don't think you can choose to kick the gift horse in the mouth just because it bucks sometimes when you chose to ride it in the first place. troops on the other hand have to go/be where they're told.

The troops volunteered and signed on the dotted line too, they're just there for less cash.

[Nyteshade]

That number is surprisingly low.

[KING SIZE]

Originally Posted by Nyteshade

That number is surprisingly low.

i woulda guessed higher too.. since they're even more of a target than regular troops.

[E-Nice]

Your tax dollar is paying truck driving Rednecks w/ GEDs the same as a Colonel w/ 25+ yrs of service.

[KING SIZE]

Originally Posted by E-Nice

Your tax dollar is paying truck driving Rednecks w/ GEDs the same as a Colonel w/ 25+ yrs of service.

and i'm highly fucking against that and i think it's disgusting. actually more than that i think it's shameful that our troops have to roll around protecting contractors who are getting paid ridiculous amounts of money to do jobs that should be for the military.

[zcwilly]

$80K a year is hardly a ridiculous amount of money when your life is at stake. Yes, it may seem like the military pays them alot, but in reality they are saving money by outsourcing the extra work for a limited amount of time. The alternative is the gov't buys all of these trucks, tractors, bobcats, and other equipment and then what do they do with them when the war is over? Upkeep, fuel, shipping them back, etc. it would cost a fortune.

It's like if you own a Christmas tree farm and only ship your product 1 month out of the year, it makes more sense to outsource the work to other trucking companies then to buy 25 trucks, trailers, hire drivers, get insurance, the list goes on..

That is in theory, anyway. I have heard the allegations that alot of this money was mishandled and unnaccounted for, but that's a whole 'nother thread.

[E-Nice]

Originally Posted by zcwilly

$80K a year is hardly a ridiculous amount of money when your life is at stake. Yes, it may seem like the military pays them alot, but in reality they are saving money by outsourcing the extra work for a limited amount of time. The alternative is the gov't buys all of these trucks, tractors, bobcats, and other equipment and then what do they do with them when the war is over? Upkeep, fuel, shipping them back, etc. it would cost a fortune.

The DOD's various transportation and engineering Corps have very large aging fleets of the vehicles you mentioned,

Wouldn't it be prudent to use them in this conflict? They could be driven until they break down and then replaced with new modern vehicles. These old vehicle fleets desparately need to replaced as early as possible in this new century of modern warfare.

Why bulletproof a semi trailer that will be eventually be used by civilians in the US???

[zcwilly]

Originally Posted by E-Nice

The DOD's various transportation and engineering Corps have very large aging fleets of the vehicles you mentioned,

Wouldn't it be prudent to use them in this conflict? They could be driven until they break down and then replaced with new modern vehicles. These old vehicle fleets desparately need to replaced as early as possible in this new century of modern warfare.

Why bulletproof a semi trailer that will be eventually be used by civilians in the US???

It just doesn't make sense to put our soldiers in "aging" vehicles, argueably putting their lives even further at risk, not to mention we would have to pay a fortune to ship the equipment there and maybe back. What you said about the Corps having large aging fleets proves my point even further that we don't need to expand that large aging fleet with unnecessary purchases. Yes, of course we still own and purchase a lot of trucks and equipment, but this war temporarily demands more than just the normal usage beyond our capacity so why not outsource that extra work to someone who has their own equipment? They worry about shipping, they worry about hiring and training, they worry about bulletproofing, they worry about insurance and pensions, they take care of pretty much everything while our government gets more time to worry about winning the war.

[PETA]

Originally Posted by E-Nice

Your tax dollar is paying truck driving Rednecks w/ GEDs the same as a Colonel w/ 25+ yrs of service.

So we underpay our servicemen and officers? We should pay them more.
Since when have these been a disputed notions?

[randyc]

Hi,

I read this thread and just had to interject.

My name is Randy and I spent almost 2 years in Iraq as a civilian contractor.

Some people understand the benefit of people like me serving the country. Others do not.

For the "outrageous" money I was paid, I brought to the table 12 years of solid network engineering/administration experience. I was a subject matter expert on the design and implementation of MANY networks in Iraq. To a Spec4 or a Lance Corporal, I was just an overpaid contractor. The thing is, though, those Spec4's and LCpls worked under my supervision and training. I'm a 33 year old man with loads of experience. They were all young men and women who had VERY LITTLE experience with real world IT systems. My job was to make it happen and sometimes drag them kicking and screaming along the way. The Commandant of the Marine Corps understood this and thanked me heartily the times I met him. When he toured the comms facility, it was ME that showed him around and explained the what and why of the installation. It wasn't the Chief Warrant officers, it wasn't the Colonel. Me.

I love our service members. They do a great job. They deserve every bit of support we can give.

The thing is, though, people that build a really high level of technical skill bail from the service post haste. They have no choice but to bring in SME's.

Where the savings really does come in to play is before and after the conflict. The government spent 0 dollars training me to be what I am. I brought that to the table. After the conflict, I get NO disability or compensation. I had to pay workman's comp insurance. During my time there, I was hospitalized twice. I was exposed to many of the same residual contaminants that the rest of the soldiers and marines were. The difference? If I come down with lymphoma, DU poisoning, Gulf War Syndrome, PTSD, etc etc, I'm phuqued. No VA. Get ready, because there are going to be 10's of thousands of young men and women falling ill within a few years. The evironment there is horrendous and you are exposed to alot of nasty stuff. If I was killed there, my family would recieve no life insurance because no insurance company I could find was willing to write a policy for somebody going to the most dangerous place on Earth.

Am I complaining? No. I struggled for a long time about what goes on there. The American tax payer is being bilked. I'm proud, though, at the end of the day. I met some incredible people and did some incredible things. My intentions were not to harm the Iraqis. Quite a few of them became good friends. I'm finally letting that guilt go.

Are there companies profiteering and lining their pockets with your tax money? Y E S. $45 for a plate of food at the D-Fac. Pallettes of money disappearing from warehouses. Millions of dollars spent on construction projects that don't exist. That stuff is all real and I've seen it with my own eyes. Don't blame the individual contractor. They're just doing a job. Look at the leadership of this country and their corporate task masters. They brought you this.

I've believed from day 1 that the service members need and deserve more compensation. Either through hard money or through soft benefits like FREE tuition to state schools. They need MORE assistance with their families left behind. I got pretty tired of seeing public service announcements on AFN about how military wives can obtain food stamps.

So, to sum up my rant: Yes the contractors do get paid a bunch. Yes it's worth it.

[zcwilly]

Thank you for putting your life on the line to serve our country, much respect.. you earned every penny!

[Nyteshade]

Coming from a sevice member's point of view now. We respected and understood that the contractors that bring technical skills not found in the military get paid better. That's no big deal to us since anyone who has a semi-technical MOS knows they are worth the money. What we didn't like were contractors who are holding the same job as service members (i.e. truck drivers, food preparation, etc.) getting paid 4x the amount. Why does a truck driver pull $85,000/yr while a LCpl in MT gets about $20k? Why are there mercenaries that make almost $250k to do the EXACT SAME JOB as a grunt?

[zcwilly]

Originally Posted by Nyteshade

Coming from a sevice member's point of view now. We respected and understood that the contractors that bring technical skills not found in the military get paid better. That's no big deal to us since anyone who has a semi-technical MOS knows they are worth the money. What we didn't like were contractors who are holding the same job as service members (i.e. truck drivers, food preparation, etc.) getting paid 4x the amount. Why does a truck driver pull $85,000/yr while a LCpl in MT gets about $20k? Why are there mercenaries that make almost $250k to do the EXACT SAME JOB as a grunt?

Let me say first, I respect your service to our country more than I can express in words. Military personnell should be paid more considering what is at stake. I am neither a contractor nor a service member, but I do work in the trucking business. So here is my thinking on that aspect:

If you look beyond what the driver is getting paid, and look at the bigger picture taking into consideration all of the costs versus benefits, you would find that it does make sense to outsource some of this work and it actually saves money in the long run. As you know, the military does utilize it's own equipment and drivers, but there is more work than they could handle without buying and hiring more. Why would they buy a bunch of new trucks and train new drivers when we might be out of there in 6 months to a year?

Think of these contractors as "temporary workers", like if you ran a gift basket business which was only busy 2 months out of the year and a special machine is required to do the shrink wrap.. would you rather buy your own machine and hire someone all year round for $6 per hour, provide them with health insurance, a pension, and tuition help, or would it make more sense to hire a temporary worker who has their own wrapping machine for a flat $12 per hour for two months?