66 Companies Contact Blackwater as US Navy Says Private Sector Must Fight Pirates

At least 66 shipping and merchant companies have contacted Blackwater for help in protecting vessels from Islamist pirates off the coast of Somalia.

The US Navy says it's overburdened, and that private companies must ensure their own security. "The coalition does not have enough resources to provide 24-hour protection for the vast number of merchant vessels in the region," says the US Fifth Fleet Commander, Vice Admiral Bill Gortney. "The shipping companies must take measures to defend their vessels and their crews."

Blackwater spokesman Anne Tyrell says that the company will offer seaborne and helicopter escort services but will not place private security guards aboard the tankers, freighters, and other ships. The firm's 180-foot helicopter carrier, McArthur (pictured), is reported to be in the area.

"Shipowners are irked by the suggestion they should be protecting themselves," the Toronto Globe and Mail reports. '[What] we are talking about is the fundamental obligation of nations to provide safe passage for world trade,' said Peter Hinchliffe, marine director for the London-based International Chamber of Shipping."

US Navy Encourages Private Security Companies to Protect Ships from Piracy

The United States Navy has praised the rise of private security companies to protect private shipping from pirates as a "great trend."

Media commentators have been generally skeptical of Blackwater's dispatch of its 183-foot ship, the McArthur, to the Gulf of Aden to provide security for private ships that the United Nations and the world's navies are leaving vulnerable to Islamist criminal gangs.

However, a US Navy spokesman has praised the move and encourages more private security companies to follow Blackwater's example. British security companies are already active in protecting ships, but Blackwater plans to provide McArthur, which can carry two special operations helicopters complete with doorgunners, to escort civilian ships that the UN and government navies can't or won't protect.

"This is a great trend," a spokesman for the US Navy's 5th Fleet tells the Associated Press. "We would encourage shipping companies to take proactive measures to help ensure their own safety."

Insurance companies also like the idea. "Pirate attacks have driven up insurance premiums tenfold for ships plying the Gulf of Aden, increasing the cost of cargos that include a fifth of the world's oil. But some insurers will slash charges by up to 40 percent if boats hire their own security," according to AP.

A senior official of Somalia, off whose coast much of the piracy is taking place, says private security companies are welcome in Somali waters. Somalia's 1,800-mile coastline is difficult to avoid for ships traversing the Suez Canal.

Blackwater Wants Strict Accountability Standards in California

Blackwater supports proposed legislation to standardize accountability for firearms training in California, where it has opened up a new facility for the Navy.

The company announced support for a proposed bill that, in its words, "would serve to hold all responsible firearms training facilities to a common standard, allow training of responsible citizens, and, hopefully, reduce firearms capabilities of dangerous criminals."

"Blackwater endorses AB2498 and urges it be passed.

"Blackwater, which recently opened a facility in San Diego County, has long supported a strict credential policy, requiring every student it trains to provide documented proof of their suitability for training and eligibility to possess firearms. The company is committed to safe training on the use and handling of firearms, but is equally committed to ensuring that those firearms are in the hands of capable and confident citizens, not prohibited felons."

(Photo: Interior of new Blackwater training range in San Diego County.)

Harassment: San Diego Wants Navy Ship Simulator to be Wheelchair Accessible

Among the scores of items the city of San Diego is throwing in the path of a US Navy training facility: A demand that a ship simulator be made wheelchair accessible.

No ship in the US Navy is wheelchair accessible, and no naval ship simulator is, either. But San Diego is insisting that the training site, run on contract by Blackwater Worldwide, be accessible by wheelchair. That means that the ship simulator's gangways, hatches, ladders, and decks be unrealistically modified so that people in wheelchairs can use them - even though wheelchair-bound people are not allowed to serve in the Navy.

Brian Bonfiglio of Blackwater, who is running the San Diego operation for the Navy, says that city officials are trying to block a federal judge's ruling that the training facility proceed. He adds, "They have admitted that they realize that you don't have Navy personnel on wheelchairs on Navy vessels."

Law Upheld in San Deigo

Federal District Court Judge Marilyn Huff ruled yesterday that the Blackwater facility in San Diego may continue to operate with the permits it currently has, the AP reports. What this means is that local political forces cannot make up new permit requirements just because its election season and they want to score points with certain voters. Finally, Blackwater can get on with the work of training US Navy personnel to defend their ships from terrorists.

Blackwater Seeks Rule of Law Over Local Political Biases

Though District Judge Marilyn Huff's decision to issue a temporary restraining order against the City of San Diego - seen as a landmark case for the rule of law - has allowed Blackwater Worldwide to begin training US Navy personnel to better defend their ships, the order was only temporary. Now Blackwater is making the full case that the operating permits should be made permanent, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports.

“In a legal document filed Friday, the company states: 'At the simplest level, Blackwater seeks the protection of the federal court system to avoid parochialism and local political bias.' Blackwater maintains its position that it was entitled to open the training center with its existing permits; that its civil rights to due process are being violated; and that failure to open on time would jeopardize its contract with the Navy.”

Put simply, Blackwater wants the rights granted to any other business in San Diego, which would in turn allow it to honor its US Navy contract and help keep American sailors safe. The company wants to stop local politics from subverting the rule of law. Is that too much to ask?

Blackwater Gets Go-Ahead for Navy Facility

Federal District Judge Marilyn Huff has ordered the City of San Diego to issue Blackwater Worldwide the permits to open its new training facility, the Associated Press reports. Blackwater sued after the city refused to issue the permits, in spite of the fact that the conditions had been met.

Huff found that other firing range operators in the city had not been required to undergo similar reviews.

Classes for Navy sailors will begin Thursday, according to Brian Bonfiglio, a Blackwater executive overseeing the project. They were originally set to begin at the center Monday but were suspended pending the judge's ruling.

The facility will be used strictly to train US Navy personnel in small arms, a growing concern to the Navy since the bombing of the USS Cole, diagrammed below.(Click the image to see a larger version)

Judge to Decide Permit on Tuesday

US District Court Judge Marilyn L. Huff said she will decide until Tuesday whether to order officials of the City of San Diego to issue a permit that would allow Blackwater Worldwide to open a training center for the Navy, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

But in questions and comments to lawyers Huff indicated she was inclined to grant the company's request for a temporary restraining order, which would allow them to begin operations.

"Questions came hard and fast from U.S. District Court Judge Marilyn Huff as the city laid out its claim that Blackwater misled officials about the nature of the facility, which includes indoor firing ranges and a multi-level mock ship bulkhead built out of cargo containers: Did Blackwater fail or skip any required inspections? (It did not.) Why hadn't other firing ranges undergone the same degree of scrutiny the city proposes for Blackwater? Did the city object to Blackwater itself?" the Union-Tribune writes in another article.

Moreover, the Union-Tribune points out that Huff's ruling will come on election day, depriving any city council candidates - either incumbents or challengers - of political fodder.

City of San Diego Obstructs Navy Contract

Blackwater has asked a federal judge to help it meet the terms of US Navy contract by removing obstacles placed by the City of San Diego. The private security contractor's deal with the Navy requires them to open a training facility by June 2, but city officials have politicized the process and gone back on their word regarding permits. So now Blackwater is petitioning the federal judiciary to order the city to issue the due certification.

In a lawsuit filed Friday, the North Carolina-based company noted that city clerks and inspectors already had signed off on permits for turning the warehouse into classrooms and an indoor firing range when Mayor Jerry Sanders, City Attorney Michael Aguirre and other city officials voiced concerns. Blackwater said its training center was being scrutinized more intensely than similar facilities that previously won the city's approval. The company also said that politics was playing a role in the dispute, noting that both Sanders and Aguirre face re-election votes on June 3.... “We have met all of the permitting requirements, and withholding the certificate of occupancy is in violation of law,” said Michael Neil, a San Diego attorney who represents Blackwater in the suit.

A spokesman for Mayor Sanders said his office would not comment on the litigation.

The facility in question will be used to teach sailors will marksmanship, weapons assembly and disassembly, basic arrest and apprehension techniques and how to safely handle the latest weapons. Blackwater, which has never attempted to hide the nature of the facility or the company's role in training US Navy personnel, has already spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on renovating the facility.