re: "Personal Army"

Lex at Neptunus Lex ("The unbearable lightness of Lex.") seems troubled at the size of this contract.

Money quote(s):

"DoS reveals its plan to secure their personnel in Iraq after the troops come home"

&

"The size of the US mission in Iraq was forecast to be roughly 3000 souls, or 1.5 contract support personnel per DoS employee. The sums spent on contract support are nearly double the entire amount spent by State in Iraq in 2010, and represents nearly 18% of the entire FY10 budget. 5,100 contractors is roughly the size of a reinforced brigade."

Three thousand "souls" is a huge-ass country mission. Many of these folks will be from tenant agencies, some will be contract hires brought aboard solely to work in Iraq, and there'll probably be at least that many more (more like two times as many) in locally engaged staff (LES) employees.

Still and all, if it seems like it's going to take a major and costly effort to support our diplomatic/civilian mission in Iraq, that's because it is a major and costly effort. Except, until now, that fact has been masked considerably by the fact that State has been able to "piggy back" on the U.S. military establishment in Iraq.

The U.S. military deployment, and its support infrastructure, are going away. Real. Soon. Now. The diplomatic deployment (i.e., embassy, consulates, regional offices, and PRTs) aren't going away. (At least not yet.) And the need for support services of all types, that simply aren't to be had "on the economy" in Iraq, persists nonetheless.