Slowly but surely we're getting more and more involved in Gaza...

Re: Slowly but surely we're getting more and more involved in Gaza...

It'll be fascinating to see if it's actually true. The three biggest American military contractors are DynCorp, Triple Canopy, and Academi - formerly Blackwater - and the last two are owned by the Constellis Group. I checked, and Constellis is a massive multiple blind, and it's gone through a whole bunch of ownership changes and financial restructurings over the years and has a whole bunch of private equity firms as its ownership board. The biggest player in that group seems to be Apollo Global Management, which is owned by institutional stockholders, and they're public..."APO" is listed on the NYSE. The biggest known shareholder there is Leon D. Black, who was once Apollo's CEO...until he stepped down in 2021 when it came out that he'd paid $158 million in fees to Jeffrey Epstein. (Cue the conspiracy theories here.) But even Black only owns 7.5% of Apollo and he's the largest shareholder.

So whatever, the ownership structure of Constellis is absolutely Byzantine. There's no one guy running anything, it's a whole bunch of private equity firms owned by various shells and shareholders, a number of which are apparently investment firms. Groups like that are distinctly not monoliths...generally speaking, those kind of entities are capable only of seeking profit since SEC fiduciary-responsibility laws to their shareholders are their only real guiding star. So if it's a Constellis outfit, it's all about money.

DynCorp is owned by Amentum, another company owned by private equity investors, the largest of which is Lindsay Goldberg. (The private equity firm, not an individual.) So it's pretty much the same and the motive is the same: profit.

What would be a non-conspiracy reason for him to pay $158 million to a

tabbyplague®

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Never dealt much with these military security contractors

May 8, 2024, 7:53 AM

but did run across a few of these "cowboys" in Iraq. All duded up in their Spec Ops "cool guy" gear strutting around like they were prom queens who didn't have to abide by any rules. They didn't exactly endear themselves to the average GI...

I've talked to a few of my friends who are genuine US military Special Operations warriors and their opinion of these contract cowboys is largely "ho hum". I was told a lot of these contract guys are "quitters" (their word - not mine) from the Spec Ops world who couldn't take the operational military grind and others who were outright scrubs/washout SpecOps wannabes that never made it out of training. They did say that a few of these contract guys were good dudes who retired from the military and were taking these jobs to make some really big paychecks for a limited time (enough to buy a house outright, pay for kids college etc...) before punching out of the workforce for good.

I just have an inherent distrust of all US military contract "security" organizations. It is a blood money job and anyone who I encounter in a combat zone taking that kind of civilian employment will always give me pause. As Q pointed out - their loyalty is to making money for themselves, their company and their shareholders - not Mom, apple pie or the USA.

I hadn't really heard of these private military contract company's prior to OIF but Rumsfeld just loved throwing millions of our Defense tax dollars at them. Eventually these guys were all over the place and the money Rumsfeld was putting into their coffers seemed endless. So much so that it seemed to generate a whole new military "security" company industry in the USA. Just another of the many reasons I despised Donald Rumsfeld...

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It is (or was) called Blackwater. I find it interesting the contractor is not

Re: Slowly but surely we're getting more and more involved in Gaza...

What would be a non-conspiracy reason for him to pay $158 million to a

These are the guys the CIA/Mossad/MI-6 call for off-the-books work...

Never dealt much with these military security contractors

It is (or was) called Blackwater. I find it interesting the contractor is not

Supposedly there are a bunch of ex-Mexican Spec Ops guys, US-trained, working

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