Perhaps the most mysterious Blackwater front is XPG LLC, a company whose sole listed purpose is “classified services.”
Earlier this year, in one of the few published articles to mention XPG, Matthew Cole of ABC News reported that the company is Blackwater’s “equivalent of Special Forces,” with “a classified contract providing security at seven Special Forces facilities in Afghanistan along the Pakistan border. The contract stipulates that the company receives $17,000 per day, earning XPG more than $6 million annually, according to a source who has reviewed the contract.”
According to the North Carolina Secretary of State’s office, XPG is managed by two men, Daniel Payton and John Perks. The company’s registered agent (read: attorney) is R. Mark Warren.
Until XPG’s latest annual report, filed with the state March 31, the organizers were listed as Mike Blum and Syd Beem.
Beem is or was evidently a US Navy Captain; in a LinkedIn profile, she lists herself as a Blackwater “manager.” More importantly, Beem is among the Blackwater employees named in a legal complaint filed last year in Virginia by Susan L. Burke, a human rights attorney representing the survivors of an Iraqi man killed during an alleged program of indiscriminate killing. [visitor]
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[/visitor] Blackwater founder Erik Prince gave “direct authorizations to kill Iraqis…to employees working within the Blackwater structure known as ‘SELECT,’” the complaint alleges. It goes on:
Blackwater men participating in the “night hunting” went out in Blackwater’s Little Bird helicopters at night. These persons shot and killed scores of innocent Iraqis by reasoning that any Iraqi outside after curfew must be a “combatant” who deserved to be killed by Blackwater’s private army.
Persons who managed or participated in the SELECT program included Paul Mullis, Kurt Smith, Randy Leonard and a woman named Syd Beem. These persons participated to varying degrees in the ongoing conspiracy to use SELECT personnel as method to kill scores of innocent Iraqis.
Innocent or otherwise, records suggest XPG at least has the means to kill “scores” at a time.
US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives records show XPG holds a type 9 federal firearms license, which is necessary to deal in high-powered guns and “destructive devices,” including:
(1) any explosive, incendiary, or poison gas (A) bomb, (B) grenade, © rocket having a propellent charge of more than four ounces, (D) missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter ounce, (E) mine[s]
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Finally, one more followup to Sunday’s post: It looks like the Senate Armed Services Committee missed a few Blackwater affiliates in its otherwise exhaustive report this year.
A July 25, 2008 report by the US Small Business Administration Office of Inspector General—the result of an investigation requested by US Rep. Henry Waxman, D-California, into whether Erik Prince’s business empire deserved the benefits of “small business” status—contains another list of nearly 30 front companies.
Most are variations on other corporate entities. Some of them don’t overlap with the list I posted yesterday. Here are those:
Alliance Canine Solutions LLC Blackwater (UK) Ltd Damocles Solutions LLC EP Investments LLC Greystone North America LLC Prince Household LLC Prince Manufacturing Corporation Prince Manufacturing de Mexico Prince Manufacturing Corporation Indiana Prince Manufacturing Corporation North Carolina Prince Manufacturing Corporation Oxford Townview Properties LLC Townview Properties Management Inc Security Management Solutions Inc
Townview Properties Management? Only the toughest condo association on the planet.