Re: [thingist] America's For-Profit Secret Army

I think if we all emailed Krugman, [email protected], about Genius 2000 he
might listen. Mirapaul could assist or consult.

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/20/magazine/20INEQUALITY.html

Plus the part about "eminence of excess" shows how the field of architecture
has gone straight down the shithole. Hence the Millennium Hut etc. etc.

>From: "ricardo dominguez" <[email protected]>
>Reply-To: [email protected]
>To: <[email protected]>
>Subject: [thingist] America's For-Profit Secret Army
>Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2002 12:37:28 -0400
>
>http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/13/business/yourmoney/13MILI.html?pagewanted=
>all&position=top
>October 13, 2002
>America's For-Profit Secret Army
>By LESLIE WAYNE
>
>
>ith the war on terror already a year old and the possibility of war against
>Iraq growing by the day, a modern version of an ancient practice - one as
>old as warfare itself - is reasserting itself at the Pentagon. Mercenaries,
>as they were once known, are thriving - only this time they are called
>private military contractors, and some are even subsidiaries of Fortune 500
>companies.
>
>The Pentagon cannot go to war without them.
>
>Often run by retired military officers, including three- and four-star
>generals, private military contractors are the new business face of war.
>Blurring the line between military and civilian, they provide stand-ins for
>active soldiers in everything from logistical support to battlefield
>training and military advice at home and abroad.
>
>Some are helping to conduct training exercises using live ammunition for
>American troops in Kuwait, under the code name Desert Spring. One has just
>been hired to guard President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, the target of a
>recent assassination attempt. Another is helping to write the book on
>airport security. Others have employees who don their old uniforms to work
>under contract as military recruiters and instructors in R.O.T.C. classes,
>selecting and training the next generation of soldiers.
>
>In the darker recesses of the world, private contractors go where the
>Pentagon would prefer not to be seen, carrying out military exercises for
>the American government, far from Washington's view. In the last few years,
>they have sent their employees to Bosnia, Nigeria, Macedonia, Colombia and
>other global hot spots.
>
>Motivated as much by profits as politics, these companies - about 35 all
>told in the United States - need the government's permission to be in
>business. A few are somewhat familiar names, like Kellogg Brown & Root, a
>subsidiary of the Halliburton Company that operates for the government in
>Cuba and Central Asia. Others have more cryptic names, like DynCorp;
>Vinnell, a subsidiary of TRW; SAIC; ICI of Oregon; and Logicon, a unit of
>Northrop Grumman. One of the best known, MPRI, boasts of having "more
>generals per square foot than in the Pentagon."
>
>During the Persian Gulf war in 1991, one of every 50 people on the
>battlefield was an American civilian under contract; by the time of the
>peacekeeping effort in Bosnia in 1996, the figure was one in 10. No one
>knows for sure how big this secretive industry is, but some military
>experts
>estimate the global market at $100 billion. As for the public companies
>that
>own private military contractors, they say little if anything about them to
>shareholders.
>
>"Contractors are indispensible," said John J. Hamre, deputy secretary of
>defense in the Clinton administration. "Will there be more in the future?
>Yes, and they are not just running the soup kitchens."
>
>That means even more business, and profits, for contractors who perform
>tasks as mundane as maintaining barracks for overseas troops, as
>sophisticated as operating weapon systems or as secretive as
>intelligence-gathering in Africa. Many function near, or even at, the front
>lines, causing concern among military strategists about their safety and
>commitment if bullets start to fly.
>
>The use of military contractors raises other troubling questions as well.
>In
>peace, they can act as a secret army outside of public view. In war, while
>providing functions crucial to the combat effort, they are not soldiers.
>Private contractors are not obligated to take orders or to follow military
>codes of conduct. Their legal obligation is solely to an employment
>contract, not to their country.
>
>Private military contractors are flushing out drug traffickers in Colombia
>and turning the rag-tag militias of African nations into fighting machines.
>When a United Nations arms embargo restricted the American military in the
>Balkans, private military contractors were sent instead to train the local
>forces.
>
>At times, the results have been disastrous.
>
>In Bosnia, employees of DynCorp were found to be operating a sex-slave ring
>of young women who were held for prostitution after their passports were
>confiscated. In Croatia, local forces, trained by MPRI, used what they
>learned to conduct one of the worst episodes of "ethnic cleansing," an
>event
>that left more than 100,000 homeless and hundreds dead and resulted in
>war-crimes indictments. No employee of either firm has ever been charged in
>these incidents.
>
>In Peru last year, a plane carrying an American missionary and her infant
>was accidentally shot down when a private military contractor misidentified
>it as on a drug smuggling flight.
>
>MPRI, formerly known as Military Professionals Resources Inc., may provide
>the best example of how skilled retired soldiers cash in on their military
>training. Its roster includes Gen. Carl E. Vuono, the former Army chief of
>staff who led the gulf war and the Panama invasion; Gen. Crosbie E. Saint,
>the former commander of the United States Army in Europe; and Gen. Ron
>Griffith, the former Army vice chief of staff. There are also dozens of
>retired top-ranked generals, an admiral and more than 10,000 former
>military
>personnel, including elite special forces, on call and ready for
>assignment.
>
>"We can have 20 qualified people on the Serbian border within 24 hours,"
>said Lt. Gen. Harry E. Soyster, the company's spokesman and a former
>director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. "The Army can't do that. But
>contractors can."
>
>For that, MPRI is paid well. Its revenue exceeds $100 million a year,
>mainly
>from Pentagon and State Department contracts. Retired military personnel
>working for MPRI receive two to three times their Pentagon salaries, in
>addition to their retirement benefits and corporate benefits like stock
>options and 401(k) plans. MPRI's founders became millionaires in July 2000,
>when they and about 35 equity holders sold the company for $40 million in
>cash to L-3 Communications, a military contractor traded on the New York
>Stock Exchange.
>
>Within the military, the use of contractors is Defense Department policy
>for
>filling the gaps as the number of troops falls. At the time of the gulf
>war,
>there were 780,000 Army troops; today there are 480,000. Over the same
>period, overall military forces have fallen by 500,000.
>
>Pentagon officials did not respond to many telephone calls and e-mail
>messages requesting interviews, but they have maintained that contractors
>are a cost-effective way of extending the military's reach when Congress
>and
>the American public are reluctant to pay for more soldiers.
>
>"The main reason for using a contractor is that it saves you from having to
>use troops, so troops can focus on war fighting," said Col. Thomas W.
>Sweeney, a professor of strategic logistics at the Army War College in
>Carlisle, Pa. "It's cheaper because you only pay for contractors when you
>use them."
>
>But one person's cost-saving device can be another's "guns for hire," as
>David Hackworth, a former Army colonel and frequent critic of the military,
>called them.
>
>"These new mercenaries work for the Defense and State Department and
>Congress looks the other way," Colonel Hackworth, a highly decorated
>Vietnam
>veteran, said. "It's a very dangerous situation. It allows us to get into
>fights where we would be reluctant to send the Defense Department or the
>C.I.A. The American taxpayer is paying for our own mercenary army, which
>violates what our founding fathers said."
>
>They are not mercenaries in the classic sense. Most, but not all, private
>military contractors are unarmed, even when they oversee others with guns.
>They have even formed a trade group, the International Peace Operations
>Association, to promote industry standards.
>
>"We don't want to risk getting contracts by being called mercenaries," said
>Doug Brooks, president of the association. "But we can do things on short
>notice and keep our mouths shut."
>
>That, some critics say, is part of the problem. By using for-profit
>soldiers, the government, especially the executive branch, can evade
>Congressional limits on troop strength. For instance, in Bosnia, where a
>cap
>of 20,000 troops was imposed by Congress, the addition of 2,000 contractors
>helped skirt that restriction.
>
>Contractors also allow the administration to carry out foreign policy goals
>in low-level skirmishes around the globe - often fueled by ethnic hatreds
>and a surplus of cold war weapons - without having to fear the media
>attention that comes if American soldiers are sent home in body bags.
>
>At least five DynCorp employees have been killed in Latin America, with no
>public outcry. Denial is easier for the government when those working
>overseas do not wear uniforms - they often wear fatigues or
>military-looking
>clothes but not official uniforms.
>
>"If you sent in troops, someone will know; if contractors, they may not,"
>said Deborah Avant, an associate professor of political science at George
>Washington University and author of many studies on the subject.
>
>Only a few members of Congress have expressed concern about the phenomenon.
>
>"There are inherent difficulties with the increasing use of contactors to
>carry out U.S. foreign policy," said Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of
>Vermont and the chairman of the foreign operations subcommittee. "This is
>especially true when it involves `private' soldiers who are not as
>accountable as U.S. military personnel. Accountability is a serious issue
>when it comes to carrying guns or flying helicopters in pursuit of U.S.
>foreign policy goals."
>
>In the House, Representative Jan Schakowsky, an Illinois Democrat, led the
>battle against a Bush administration effort to remove the cap that limits
>the number of American troops in Colombia to 500 and private contractors to
>300.
>
>"American taxpayers already pay $300 billion a year to fund the world's
>most
>powerful military," Ms. Schakowsky said. "Why should they have to pay a
>second time in order to privatize our operations? Are we outsourcing in
>order to avoid public scrutiny, controversy or embarrassment? Is it to hide
>body bags from the media and thus shield them from public opinion?"
>
>
>Such concerns are hardly slowing the pace across the Potomac, at MPRI in
>Alexandria, Va. The company may look like hundreds of other white-collar
>concerns that fill small office buildings in northern Virginia, but there
>are telltale signs to the contrary: the sword that serves as the corporate
>logo and conference rooms named the Infantry Room, the Cavalry Room and the
>Artillery Room. Its art consists of paintings of celebrated battles,
>largely
>from the Civil War.
>
>It's hard to tell where the United States military ends and MPRI begins.
>For
>the last four years, MPRI has run R.O.T.C. training programs at more than
>200 universities, under a contract that has allowed retired military to put
>their uniforms back on. It recently lost the contract to a lower bidder,
>but
>MPRI offset the loss with one to provide former soldiers to run recruitment
>offices.
>
>The company, which has 900 full-time employees, helps run the United States
>Army Force Management School at Fort Belvoir. It also provides instructors
>for advanced training classes at Fort Leavenworth, teaches the Civil Air
>Patrol and designs courses at Fort Sill, Fort Knox, Fort Lee and other
>military centers.
>
>The Pentagon has even hired MPRI to help it write military doctrine -
>including the field manual called "Contractors Support on the Battlefield"
>that sets rules for how the Army should interact with private contractors,
>like itself.
>
>Overseas, MPRI is, if anything, more active. Under a program it calls
>"democracy transition," the company has offered countries like Nigeria,
>Bosnia, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, Ukraine, Croatia and Macedonia training in
>American-style warfare, including war games, military instruction and
>weapons training.
>
>In Croatia, MPRI was brought in to provide border monitors in the early
>1990's. Then, in 1994, as the United States grew concerned about the poor
>quality of the Croatian forces and their ability to maintain regional
>stability, it turned to MPRI. A United Nations arms embargo in 1991,
>approved by the United States, prohibited the sale of weapons or the
>providing of training to any warring party in the Balkans. But the Pentagon
>referred MPRI to Croatia's defense minister, who hired the company to train
>its forces.
>
>In 1995, MPRI started doing so, teaching the fledgling army military
>tactics
>that MPRI executives had developed while on active duty commanding the gulf
>war invasion. Several months later, armed with this new training, the
>Croatian army began Operation Storm, one of the bloodiest episodes of
>"ethnic cleansing" in the Balkans, an event that also reshaped the military
>balance in the region.
>
>The operation drove more than 100,000 Serbs from their homes in a four-day
>assault. Investigators for the international war crimes tribunal in the
>Hague found that the Croatian army carried out summary executions and
>indiscriminately shelled civilians. "In a widespread and systematic matter,
>Croatian troops committed murder and other inhumane acts," investigators
>said in their report. Several Croatian generals in charge of the operation
>have been indicted for war crimes and are being sought for trial.
>
>"No MPRI employee played a role in planning, monitoring or assisting in
>Operation Storm," said Lieutenant General Soyster, the MPRI spokesman. He
>did say that a few Croatian graduates of MPRI's training course
>participated
>in the operation.
>
>Yet what happened in Croatia gave MPRI international brand recognition and
>more business in that region. When Bosnian Muslims balked in 1995 at
>signing
>the Dayton peace accords out of fear that their army was ill-equipped to
>provide sufficient protection, MPRI was called in.
>
>"The Bosnians said they would not sign unless they had help building their
>army," said Peter Singer, a foreign policy fellow at the Brookings
>Institution who is writing a book on contractors. "And they said they
>wanted
>the same guys who helped the Croatians."
>
>That is who they got. Under a plan worked out by American negotiators, the
>Bosnian Muslims hired MPRI using money that was provided by a group of
>Islamic nations, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Brunei, the United Arab
>Emirates and Malaysia. These nations deposited money in the United States
>Treasury, which MPRI drew against.
>
>"It was a brilliant move in that the U.S. government got someone else to
>pay
>for what we wanted from a policy standpoint," Mr. Singer said.
>
>At the moment, MPRI is advertising for special forces for antiterrorist
>operations, is bulking up to train American forces in Kuwait and is looking
>for people with special skills like basic-training instruction and
>counterintelligence. Recently, however, it lost a $4.3 million contract to
>provide training to the army in Colombia when officials there complained
>about what they called the poor quality of MPRI's services.
>
>In Africa, MPRI has conducted training programs on security issues for
>about
>120 African leaders and more than 5,500 African troops. Most recently, it
>went toe to toe with the State Department, and won, gaining permission to
>do
>business in Equatorial Guinea, a country with a deplorable human rights
>record where the United States does not have an embassy.
>
>After two years of lobbying at the State Department, and after being turned
>down twice on human rights grounds, MPRI was finally given approval last
>year to work with President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, whom the State
>Department
>describes as holding power through torture, fraud and a 98 percent election
>mandate. MPRI advised President Obiang on building a coast guard to protect
>the oil-rich waters being explored by Exxon Mobil off the coast.
>
>More recently, when MPRI and President Obiang proposed that MPRI also help
>the country build its police and military forces, the State Department
>objected and the project is now dormant.
>
>"We thought helping the coast guard would be pretty innocuous in terms of
>human rights," Lieutenant General Soyster of MPRI said. But Ms. Avant of
>George Washington University disagreed, saying any alliance with United
>States military contractors would strengthen President Obiang's power.
>
>MPRI is not the only company to have run into problems overseas. DynCorp, a
>privately held company in Reston, Va., with nearly $2 billion in annual
>sales, has been tapped to provide protection for Mr. Karzai in Afghanistan.
>DynCorp also provides worldwide protective services for State Department
>employees.
>
>In late September, DynCorp settled charges - for an undisclosed sum -
>brought by a whistle-blower the company had fired after he complained of a
>sex ring run by DynCorp employees in Bosnia. In August, a British court,
>meanwhile, ruled in favor of another former DynCorp employee in a separate
>whistle-blower case. DynCorp is appealing.
>
>The two employees made similar accusations: that while working in Bosnia,
>where DynCorp was providing military equipment maintenance services,
>DynCorp
>employees kept underaged women as sex slaves, even videotaping a rape.
>Among
>the charges was that while the DynCorp employees trafficked in women -
>including buying one for $1,000 - the company turned a blind eye. Since the
>DynCorp employees involved were not soldiers, their actions were not
>subject
>to military discipline. Nor did they face local justice; they were simply
>fired and sent home.
>
>In both cases, after complaining, the two employees who blew the whistle
>were fired. Ben Johnston, one of them, said last April in Congressional
>testimony: "DynCorp employees were living off post and owning these
>children
>and these women and girls as slaves. Well, that makes all Americans look
>bad. I believe DynCorp is the worst diplomat our country could ever want
>overseas."
>
>A DynCorp spokesman, Chuck Taylor, said the company "felt horrible" and
>held
>its own internal investigation before firing the employees who operated the
>ring.
>
>DynCorp also handles aerial anti-narcotics efforts for the United States
>government in the skies over Colombia and nearby countries - where several
>employees have been killed. Because of Congressional caps on the use of
>private military contractors, DynCorp has hired local citizens; two were
>recently killed.
>
>Still, in its recruiting material, the company plays up the excitement of
>this type of work: "Being the best is never easy and when your office is
>the
>cockpit of a twin-engine plane swooping low over the Colombian jungle, the
>challenges can often be enormous."
>
>Incidents like these - sex rings, deals with dictators, misused military
>training and tragic accidents - raise questions about the use of
>contractors. To whom are they accountable: the United States government or
>their contract? When such incidents occur, who bears the responsibility?
>
>Moreover, while the general mantra about military privatization is that it
>saves money, there are few studies to prove the case - and in fact, reports
>exist to the contrary.
>
>For instance, Kellogg Brown & Root, which was paid $2.2 billion to provide
>logistics support to American troops in the Balkans, was the subject of a
>General Accounting Office report entitled, "Army Should Do More to Control
>Contract Costs in the Balkans." The office found that the Army was not
>exercising enough oversight on Kellogg Brown & Root as contract costs rose,
>to the benefit of the company. Still, the company continues to pick up new
>business.
>
>Questions about security and control are even more basic. In the
>battlefield, a commander cannot give orders to a contractor as he can a
>soldier. Contractors are not compelled by an oath of office, as soldiers
>are, but instead by an employment contract that provides little
>flexibility.
>Nor are contractors subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
>
>Contractors cannot arm themselves - they risk losing their status as
>noncombatants if they do and, in the extreme, could be declared mercenaries
>and subject to execution if captured. Yet in the gulf war, contractors were
>in the thick of battle, providing maintenance to tanks and biological and
>chemical vehicles as well as flying air support.
>
>Should there be a war in Iraq, the line could be even blurrier.
>
>"There are no rear areas anymore," Colonel Sweeney of the Army War College
>said. With chemical and biological weapons, "no place is safe," he said.
>
>"You can't draw a map and say `no contractors forward of this line,' " he
>added. "The American concept of combat is to take the battle to the rear
>areas and be as disruptive as possible. The other guy is thinking the same
>thing."
>
>One tenet of warfare is that soldiers handling support functions can grab a
>gun and hit the front lines if needed. While this is often dismissed as a
>quaint World War II concept, it happened in Somalia in 1993 when Army
>rangers were in trouble and military supply clerks came to their rescue.
>When the support staff is filled with contractors, would they do the same?
>Or would commanders in the field become responsible for the safety of the
>growing number of contractor employees at the expense of advancing the
>battle?
>
>The issue is just beginning to generate some attention in military circles.
>
>"We sort of blur the lines," Col. Steven J. Zamparelli of the Air Force
>said
>in an interview. In an article in 1999 for the Air Force Journal of
>Logistics, Colonel Zamaparelli said: "The Department of Defense is gambling
>future military victory on contractors' performing operational functions in
>the battlefield."
>
>Others in the military are more blunt about the effect on soldiers. "Are we
>ultimately trading their blood to save a relatively insignificant amount in
>the national budget?" said Lt. Col. Lourdes A. Castillo of the Air Force, a
>logistics expert, in a 2000 article in Aerospace Power Journal. "If this
>grand experiment undertaken by our national leadership fails during
>wartime,
>the results will be unthinkable."
>
><<<<MORE>>>
>
>http://www.dod.gov/news/contracts.html
>Contracts valued at $5 million or more are announced each business day at 5
>p.m.
>
>[Here are a few selections from the last week.]
>
>DEFENSE LOGISTICS AGENCY
>American Apparel, Inc., Selma, Ala., is being awarded a $24,046,050
>firm-fixed-price with indefinite-quantity type of contract for temperate
>woodland camouflage, Type I coats and hot weather woodland camouflage, Type
>VI enhanced coats for the U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S. Air Force, and U.S.
>Marine Corps. Work will also be performed in Alabama. Performance
>completion
>date is scheduled for Oct. 16, 2003. Contract funds will expire at the end
>of the current fiscal year. There were 64 proposals solicited and 15
>responded. The contracting activity for this contract is the Defense Supply
>Center Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pa. (SP0100-99-D-0343)
>
>D.J. Manufacturing Corp.* (InHUBZone), Caguas, Puerto Rico, is being
>awarded
>a $24,046,050 firm-fixed-price with indefinite-quantity type of contract
>for
>temperate woodland camouflage, Type I combat coats and hot weather woodland
>camouflage, Type VI enhanced coats for the U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S. Air F
>orce, U.S. Marine Corps and the Coast Guard. Performance completion date is
>scheduled for October 16, 2003. Contract funds will expire at the end of
>the
>current fiscal year. There were 64 proposals solicited and 15 responded.
>The
>contracting activity for this contract is the Defense Supply Center
>Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pa. (SP0100-99-D-0345)
>
>World Fuel Services (Singapore) Pre., Ltd.*, United Square, Singapore, is
>being awarded $23,345,177 fixed price with economic price adjustment type
>of
>contract for Jet A-1 aviation turbine fuel for the Defense Energy Support
>Center. Work will also be performed in Pakistan. Performance completion
>date
>is scheduled for Nov. 15, 2003. Contract funds will expire at the end of
>the
>current fiscal year. There were 12 proposals solicited and six responded.
>The contracting activity for this contract is the Defense Energy Support
>Center, Fort Belvoir, Va. (SP0600-03-D-450)
>
>Golden Manufacturing Co., Inc.*(In HUBZone), Golden, M iss., is being
>awarded $20,573,640 firm fixed price with indefinite quantity/delivery type
>of contract for temperate woodland camouflage, Type I combat coats and hot
>weather woodland camouflage, Type VI enhanced coats for the U.S. Army, U.S.
>Navy, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Marine Corps and the Coast Guard. Work will also
>be performed in Marietta, Miss. Performance completion date is scheduled
>for
>October 16, 2003. Contract funds will expire at the end of the current
>fiscal year. There were 64 proposals solicited and 15 responded. The
>contracting activity for this contract is the Defense Supply Center
>Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pa. (SP0100-99-D-0344)
>
>Pocono Produce Co.*, Stroudsburg, Pa., is being awarded a $6,000,000
>firm-fixed-price with indefinite-quantity type of contract for full line
>food distribution for the U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S. Air Force and Coast
>Guard/Job Corps. This contract is exercising its first one-year option.
>Performance completion date is scheduled for Oct. 3, 2003. Contract funds
>will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. There were 42 proposals
>solicited, and two responded. The Defense Supply Center Philadelphia,
>Philadelphia, Pa., is the contracting activity (SP0300-02-D-3019).
>
>NAVY
>Bechtel Bettis Inc., Bettis Atomic Power Laboratory, West Mifflin, Pa., is
>being awarded a $439,900,000 cost-plus-fixed-fee modification to previously
>awarded contract (N00024-98-C-4064) for Naval nuclear propulsion work at
>the
>Bettis Atomic Power Laboratory. Work will be performed in West Mifflin, Pa.
>No completion date or additional information is provided on nuclear
>propulsion contracts. Contract funds in the amount of $2,248,600 will
>expire
>at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command,
>Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity.
>
>KAPL Inc., Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory, Schenectady N.Y., is being
>awarded a $149,300,000 cost-plus-fixed-fee modification to previously
>awarded cont ract (N00024-00-C-4011) for Naval nuclear propulsion work at
>the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory. Work will be performed in Schenectady,
>N.Y. No completion date or additional information is provided on nuclear
>propulsion contracts. Contract funds in the amount of $1,356,400 will
>expire
>at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command,
>Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity.
>
>ARMY
>Poole & Kent Co./Gaudreau Inc., Baltimore, Md., was awarded on Sept. 30,
>2002, a $38,129,517 firm-fixed-price contract for construction of an
>advanced chemistry laboratory. Work will be performed at Aberdeen Proving
>Ground, Md., and is expected to be completed by March 31, 2005. Contract
>funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. There were 51
>bids solicited on Dec. 18, 2001, and six bids were received. The U. S. Army
>Engineer District, Baltimore, Md., is the contracting activity
>(DACA31-02-C-0044).
>
>DEFENSE LOGISITICS AGENCY
>Dorothea Knitting Mills, USA Ltd.*, New York, N.Y., is being awarded
>$15,625,173 (exclusive of government furnished material), firm fixed price
>for 1,984,464 wool berets of various colors for the U.S. Army and U.S. Air
>Force. Work will also be performed in Glade Spring, Va. This contract is a
>2-year contract with three 1-year options. Performance completion date is
>scheduled for Aug. 3, 2005. Funds have been obligated for the current
>fiscal
>year (fiscal year 2003). There were 154 proposals solicited, and 13
>responded. The Defense Supply Center Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pa., is
>the
>contracting activity (SP0100-03-C-0303).
>
>Bancroft Cap Co.*, Cabot, Ark., is being awarded $14,883,120 (exclusive of
>government furnished material) firm-fixed-price for 1,984,416 wool black
>berets for the U.S. Army and U.S. Air Force. This contract is a 2-year
>contract with three 1-year options. Performance completion date is
>scheduled
>for Aug. 3, 2005. Fund s have been obligated for the current fiscal year
>(fiscal year 2003). There were 154 proposals solicited, and 13 responded.
>The Defense Supply Center Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pa., is the
>contracting activity (SP0100-03-C-0304).
>
>
>
>
>
>
>——————————————————————–
>t h i n g i s t
>message by "ricardo dominguez" <[email protected]>
>archive at http://bbs.thing.net
>info: send email to [email protected]
>and write "info thingist" in the message body
>——————————————————————–


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