From todays Latimes. Operations like Blackwater have done more to ensure that we will not win the hearts and minds of Iraqis then almost anything else we've done there:

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-blackwater7oct07,0,2076854.story?coll=la-home-center


Ever since the contractors were granted immunity from Iraqi courts in June 2004 by the U.S.-led occupation authority, diplomats have cautioned that the decision to do so was "a bomb that could go off at any time," said one former U.S. official.

...
Gans said that during her travels around the country she saw heavily armed contract guards frighten Iraqi civilians and destroy their property, and she was shocked that they appeared to have so little accountability and that the Iraqis often found it difficult to obtain justice or compensation.

Gans, who related her experiences in an interview and in an opinion article published in Saturday's Times, described one incident. In 2005, a heavily armored Chevy Suburban at the head of her U.S. convoy smashed into a tiny car carrying an elderly man, a younger woman and three frightened children.

When she objected, the contractors pointed out that they were trained to treat all Iraqis as potential terrorists. Gans said she replied: "If they weren't terrorists before, they certainly are now."




>Sorry if I wasn't rooting for the right guys on this case - didn't really look who's wearing what kind of drab khaki gray camo garb, sunshades or not. I rarely have any sympathy for mercenaries, regardless of the color of their money.