The term PMSC (Private Military & Security Contractor) defines international operations offering violence services by military or paramilitary means. The institution of mercenary armies has existed since antiquity and PMSC companies are essentially a modern development.
PMSC companies are belonged into the following main categories:
1. Traditional mercenaries that operate independently and rarely. They are recruited to participate in armed conflicts in foreign areas.
2. Mercenaries who are motivated are mainly ideological or religious and secondary economic.
3. The private militia that provides security to certain communities.
4. Companies with legal status that provide a wide range of services and offer them to anyone who requests them. They follow a commercial policy, advertise both them and their services and hire staff according to their qualifications without restrictions based on nationality.
by Thanos S. Chonthrogiannis
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Photo by the website www.shockmonitor.org
PMSC companies offering their services in one country allow indirect employer-country involvement in combat operations taking part in the territory of another country. Essentially through the PMSC companies hired these countries serve their interests.
Through PMSC companies, secret services from other countries operate, while PMSC companies do not expose any country for any war crimes they may commit. Now the conflicts do not take place directly between countries but the PMSC participation on their part gives the war an “international status”.
The war conflicts on the territory of Syria, Libya and Nagorno Karabakh respectively involve only the warring sides, but also a plethora of other countries through mercenaries. Well-known PSMC companies are Russian Wagner, American Blackrock, Turkish Sadat etc.
The US has made extensive use of PMSCs in military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, respectively.
Other Services of PMSC
In addition, PMSC companies also act as military advisers to the governments that hire them (e.g., Soudan, countries of Central Africa etc.). Most Western PMSC companies also offer logistics and support services.
Their role contrasts with Russian PMSCs that are more ready for direct war engagement while having more ideological motivation.
PMSC companies, when not involved in a conflict as a contractor, are active in the arms trade by providing their customers with access to the appropriate networks and contacts to obtain the necessary equipment that these countries would not have been able to acquire under other circumstances (e.g., poor Central African countries, etc.).
PMSCs are not legalised even though they are officially operational. This is because the countries hosting their seats can at any time deny responsibility for their actions.
PMSCs have grown through years and become a central component of US and UK military activity and are now a multi-dollar enterprise. This growth has been caused by the desire of governments to maintain global reach while evading accountability from a public increasingly unwilling to pay the costs of war.
The problems created by the involvement of PMSC companies on the battlefields
1. National armies in countries whose democracy is characterised by the rule of law are held accountable based on political and legal institutional procedures. However, this does not apply to PMSCs and their employees, who are only required under the terms set out in their contracts.
2. However, the countries that “host” the headquarters of these PMSC companies are under very severe criticism and pressure because of the human rights violations that these companies can occasionally carry out on the battlefields.
3. They can change the course of the conflict especially when recruited by weak governments and rebel groups (Angola, Croatia, Sierra Leone).
Governments in which the seats of PMSC companies are hosted should establish a legislative framework that controls these companies while ensuring that they operate within an internationally controlled institutional framework.
