Abstract

Private contractors and mercenaries are beginning to equal and even exceed official military presence in many conflicts as war is increasingly privatised. It’s time to incorporate them into our training scenarios to better know how they function in the battlespace and plan for an increasing world of privatised warfare and grey zone operations.

Introduction

Australian Army exercise planning for opposing forces has consistently made use of insurgent and guerrilla irregular forces within exercise design. This has enabled the addition of hybrid warfare scenarios in conjunction with conventional threats to further enhance training and promote effective decision making in complex environments. This paper will present a new possible training adversary in the form of the private military contractor or mercenaries, while seeking to create a discussion about their implementation into exercise design to increase the complexity of the modern battlespace.

This essay will establish a basic understanding and history of Private Military Security Contractors (PMSCs), and the grey area in which they operate in regards to international humanitarian laws for conflict. This will help establish scenarios and questions for a commander if or when they are deployed to an area of operations (AO) where a PMSC is also represented. Five PMSCs of various origin will be discussed in regards to their foundation and what they have accomplished and these types of companies will provide the basis for possible training scenarios.

Since the onset of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq in the early 2000s, PMSCs have been hired to support military forces in the Middle East. They have been employed for various reasons such as cleaning, catering, maintenance, food delivery, ICT services and intelligence support. They have also been employed in kinetic roles such as convoy protection, base and embassy security, and close personal protection. Private contractors have also been used as a direct action force to achieve specific goals through kinetic attacks, such as capturing energy production facilities in the Middle East, or conducting actions for a government that cannot be done by uniformed members; these organisations have also been used to train standing armies in developing nations. During the height of the wars in the Middle East, private contractors outnumbered coalition forces deployed, however, not all private military contractors are armed groups conducting defensive or offensive actions. This privatisation of war is increasing and unlikely to stop anytime soon. This is due to countries becoming increasingly hesitant to use their armed forces as these private groups may be a cheaper or quicker alternative. Additionally, a civilian population’s hesitance to see uniformed casualties in the media contributes to overall reluctance of governments to commit troops.

History of mercenary employment throughout the world

Mercenaries have been employed around the world throughout history in areas such as Egypt, Mesopotamia, Israel, Persia, Greece, and Italy dating back thousands of years. Notable conflicts making use of mercenary forces include the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BCE), Punic Wars (221-201 BCE) and Alexander the Great’s campaigns (336-323 BCE). Italian city-states hired mercenary groups called Free Companies to wage their wars. These ‘Free Companies’ acted like modern private military companies; with a captain (now CEO or board) who negotiates prices with customers, and the mercenaries (now contractors), themselves to conduct kinetic actions to carry out a contract.

The Treaty of Westphalia which ended the Thirty Years’ War (1648 CE) formalised the idea of the modern nation-state and international relations. The treaty normalised the idea of the nation-state having complete authority over all domestic matters to the exclusion of foreign influence, complete control of the use of force by creating standing armies, and all countries being equal in international law. While the Treaty of Westphalia led to the creation of national standing armies, the use of mercenaries did not diminish; it was still cheaper at the time to field a hired army than it was to train, equip and support a national army in the field. From the late 18th century onwards, the hiring of mercenaries diminished with the Total War concept being adopted in the 19th. During World Wars One and Two, countries called on former colonial territories to provide forces adopting the Total War concept, making the hiring of mercenaries largely redundant. However, there were mercenaries during the World Wars, used as a way for countries not involved in the war to provide assistance to allies at war, such as the USA allowing pilots to go to China and provide support during World War Two.^[1]

Post-World War Two, mercenaries came back into the fore during independence struggles in former colonial territories in Africa. Africa saw the largest number of mercenaries employed to train local forces and fight for newly formed governments. The French Foreign Legion (FFL) and ex-British soldiers used their combat experience to make money during these conflicts. The conflicts in Africa saw a shift towards corporate mercenaries in the 1970s, where these organisations began to act as commercial entities, paving the way for the modern PMSC.

This shift to using mercenaries post-World War Two by governments and other groups, through the hiring of small bands of experienced fighters to train and fight with armies or assist with coup d’états, were low cost both financially and politically to achieve a group’s goals. The Congressional Budget Office, a US watchdog agency, noted in 2008 it cost the equivalent of A$125 million a year to operate a standard infantry battalion, but only A$112 million a year to use private contractors.^[2] Countries also used mercenaries to achieve strategic goals post-World War Two. As the cost of the war was significant to all parties involved, the use of mercenaries reduced the cost of human lives of weakened national armies. The FFL is a notable example of this. The Legion, a quasi-mercenary force under the command of the French government, deployed to Africa to achieve French strategic goals. Using the FFL reduced the risk to French citizens and the need to use their national army and to deny any part in neo-colonialism actions. John-Clark Levin, a private maritime security expert, said of the use of private contractors, ‘Private security contractors allow politicians to move some of their military activities off the books in terms of oversight and political responsibility’.^[3] Gordon Conroy, former Australian SASR member and founder of Australian private military company Unity Resource Group, said, ‘We have got private companies coming up because military resources are very stretched and when a marine gets killed, it is not a good look politically, when one of us are killed, well, we are contractors it is not as bad’.^[4]

Differentiating between Private Military Contractors (PMCs), Private Security Contractors (PSCs) and Mercenaries

PMCs are groups hired to provide services to train, replace, reinforce or enhance an army or armed group. PSCs provide services to governments, businesses or individuals aimed at protecting property from criminal activity. Both are present in countries where armed conflicts are ongoing, and the distinction between combatant and civilian is thin and can shift rapidly during war.

Both PMCs and PSCs hire individuals to conduct more than just kinetic actions in combat, which can include security, logistics, transportation and intelligence collection. This gives these companies a sense of legitimacy as long as they are not breaking international laws. Some PMCs and PSCs have hired former high-ranking military officials, such as Aegis Defence Services and Military Professional Resource Incorporated who have had former British and US generals employed respectively. This in turn lends further to their credibility and an attempt to steer clear of the mercenary label. Some PMCs and PSCs volunteer to sign up to oversight committees such as the International Code of Conduct Association which establishes trade standards and complies with international humanitarian law. Some PMCs and PSCs allow third party audits and follow global business standards. Not all PMCs operate in the public domain, or are legally traded in stock exchanges or have government contracts. Some PMCs prefer to operate in a covert manner, to provide clients with plausible deniability after conducting illegal operations; covert PMCs receive contracts through word of mouth and will usually fall under the label of the traditional mercenary groups. Both PMCs and PSCs will be referred to simply as PMSCs moving forward. Both overt and covert PMSCs will be considered in the ‘what if’ scenarios below.

PMSCs are well renumerated compared to national armed forces, incentivising applications from ex-service members with a high level of training. An individual contractor from a Western nation can make A$15-44,000 a month, compared to a US PTE to CAPT making A$1,700-8,800 a month.^[5] A PMSC can also make more money per day, up to A$17,000 compared to A$3,500 a day for Tier One special-forces operators in 2003.^[6] Employing PMSCs is also a cheaper alternative to the employment of a nation’s armed forces, especially in regards to Combat Service Support (CSS). Executive Outcomes in Africa were paid a total A$50.6 million, or A$1.6 million a month, over two years to defeat a rebellion against the democratically elected Sierra Leone government; UN forces doing the same task cost A$60 million a month.^[7]

In 1989, the UN General Assembly ratified Resolution 44/34, Article 47, titled International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing and Training of Mercenaries. It lists a mercenary as any person who:

Protocol One

• is specially recruited locally or abroad in order to fight in an armed conflict;
• is motivated to take part in the hostilities essentially by the desire for private gain and, in fact, is promised, by or on behalf of a party to the conflict, material compensation substantially in excess of that promised or paid to combatants of similar rank and functions in the armed forces of that party;
• is neither a national of a party to the conflict nor a resident of territory controlled by a party to the conflict;
• is not a member of the armed forces of a party to that conflict; and
• has not been sent by a state which is not a party to that conflict on official duty as a member of its armed forces.

Protocol Two

A mercenary is also a person who, in any other situation:

• is specially recruited locally or abroad for the purpose of participating in a concerted act of violence aimed at:
  • overthrowing a Government or otherwise undermining the constitutional order of a state; or
  • undermining the territorial integrity of a state;
• is motivated to take part therein essentially by the desire for significant private gain and is prompted by the promise or payment of material compensation;
• is neither a national nor a resident of the State against which such an act is directed;
• has not been sent by a State on official duty; and
• is not a member of the armed forces of the State on whose territory the act is undertaken.

All conditions of Protocol One must be met for an individual or group to be labelled ‘mercenary’. PMSCs are not official representatives of the country who hires them or directed to follow any national army’s code of military conduct. However, during the war in Iraq (2003) many US PMSCs could not by definition of Article 47 (c) be considered mercenaries since they were nationals of a party to the conflict.

This allows PMSCs to avoid punishment in most countries and the International Criminal Court; if any contractor is caught and labelled a mercenary in accordance with Resolution 44/34, the definition of mercenary is so loose, author and military historian Geoffrey Best stated, ‘any mercenary who cannot exclude himself from this definition deserves to be shot—and his lawyer with him’. Considerations of Laws of Armed Conflict (LOAC) and Humanitarian Law for PMSCs will be included in the below ‘what if’ scenarios.

During international armed conflicts, members of the armed forces involved are defined by the Fourth Hague Conventions (18 October 1907). Additionally, personnel of PMSCs will be recognised as combatants if formed as militias belonging to a belligerent of an armed conflict. As many PMSCs conduct operations in direct support of a military in international armed conflict (Blackwater 2004), they are counted as legal combatants and therefore eligible for targeting of military attacks. This also means PMSCs assisting armed forces in combat can be entitled to prisoner of war status. In non-international armed conflicts, such as civil wars, combatants are not defined by international law and prisoner of war status cannot be designated to any participant.

Individuals or groups not listed as members of the armed forces of a party in conflict, and who do not take direct action in hostilities, are legally civilians. As civilians, they are protected by international law against military attacks. Participation in hostilities is not precisely defined by any Geneva Conventions, however, commentary on their Protocols states ‘direct participation means acts of war which by their nature or purpose are likely to cause actual harm to the personnel and equipment of the enemy armed forces’.^[8] This leaves a grey area where third party contractors to belligerents in conflict, who provide maintenance, food, weapons and transport, are not directly participating in direct conflict, but are contributing to belligerents of the conflict and can possibly lose their civilian status. Contractors who take direct part in hostilities lose their protection under international humanitarian law during hostilities, however, they become civilians and non-targetable once they have ceased their engagement.

A common task for PMSCs is to act as security for a building or area such as the Green Zone in Iraq or a military base on home soil or overseas. International law regarding international and non-international armed conflict states ‘attacks shall be limited strictly to military objectives. Insofar as objects are concerned, military objectives are limited to those objects which by their nature, location, purpose or use make an effective contribution to military action and whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralisation, in the circumstances ruling at the time, offers a definite military advantage’.^[9] Therefore, private contractors providing security to military establishments or locations that make effective contributions to military actions during times of war are not afforded civilian status. During the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, PMSCs were hired to provide close personal protection (CPP) to government officials, a security and defensive precaution. However, Article 49, Protocol One of the Geneva Conventions defines attacks as ‘acts of violence against the adversary, whether in offence or in defence’.^[10] This means if a contractor providing CPP to a belligerent of a conflict comes under fire from another belligerent in the conflict and fires back in self-defence, they are participating in hostilities and therefore no longer a civilian. If, however, they come under attack from criminals and fire back, their civilian status remains.^[11]

Snapshot of global PMSCs

Wagner Group. The Wagner Group is a PMSC that supports and promotes Russian operations abroad. The reported founder of Wagner in 2014 is Dmitry Utkin, a veteran of the Chechen wars and leader of a Spetnaz unit. Utkin left the Russian military and joined the Slavonic Corps, a predecessor to Wagner. Wagner is also reported to have ties to the Russian oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In 2014, the Wagner Group participated in the Ukraine conflict with Russia, where Ukrainian signals intelligence is reported to have intercepted communications between Utkin and Colonel Oleg Ivannikov, a Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (GRU) member and MAJGEN Evgeny Nikiforov, chief of staff of Russia’s 58th Army. The Wagner Group’s headquarters and main base is located in Molkino, Russia, and is shared with a GRU facility. The Wagner Group is a registered company in Argentina with offices in Saint Petersburg and Hong Kong.

Wagner Group was used as an offensive force in Ukraine, Syria and Libya, and in a train-and-protect function in Sudan and the Central African Republic (CAR). With a reported three to six thousand personnel in their employ, Wagner is reported to further the goals of the Kremlin and maintain deniability from the Russian government. Vladimir Putin has said in regards to PMSCs that they are, ‘Instruments for realising national interests without the direct participation of the state’.^[12]  Wagner Group were tasked with capturing and protecting oil and gas fields from the Islamic State in Syria. During the conflict in Syria, Russian and Syrian ministers for energy negotiated in 2017 to ‘liberate oil and gas fields, plants and other infrastructure captured by enemies of the regime, and then guard them’^[13]. In return, Russian companies would receive a quarter of the field’s output revenue and expenses for military expenditure.

On 07 February 2018, a Russian-speaking militia supported directly by Wagner Group personnel crossed the US/Russia deconfliction line in Syria and attacked the Conoco gas plant in Deir-el Zour. This gas plant was defended by Kurdish forces supported by United States of America military personnel. US forces called in air support for approximately four hours and successfully defended the gas plant, inflicting approximately 300 casualties on the Wagner Group-backed militia. The Russian high command insisted during and after the event they had no presence in the area.

Academi. Academi (formerly Blackwater) is a PMSC founded in 1997 in the USA by Al Clark and Erik Prince, both former US Navy SEALs who discharged to create Blackwater. Blackwater has employed former Special Forces members to train US special operations personnel in North Carolina. Post the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre’s Twin Towers in New York, Blackwater grew rapidly to support and train US servicemen going overseas. Blackwater was hired to protect US State Department and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan, employing approximately one thousand personnel. According to Erik Prince, Blackwater became a CIA asset during their time in the Middle East.^[14] On 31 March 2004, Iraqi insurgents attacked a Blackwater convoy that was protecting food caterers in the city of Fallujah’ all four members of the Blackwater PMSC were killed and hanged from a bridge. The United States leadership feared the killings would embolden uncommitted Iraqi nationals against the US presence^[15] leading to the first battle of Fallujah, which caused 27 US soldiers’ deaths and approximately 600 civilian deaths.

On 16 Sept 2007, Blackwater personnel were contracted to protect US officials in Iraq. After a car bomb exploded near the Izdihar compound, 19 Blackwater contractors were tasked to secure the evacuation route for the US officials in the Green Zone. The Blackwater commander made a decision to advance towards Nisour Square outside of the Green Zone. New orders came to the Blackwater team to secure Nisour Square and stop traffic; soon after arriving, the Blackwater team opened fire on civilians alleging a car would not stop after warnings, killing 17 and wounding 18 unarmed civilians. During their time in Iraq, Blackwater used deadly force 289 times against civilians, compared to 63 against insurgent combatants’.8

The Nisour Square incident led to a decline in Blackwater contracts with the US State Department and CIA, and the removal of Erik Prince as CEO. Prince went on to create a PMSC in the United Arab Emirates, which failed. He then became a chairman of the Frontier Services Group, a PMSC with ties to the Chinese State, to support Chinese energy projects in Africa. Blackwater changed its name to Xe Services to distance itself from the Blackwater name, then to Academi when it merged with Triple Canopy, another PMSC.

Executive Outcomes (EO). EO was founded in 1989 by Eeben Barlow, a veteran sapper from the South African Defence Force (SADF). EO only hired ex-South African servicemen from the various branches of military and law enforcement, to train active military personnel, employing approximately two thousand personnel. In 1989, EO was hired to develop training packages for the SADF, which included intelligence gathering, counter espionage and covert operations. EO’s success in training SADF members was noticed by other clientele in South Africa and abroad, and soon EO were hired to train mining security officials and South American drug enforcement agencies. EO made use of fixed and rotary wing aircraft as well as armoured vehicles during operations.

EO’s most successful operations were in Angola and Sierra Leone, where EO was hired to train government militaries and conduct kinetic actions against rebel organisations. After a successful contract to defend a recovery mission in the town of Soyo, Angola, EO was hired in 1993 by the Angolan government to train the Angolan Armed Forces’ (FAA) 16 Brigade. EO’s training and direct assistance to combat operations against an Angolan rebel group led to an FAA victory, ceasefire and transition of power to a democratically elected leader. In 1994, the Sierra Leonean government hired EO to train Sierra-Leone’s military forces and helped recapture diamond mines from rebel forces, eventually forcing a ceasefire. EO was more successful and cheaper to maintain than the UN peacekeeping force in Sierra Leone at the time that cost twice as much and were not as effective at securing or maintaining peace.^[16]

Sandline International. Sandline International was an offshoot of EO, founded in the 1990s by EO members Tim Spicer and Simon Mann, former British army officers. In 1997, Sandline was hired by the Papua New Guinea (PNG) Prime Minister Sir Julius Chan to assist the Papua New Guinea Defence Force (PNGDF) in capturing the Panguna mine from rebels in Bougainville for A$45 million.^[17] The Chief of the Papua New Guinea Defence Force was unaware of this deal. News of this contract brought an international spotlight on PNG and the Australian Government pressured the Government of PNG (GoPNG) to back down and cancel the contract. Sandline helicopter gunships, weapons and ammunition heading to Bougainville were impounded in Thailand before being relocated to RAAF base Tindal in Australia. GoPNG cancelled the contract after domestic and international backlash.

DeWe Security. DeWe Security is a Chinese PMSC, founded in 2011 by former members of the Chinese police and armed forces. DeWe is based out of a converted warehouse near the Beijing airport. They employ approximately 350 personnel abroad and have worked in 50 countries. DeWe came into the global spotlight in 2016 when they supported an evacuation of personnel from the China National Petroleum Corp, DeWe’s largest client, in South Sudan. Fighting broke out within Juba, and DeWe Security helped evacuate 330 personnel to Nairobi, Kenya.

China, with its expanding Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), are working in an increasing number of austere environments across the globe, including Syria, Iraq, South Sudan, Democratic Republic of the Congo and the CAR. The state-backed companies working in these regions require significant security due to the money spent on natural resource projects. PMSCs were only legalised in China in 2010 to provide armed services to domestic businesses such as banks and factories. With the increase in China’s foreign projects through the BRI, China needed to provide increased security, and could not employ their armed forces for protection,  hence the enabling legalisation and increase in the use of PMSCs for security. Chinese PMSCs are largely filled with ex-army and police, likely with indirect ties back to the state, giving the Chinese Communist Party increased influence where their BRI projects are conducted.

Wagner Group, Academi and DeWe Security are PMSCs with both tacit and overt support from the governments of their home countries (Russia, USA and China respectively) with consistent contracts and good working relations with their country’s military. The militaries of these countries are a recruiting pool for such PMSCs, reducing the amount of time it takes to train new employees. EO and Sandline are two groups that fall under the traditional mercenary idea of the nationless military force offering services to various countries conflicts. While EO’s founder, Eeben Barlow, has stated many times in interviews they followed international laws and were not a mercenary group. However, Sandline, for example, can be defined as a mercenary group as it meets all conditions of Protocol One of Article 47: a, Hired by GoPNG to fight in an overseas conflict; b, motivated by financial gain’; c, not a national to the parties involved; d, not a member of the PNGDF; e, and sent by a belligerent of the conflict–GoPNG. Currently, there are 97 PMSCs that have signed on to the International Code of Conduct Association globally, only a small portion of the PMSC market. During the Afghanistan and Iraq conflicts in the 2000s, the USA lost more contractors than uniformed members: 7,071 US contractors lost their lives compared with the 6,860 US soldiers who lost their lives during the conflicts.^[18]

Potential ‘what if’ or implications scenarios

The following paragraphs will set out a general idea making use of the DATE Pacific adversary, North Torbia (NT), to set up the operational environment for ‘what if’ scenarios. Special ideas will make use of PMSCs and mercenaries of overt and covert origins to generate a commentary about the benefit of using such a force alongside the conventional adversary in the modern battlespace in the training environment.

General Idea

A Battle Group (BG) is currently supporting Joint Task Force (JTF) combat operations against NT Force Elements (FE) on Hervey Island. This conflict has been extended and become conventional war between an Australian and New Zealand coalition with Belesian military support against NT forces with tacit Olvanan support. After some months of protracted warfare, the Belesian security forces have been effectively destroyed and the coalition JTF cannot support military operations and maintain security of certain Belesian locations within the JTF AO; these locations include energy producing facilities, supply depots, ports and airports. The Free Sulu Movement (FSM), who are affiliated with NT operations, have conducted kinetic actions against Belesian locations.

Special Idea 1

During the conflict with NT in Belesia, Olvana, in an overt way of staying impartial, has hired a PMSC to seize and protect Olvanan energy interests in Belesia. This PMSC has ties to key Olvanan officials within the energy sector. Olvana has also hired covert mercenaries to assist NT operations in Belesia and train affiliated forces such as the FSM; these covert forces have also supplied Soviet-era Tier three armoured vehicles to this organisation and provide limited air support and Reconnaissance, Intelligence, Surveillance and Target acquisition (RISTA).

What if the ADF, in accordance with their peacekeeping duties, are required to secure energy facilities protected by non NT FE? Will they have to:

• carry out the mission of securing these facilities regardless of who is defending them?
• cancel/delay the mission to take it up to higher HQ, as this scenario creates a targeting dilemma for ADF forces?

If ADF personnel attack a PMSC because they risk mission success, how will the international community react to these actions? If it was a state-backed PMSC, how will the state–Olvana–react to news of the ADF attacking them? Will it be considered an attack on the Olvanan state itself? Could an attack be the catalyst for a deception plan to draw conventional Olvanan forces into Belesia to protect their interests and diaspora?

If the JTF has not received intelligence of a covert PMSC providing weapons and training to the FSM, BG patrols can possibly be under-equipped to defend against FSM with covert mercenary support, armoured vehicles and air support. If this happens, the FSM might be pushed towards a traditional mercenary group, creating a command decision point for increased actions and targeting against the FSM within international human rights laws.

Special Idea 2

Post-conflict with NT, Belesia is undergoing a civil war between the internationally UN-backed government and rebels attempting a coup. The BG, in support of JTF operations, are conducting stability operations in Belesia after the UN declared it a priority. Belesian oligarchs have also hired overt PMSCs to protect their interests during the unrest.

What if a PMSC protecting a location comes under fire by rebels seeking to gain access to the area or building? Will the BG have to:

• divert a patrol to assist in combat? Possibly delaying BG operations.
• have the correct Orders for Opening Fire (OFOF) and Rule of Engagement (ROE) to assist?
• have communications channels between PMSCs in the AO with the JTF and BG?
• will the origin of the PMSC influence decision making, such as a PMSC comprised of ex-ADF soldiers that are known to current servicemen in the BG or command team?
• are BG commanders ready to conduct rescue operations in the event of another incident such as the Blackwater killings in Fallujah if the government requests it?

If a PMSC has consistently opened fire on civilians during their duties, it decreases trust in national armies conducting stability operations in an area. This may lead to attacks on ADF from individuals or groups seeking retaliation on actions conducted by PMSCs. Will ADF have to:

• liaise with PMSC leadership to deconflict or limit the capability and area PMSCs can operate?
• order a PMSC out of an area? Will commanders on the ground or ADF have the remit and authority to command a private entity?
• task ADF FE to patrol or watch PMSCs to act in accordance with international laws/Geneva Conventions?
• attach a liaison officer to the PMSC commander? Will a private entity allow a foreign military to supervise their operations?

If a PMSC, hired by Government of Belesia (GoBelesia), are conducting simultaneous offensive actions against rebels or a rebel position, will the BG have to:

• plan in conjunction with the PMSC? If this is the case, how will the ADF maintain operational and communications security?
• offer medical support, evacuation or supplies if conducting operations simultaneously with a PMSC to achieve a common goal?

If a mercenary group started committing war crimes by killing civilians within the same AO ADF are operating in during a UN Assistance Mission in a developing nation, would the BG have to:

• consider changing the ROEs and OFOFs to defend the civilians?
• maintain current ROEs and OFOFs and stay on mission. (Rwanda, 1990s)
• attempt to minimise escalation of force and increasing tensions, find a way to help civilians?

If ADF operations are reliant on civilian companies to provide CSS, such as cooking, cleaning and transport, PMSCs will likely be hired to provide protection to these companies instead of using the military. As PMSCs are private companies, they can possibly be hired in a region by opposing forces/governments, denying ADF access to local groups, thus forcing the ADF to provide protection to civilian support in conflict areas or pay more to bring in a PMSC from farther away from the AO.

Using PMSCs in training scenarios for ADF exercises

Some ways in which a PMSC or mercenary group can be employed in training scenarios are:

• The field training areas urban operations training facilities (UOTF), utilised as a civilian village, have hired mercenaries to protect them during the recent unrest in Belesia and against possible attack from FSM or NT. BG FE, in conduct with their peacekeeping operations, have set up a position in the UOTF. This scenario will force commanders to liaise with a possible neutral FE conducting a similar operation.
• A covert PMSC made up of ex-Special Forces personnel equipped with Tier two weapons and vehicles have been hired to destroy key locations in the field training area, such as key infrastructure or buildings. If this PMSC crosses paths with BG FE protecting or in vicinity of a target they will attack, how will the BG respond within the LOAC and international humanitarian law? This scenario adds an unknown FE to the battlespace, requiring the BG to send requests for information (RFIs), conduct reconnaissance or increase security.
• During Stability operations, Australian contractors providing CSS have been killed along with the PMSC providing security, the BG will now have to detach FE to provide convoy escorts and protection, decreasing their operational capability until alternate security can be arranged.
• Olvana has hired a PMSC to protect its energy projects in Belesia, this PMSC has been supported by Olvana military in the past. The PMSC, in accordance with their contract have secured an airfield and key crossing point in the field training area the BG need access to. This will require the BG to change its mission or act in accordance with their ROE to achieve mission success.
• An Olvanan PMSC has been hired to train FSM guerrillas in the AO to increase their capability in operations against BG FE. This situation can increase the employability for FSM in training scenarios falling in line with tacit Olvanan support while completely removing Olvanan military personnel.
• During stability operations, a Belesian local national (LN) has approached a patrol asking to speak with their leader; this LN has complaints about men dressed in a similar manner as the ADF soldiers, killing livestock and some of their neighbours when they confronted the men. This is the third report of a group of well-armed people harassing the local populace within the AO. The group is a mercenary group hired for unknown reasons to the ADF. This scenario should force the combat team leader to think of the higher implications of similarly armed groups killing local nationals while conducting stability operations in their country, conducting extra patrols, or establishing early warning positions farther away from the main defensive positions. Will there also be a moral obligation to assist LN who have been captured by this group?

Key deductions

The labels ‘mercenary’ and ‘contractor’ have often become synonymous, however, mercenaries are hired to achieve an outcome, usually kinetic and lethal in nature, while contractors are hired to facilitate third party operations occasionally involving kinetic actions in support of a contract (i.e defending civilian CSS or personnel.) If a group is hired to solely conduct kinetic actions overseas, they can usually be considered mercenaries.

PMSCs working in the covert domain are a non-quantifiable entity, with numbers and operations largely unreported due to the nature of clandestine and illegal operations; along with the lack of information flow from the regions they operate in. This creates a large information gap for possible threat forces in conflict zones where ADF personnel might be deployed to.

A large portion of contractors are ex-servicemen, with training, combat experience and access to significant firepower in the form of armoured vehicles and aviation assets and heavy weapons. They also do not have to follow standard doctrinal tactics for combat operations, making them difficult to plan against.

Overt PMSCs that recruit from a certain group of ex-servicemen, for example US Marines, will probably continue using tactics and behaviour learned during their time in the military. This will make their operations and tactics easier to predict, however, this will not be the case for PMSCs hiring ex-servicemen from multiple nations.

Not all PMSCs are from Western nations and hiring only ex-military members; many are from Latin American, Asian or African nations consisting of ex-cartel members, ex-child soldiers or death squads. Groups filled with this type of personnel will lean towards covert tasks with highly unconventional tactics and will likely destabilise any AO they operate in.

Not all members of PMSCs are frontline soldiers, they still require human resources, accountants, and public relations to support daily operations just like a publicly traded company. This can hide the exact number of personnel who conduct kinetic activities for a PMSC.

Security contractors, such as MSS providing security and patrols on Australian bases, will lose civilian status during times of war at the bases they are working on.

As  private entities, PMSCs do not have to abide by military law, allowing individual contractors greater leniency in their actions; this also allows a PMSC to offer their services to anyone willing to pay for their services without fear of repercussions for committing war crimes.

PMSCs can be state-backed and further the goals of that country; if this is the case, these state-backed PMSCs are given greater support to operations from a conventional military, with combat service support capabilities in movements and combat support from fires. State-backed PMSCs will also have a monopoly on contracts from the state, further increasing relations and creating a recruiting pool for ex-servicemen to join a PMSC.

PMSCs and mercenaries are a quicker alternative in peacekeeping missions than international effort directed from the UN, increasing the demand for these groups in developing nations with heightened internal unrest.

PMSCs and mercenaries can decrease a local population’s perception of national militaries if they are seen doing the wrong thing, such as the Blackwater Nisour Square incident and their overall activities in the Middle East. If this happens, it will be harder for militaries to gain support from local populations, increasing the risk to themselves and the mission during counterinsurgency operations and stability operations. PMSCs or mercenaries will degrade the overall strategy of military operations if they are not communicating with the military in the same AO.

PMSCs contracted by a state may need support in conflict zones, increasing the strain on combat operations to support the contractors. This could lead to deployment of troops to an area not considered important by the military, and need securing or long-term presence after any incident, such as the events leading to the first battle of Fallujah in 2004.

State-backed PMSCs can be used to conduct illegal combat operations against neutral forces in conflict zones to further the national agenda while allowing deniability from the sponsoring state. This is a grey area that can be exploited as Russia has done with Wagner Group in Syria and Ukraine.

In the current climate of low-intensity conflicts, counterinsurgencies and grey zone warfare, PMSCs will increasingly be used to conduct kinetic actions to solve internal conflicts or extend the reach of a government which cannot overtly order uniformed soldiers into an area.

The privatisation of conflict erodes a country’s sole ownership of the legitimate use of force as per the Westphalian order. This incentivises countries providing their own PMSCs to foreign countries where projects need security, thus influencing their presence and diplomatic power while reducing the host nations’, as they are seen as not being able to provide sufficient security to international projects and personnel.

Including PMSCs in training scenarios will increase the complexity of the training and bring it in line with future battlespaces where the ADF may provide peacekeeping operations.

Conclusion

PMSCs and mercenaries have become an increasing facet of conflict zones post-World War Two, and moreover, since the beginning of the wars in the Middle East in the early 2000s, to protecting civilian CSS and training national security forces or simply fighting for money. In training and exercise development, using irregular forces that are always sympathetic to the OPFOR is not congruent with real world examples and the relationship can fail for numerous reasons or if there is no longer a common goal. How we understand and categorise what OPFOR is should also be looked at more closely in regards to PMSCs the ADF might find itself operating with or near, to help identify the correct ROEs and OFOFs, and perhaps even lines of communication or effort. Employing Private Military and Security Contractors and mercenaries in training will be valuable not only for commanders and decision making on the ground, but also higher ADF functions such as legal, who will have to consider the LOAC and international humanitarian law when facing or working with PMSCs. It may also provide a possible example of future low-intensity conflicts with the increasing amount of privatised warfare and grey zone influence exerted by global superpowers. These organisations can be used in training scenarios to increase complexity as a possible friendly FE, a neutral FE operating within the same AO, an enemy FE supporting or training the OPFOR, or an entirely unknown entity in an AO. This training may also be able to help inform commanders of the second or third order effects of dealing with organisations described above.

RFIs

• What scale and tempo of conflict is needed to employ PMSCs in a combat role to support whole-of-government/ADF operations?
• What scale of conflict will it take for the ADF to employ civilians in a CSS role? / How long can the ADF support itself before it needs to hire contractors to supply CSS?
• What is the remit to command PMSCs in conflict zones? (Whether they have been hired by GoAus or not).
• How will the ADF/GoAus provide protection for hired civilians during international conflict where the line between civilian and combatant is blurred regarding military targets?
• How will the ADF respond if a PMSC contracted by the government commits war crimes like the Nisour Square massacre or the Abu Ghraib prison scandal?
• How will the ADF handle contracts with government-supported PMSCs such as the Wagner Group in conflict zones?
• What will the ramifications be from destroying government-supported PMSCs such as Wagner Group among the international community?
• What is the threshold of international conflict needed for the ADF to provide security for their own military locations IOT deny the targeting of civilian PMSCs protecting them?
• What are the LOAC, ROE and OFOFs for ADF against PMSCs in a warzone?
• How will a combat team leader or below liaise with any friendly PMSCs in an AO?
• How will ADF commanders deconflict with PMSCs in a conflict zones?

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