Third-Party Contractors
Sarah posted this Mother Jones article: Dirty Warriors.
The article discusses how the Pentagon increasingly hires private companies to do work that was once handled directly by military personnel and then denies any responsiblity for the actions of the employees of those private companies. After all, they're not US soldiers. I'm reminded of all the apparel companies that instead of running their own sweatshops just buy all their products from sweatshops. Nike doesn't even make clothes and sneakers anymore, they just market them. So of course it's not Nike's fault that the company making the sneakers that Nike markets hire child labor or abuse their workers, even though Nike has full control over every aspect of their suppliers, suppliers that generally produce for Nike and no one else. The saddest part is that the trick basically seems to be working for both Nike and the Pentagon.
The article discusses how the Pentagon increasingly hires private companies to do work that was once handled directly by military personnel and then denies any responsiblity for the actions of the employees of those private companies. After all, they're not US soldiers. I'm reminded of all the apparel companies that instead of running their own sweatshops just buy all their products from sweatshops. Nike doesn't even make clothes and sneakers anymore, they just market them. So of course it's not Nike's fault that the company making the sneakers that Nike markets hire child labor or abuse their workers, even though Nike has full control over every aspect of their suppliers, suppliers that generally produce for Nike and no one else. The saddest part is that the trick basically seems to be working for both Nike and the Pentagon.