'The spy who billed me'

Blackwater USA, the private military firm with operations in Iraq, has proposed building an 824-acre training facility near San Diego. Lately, the company has been on a campaign to convince skeptical residents that Blackwater should be allowed to expand in California. That means the normally secretive former Navy SEALS and military men who created the company are emerging to talk about what they do.

R.J. Hillhouse, who operates a website about military outsourcing, scored an interview with Gary Jackson, president of Blackwater USA. Hillhouse has her own rather shadowy background, describing herself as a former Cuban rum runner who also "smuggled jewels from the Soviet Union and slipped through some of the world’s tightest borders. From Uzbekistan to Romania, she's been followed, held at gunpoint and interrogated. Foreign governments and others have pitched her for recruitment as a spy. (They failed.)"

Her interview with Jackson offers some insights for elected officials and the public in San Diego County who are considering Blackwater's expansion. She asks about Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater USA, described by journalist Jeremy Scahill as a "Christian supremacist" who wanted to create an army to defend Christendom. Jackson answers:

"First, we have no private army. What we do have is a team of military and law enforcement veterans and other motivated, capable Americans who protect diplomats, provide training, and offer logistic services, and we do those things in support of friendly nation peace operations around the world, including support of some of our Muslim allies. While I hesitate to discuss his personal life, Mr. Prince is a practicing Roman Catholic and I assure you is no radical.  His views, which others have inflated to serve their own agendas, are his own and he makes no effort to force them on anyone at Blackwater."

With affiliated "intelligence services," Greystone and Total Intelligence Solutions, Blackwater represents an "unprecedented concentration of military expertise and force in the hands of a private corporation," Hillhouse writes. He replies: "We evaluate clients through research and due diligence, we ensure they are legitimate actors who support freedom and security, and we only take on work that is sanctioned by the U.S. government."

The interview ends with Hillhouse asking if Blackwater is sort of like having a wolf as a housepet. Jackson replies by extending her metaphor. "A sheepdog is a more appropriate description. Indeed, there are wolves in the world and they plot every day to do harm to the peaceful sheep. The sheep want peaceful and productive lives and to live freely and safely with other sheep. Unguarded, however, the sheep, who are tolerant, are easy prey for the wolf. The sheepdog wants the same thing. He wants to freely and peacefully coexist with the sheep, but he has a developed capacity to protect against the wolf when necessary."

(Photos: Joon Powell/AP; John R. McCutchen/San Diego Union-Tribune via AP; )