The gray areas around Blackwater

Re “Guards who hurt us,” Opinion, Oct. 6

Janessa Gans recounts an incident she experienced while being escorted by a Blackwater USA convoy in which an apparently innocent car was forced off the road. Let’s reconsider that scenario from a slightly different viewpoint: that of an Iraqi who finds Gans’ mission a direct hindrance to his own plans. For a minimal amount of money, he can arrange for the end of this annoyance. What would be a logical place for his paid assassins to arrange Gans’ demise? How about a stretch of narrow and restricted road with no easy exit, blocked by a seemingly innocent vehicle? In that situation, what is the appropriate response from Gans’ security detail? Given the amount of risk in every mission outside the Green Zone, how long would Gans be willing to be a sitting target while the security detail politely searches potentially explosive-laden vehicles or inches forward in a traffic jam surrounded by hostile citizenry? Perhaps Gans should have taken a local taxi. If that sounds dangerous, then maybe a somewhat more thoughtful analysis of the difficulties her security detail faced is in order.

Anita Swortwood

Riverside

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How much more good could have been done if Gans had written her Blackwater story about careening through the streets of Baghdad, terrorizing the populace, as soon it happened, rather than years later? Think of the lives that could have been saved if she and others in the same position had come forward and told Congress or the president about these atrocities.

I really don’t understand these former government officials who wait so long to tell the truth.

Kathi Smith

Ojai

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I was horrified to read Gans’ eyewitness account of Blackwater guards ramming a huge SUV into the smaller car of a family of five, violently running them off the road. There were children in the back of that car. Is that what a democratic people does, slam Suburbans into children? Let’s stop asking ourselves whether we are creating enemies. Of course we are. The real question we should be asking is, have we no shame regarding the things we are willing to do to other people in order to safeguard ourselves?

Mary Caroline

Cummins

Newport Beach

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Re “Guards’ actions defended,” Oct. 3

After all the fuss that has been made in the media about the behavior of the Blackwater security guards in Iraq, I got the impression that these were some really bad guys. Now I hear that members of Congress are saying the Blackwater security guards are acting like “cowboys” in Iraq. I am confused. I grew up thinking that cowboys were the good guys. Even our president dresses, walks and talks like a cowboy, and he is the guy who created the mess in Iraq. So I guess that if the Blackwater security guards are cowboys, they are really the good guys, and we should thank them.

Ted Ury

San Juan Capistrano