Can a private company have an army?

A private military company (PMC) is a private company providing armed combat or security services for financial gain. The services and expertise offered by PMCs are typically similar to those of governmental security, military or police forces, most often on a smaller scale.

What is the most powerful private military?

Currently Blackwater (Xe Services LLC, Academi) is the largest organization of its kind in the world. The company has a headquarters located in North Carolina.

Why are private military companies?

PMCs are private companies (we’ll focus on Russian ones here) that provide a variety of services to the countries where they are deployed: protective security, military tactical support, capacity building, information operations, and advising to senior leaders.

How do private military companies work?

PMCs specialize in providing combat and protection forces. Their work ranges from running small-scale training missions to providing combat units composed of up to several hundred highly trained soldiers equipped with powerful weapons platforms, including tanks and attack helicopters.

Is Blackwater a real place?

Blackwater is a city in northwest Cooper County, Missouri, United States located along the Blackwater River, from which it takes its name. Many parts of Blackwater’s commercial and residential districts are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Are private military companies more like the Marine Corps?

Private military companies such as the Wagner Group are more like heavily armed multinational corporations than the Marine Corps. Their employees are recruited from different countries, and profitability is everything.

Are private military companies cheap imitations of National Armed Forces?

Those who assume they are cheap imitations of national armed forces invite disaster because for-profit warriors are a wholly different genus and species of fighter. Private military companies such as the Wagner Group are more like heavily armed multinational corporations than the Marine Corps.

What are private military companies (PMCs)?

Mercenaries adapted to changing trends in statecraft and warfare by merging into corporate entities under the title of private military companies, or PMCs. America, the country with the strongest national military, is oddly the largest customer of PMCs.

What percentage of the US military is private contracting?

According to the Congressional Research Service, roughly 10\% of America’s armed forces were privately contracted during WWII, but during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the proportion has grown to a staggering 50\%.