they occurred when a small turboprop plane with the call sign "blackwater 61" slammed into a mountainn afghanistan. the flight was operated by presidential airways, the aviation arm of blackwater, the private military firm. it was operating under a government contract to haul troops, mail and supplies to remote landing strips. the crash was barely noted, except for the fact that one of the passengers was lieutenant colonel mike mcmahon-- at the time, the highest-ranking soldier to die in the war. but as we first reported last february, it was an accident that never should have happened, and you would not be hearing about it tonight if it weren't for his widow, herself a former high-ranking army officer, who has waged a five-year battle against one of the military's most important contractors. >> colonel jeanette mcmahon: he would have liked to have been able to go out, you know, fighting, not in the back of some plane, somebody else's victim. >> kroft: army colonel jeanette mcmahon was no ordinary widow, and in her mind, her husband was the victim of blackwater. until her retirement a

blackwater? >> commissioner, i cannot answer live blackwater was selected. i can tell you that i know the proposal that we in in in my view, the proposal that when end, the technical portion of the proposal was a new technical proposal. i can tell you also that we feel and i feel today that we could not meet the timeline of getting folks on that contract in the 60 days that were required. and one more -- >> i am running short of my time but i do want to comment that i saw you and you gave excellent testimony at the december 20 hearing on the police training contract. the gao agreed with you. it looks to me that it was being set up for blackwater, again, because the have existing facilities and country. having been kicked out of iraq by the iraqis, blackwater is creating a new empire for itself based on the fact that it has existing facilities in afghanistan. >> if i could give you another minute, can i expand the discussion with mr. ryder? talk a little bit about it, mr. ryder, about the challenges you would have to have met the 60 days and the kind of actio

as you know, blackwater has an incredible history. they shot all the iraqis which looks like a hair-trigger response. they authorized payments to allow a company to continue in business. the company's under continuing investigation with the foreign corrupt practices act. in '09, blackwater lost its state department contract to provide diplomatic security for officials in iraq because of the nisor square incident in. april 2010, federal prosecutors charged five former senior blackwater officials with weapons violations and making false statements. why in the world would we enter into any new contract with a company like that? >> i don't think i can answer that in detail. when folks making decisions on those contracts have to look at past performance. obviously the way they worked in the past. things you raised would raise concern, i would imagine. not income the decision chain, i don't know exactly how that decision would have been made by the fks who are making it. >> ms. ugone, how about you? >> there are a couple of things. as bill

the expression is to black list blackwater.you do support that or my impression is you don't support that >> a third-party certifier for incident or qualification. >> eve argued for dod to establish a multiple award contract. >> i want to ask you if you would say that such a certifier could say to blackwater you're not to get more contracts and tuesday government would say that's good enough for us they won't get more contracts. a real simple one, blackwater, independent body could it have said no more contract? >> does the independent body have access to all the investigative information, all of the witnesses, all of the normal terms? >> submission by the black water firm. >> you're against? >> others should make that judgment. >> let me get some reaction, miss brian, you know that the incident reporting system is a self-reporting system, that is the only way it gets in to the files of incident reporting is that a psc firm says to the government here we have nancy dent to report and there have been a number of studies that cas

. >> on friday, there was a reason award to a blackwater company. i want to ask you, does state county incident were 17 incidents were killed by blackwater and extreme of past form of fat is bad when it considers bid by black water? >> that is a complex question. it is based on past performance of the contract. ok. i do not have any more time. with discount as past performance? >> is still an ongoing court case. i do not want to comment on that at this time please. commissioner hanke, please, sir. witnesses are familiar withthe section deals with very comprehensive training, alleging, and equipping of private security functions. in an area of combat operation. with each of the witnesses tell me if you believe -- with each of the witnesses tell me if you think that section 22 is the most complete lot for private securities -- private contractors? >> yes. >> sir, likewise. >> likewise. >> yes, but i also think that because we use a lot of different protective security details that follow other governments rules, we need a different prototype. >> ok, m

the expression is to black list blackwater. you do support that or my impression is you don't support that >> a third-party certifier for incident or qualification. >> eve argued for dod to establish a multiple award contract. >> want to ask you if you would say that such a certifier could say to blackwater you're not to get more contracts and tuesday government would say that's good enough for us they won't get morecontracts. a real simple one, blackwater, independent body could it have said no more contract? >> does the independent body have access to allhe investigative inrmation, all of the witnesses, all of the normal terms? >> submission by the black water firm. >> you're against? >> others should make that judgment. >> let me get some reaction, miss brian, you know that the incident reporting system is a self-reporting system, that is the only way it gets in to the files of incident reporting is that a psc firm says to the government here we have nancy dent to report and there have been a number of studies that cast grav

i am upset that c-span and the media have nnt informed us about blackwater, and halliburton, and who they really are and where the tentacles go. a funny thing happened here on long island that shows you where the station is headed. i read somewhere that grummond, a big contractor here, helped to build the space shuttle. they just received a huge contract to build these huge bllimps that will be flying over afghanistan and pakistan. much like the drones, but from a different altitude. they will not be ready for two years. the blooms will not be ready for another two years. so, if you think your sons and daughters are coming down any time soon, if you think there are not people who want americans to stay and die, and be in the middle east, think again. host: let's look at an ap story from washington. the top u.s. commander has been summoned to washington to explain his controversial comments about colleagues in a recent interview. the official said that general stanley mcchrystal who has since issued an apology for comments, has been directed to attend the monthly white house meeting i

but let me say for the record, even when blackwater was taking wear oo me and other diplomats. they lost 30 people, and they didn't lose any of the people they were in charge of. so that has to be part of the record. wherever they screwed up, or some of their people didd let's take that off the chart. now answer the question. >> i just drove to that because you asked what keeps me up at night. >> ok. >> when you talk about the inherent danger of more danger on static or the road? i don't think you can make the qualifier. the instant that i gave you was in a static facility and three bombers came in the facility and we lost someone. >> bear with me. i am asking where is a possibility for your people to screw-up. that's the answer. this is not a trick question. i don't have a sense how i come down with this. i am asking you because you deal with it. i cannot believe if i was in charge of a company that i wouldn't be concerned about some more than others. that's what i asking. >> details are more common than static security. >> that's the question i was asking. >> commissioner, i

they will get blackwater coming in killing people at will. iran should get the bomb. guest: it is a fair point that is widelyyshared by many including many of the iranian leadership as they look back to 2003. one lesson they grew was that a country like north korea is immune to a u.s. invasion because they have a nuclear weapon and the country like iraq was not immune. there are several ways of looking at this. by continuing to pursue this path of nuclear weapons capabilities, they are inviting more pressure on them. it is the chicken and the egg. as the pressure on iran because of nuclear ambitions or because the powers want to keep iran down? i think that the concern, which many people now have, is one lesson that thee may drop. it is the lesson of pakistan. that as a country which after in achieve a nuclear weapon, tested a nuclear weapon, after one week of outrage the world was so concerned that they engaged pakistan. they got a lot of incentive after they achieved and across the the nuclear threshold. there is this double standard that when you actually have a nu

the cia, blackwater, other givene contractors are this money and they in turn give it to the warlords. you can bet that they are hanging onto some of that money themselv. we are just unbelievably corrupt -- is more than bad. host: what is a different model? how can things be changed in afghanistan? caller: turn around and go to east, or to the west -- come back home, get the troops out. get them out of afghanistan, iraq -- get them out of all the bases we have all over the world. it is the most misguided policy i can imagine. host: bringing it back to this story, the report describes a system in which subcontractors between $1,500 up $15 project to supply guides and secure safe passage through territory they control. let's go to vivian on the democrats' line from memis, tennessee. caller: our government is dealing in illegal things over there. that money they are using in afghanistan to pay this what here to save right people unemployment and jobs, manufacturing jobs people.ing our government needs to come out of afghanistan, like the previous caller said. people are suffering right h

congress used to authorize these private parties -- you could have somebody like blackwater, for example, do this more efficiently than the military. there's too much coast line to cover, as you said. they could specialize and find out where the hideouts are and go after them. the only way the government needs to be involved is to have a bounty. ron paul made a proposal in 2001. he introduced the act in 2001 to also target osama bin laden. that it's when you have pirates or outlaws that do not have an affiliation with a particular country. secondly, i'm trying to understand the israeli boarding of the boat in international waters. that seems to skate around the idea of piracy as well. if america cents a humanitarian ship to gaza -- and let's say they killed her -- how would they react differently? they should have been exempt. that seems like an act of piracy to me. thank you. guest: thank you for your questions. the idea is not new. the government talked about that. the issue of private security companies given licenses to hunt down and potentially kill people that they think might be g

just mention a ccuple that have been thrown out by various one is as a result of -- the event with blackwater about three years ago in iraq, the kennedy commission, which was published by the state departmmnt,,required -- based on recommendation out of the kennedy report is to have a go over with every convoy from the state department. some recommended that would be useful for the department of defense is to make sure that every time there is a large convoy to go out. that's one option that's been another option that has been mentioned is to do in depth analysis of who is being hired. so the general view of many of the people that have lloked in depth in this is that progress can be made. >> mr. forsberg, i tried to get from the last panel -- i understand i wasn't going to get much response from them, but at what point does it become counterproductive to coin a strategy to have the kind of activity that's been found in this report? what level is acceptable to still have an effective counterinsurgency strategy, to have a parallel structure of authority outside of the afghan government? >> righ

increasingly the minister of interior is saying we will not accept american pscs, you stuck with with blackwater a year longer than you should have so get rid of them to the extent you can. i want to ask professor avant, you know that -- do you know a development in the state department by which they're moving tard ease much quicker, training and commissioning of people who can fulfill some of the protective duties? >> there is this -- >> security protective special istds? >> well, in the state department for a while, there's been the talk of building a civilian reserve of some sort. and there are, i know, from my chat with you ts morning, some of that is focused on security issues right now. think that that's a smart way to go. >> okay. it may take time but we might get there. dr. stanger, you drew a distinction even though you're characterized it as being one end of the speck trug trump between static security and moving security and i want t see if we can even with your concerns, aid may say that for its mission it wants iraqi locals because it has reasons that this is better for it. inhose s