Political Ruminations

Blackwater–Xe–Now Known as Academi

For anyone still tracking Blackwater (I’m still watchful), you may recall that they changed their name back in 2009 due to all the bad publicity they were getting. It was changed again  in December 2011, and Blackwater is now known as ‘Academi’, a misleadingly innocuous name by intention.

Blackwater –>Xe Services LLC –>Academi

Meanwhile, Blackwater founder, Erik Prince, went off and moved to the Middle East in a snit over Blackwater’s poor reputation in the U.S., well deserved as it was. From Academi’s Wiki page:

Prince announced his resignation as CEO on March 2, 2009. He will remain as chairman of the board but will no longer be involved in day-to-day operations. Joseph Yorio was named as the new president and CEO, replacing Gary Jackson as president and Prince as CEO. Danielle Esposito was named the new chief operating officer and executive vice president.^[30]

In 2009, Prince announced that he would relinquish involvement in the company's day-to-day business and in December along with some of his ownership rights. He is also considering becoming a teacher.^[31] In late 2010, Prince moved to Abu Dhabi to be able to spend more time with his family.^[32]

In 2011 former NSA head and CIA executive Bobby Ray Inman became the head of Xe's board of directors.^[33] In May 2011, Xe named Ted Wright as CEO.^[34] Wright hired a new governance chief to oversee ethical and legal compliance and established a new board composed of former government officials, including Jack Quinn, former Clinton adviser, and John Ashcroft.^[35] In June, 2011 the company named Suzanne Folsom its chief regulatory and compliance officer and deputy general counsel.^[36] In July, Jack Quinn, former White House Counsel to President Bill Clinton and former Chief of Staff to Vice President Al Gore, was named as an Independent Director of the company.^[37]

In December 2011, Xe changed its name again to "Academi". The name refers to Plato's Academy^[2] and is meant, according to Ted Wright, to reflect a more "boring" image.^[38]

Blackwater Doing Black Ops for Corporations?

Via Jeremy Scahill, the authority on Blackwater, aka XE Services [emphasis is mine]:

Over the past several years, entities closely linked to the private security firm Blackwater have provided intelligence, training and security services to US and foreign governments as well as several multinational corporations, including Monsanto, Chevron, the Walt Disney Company, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines and banking giants Deutsche Bank and Barclays, according to documents obtained by The Nation. Blackwater's work for corporations and government agencies was contracted using two companies owned by Blackwater's owner and founder, Erik Prince: Total Intelligence Solutions and the Terrorism Research Center (TRC). Prince is listed as the chairman of both companies in internal company documents, which show how the web of companies functions as a highly coordinated operation. Officials from Total Intelligence, TRC and Blackwater (which now calls itself Xe Services) did not respond to numerous requests for comment for this article.

One of the most incendiary details in the documents is that Blackwater, through Total Intelligence, sought to become the "intel arm" of Monsanto, offering to provide operatives to infiltrate activist groups organizing against the multinational biotech firm.  read more...

Infiltration of activist groups by corporations owned by Erik Prince, the indisputable Prince of Black Ops. Downright scary.