AAA British Private Security

On February 22, 2013, the United Kingdom lost the coveted AAA credit rating, a privilege belonging to the best performing and promising economies. Moody, the credit rating agency, downgraded the UK rating to Aa1. This was the first occasion this happens since 1978. The argument for the downgrade was that “the continuing weakness in the UK's medium-term growth outlook, with a period of sluggish growth which Moody's now expects will extend into the second half of the decade.” The woes of the UK economy (and the Eurozone at large) are becoming a never-ending story of ‘things will get better but somehow seem to get worse.’ A consequence of the adverse economic outlook was outlined in our previous post, The British Ceremonial Army.

To recap, we revised the plans of the UK government for the further downsizing of the armed forces over a horizon roughly overlapping Moody’s forecast period of continuous sluggish growth. The planned reduction is from about 102,000 regular troops to 82,000 by 2020. What are the implications of this reduction for the future of the UK private military industry?

At the outset, we should remember that there is a well-established private military tradition in the UK. This tradition goes back centuries. Its first golden period was during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when the overseas trading companies flourished and helped consolidate the UK as the largest empire of modern times. The key private military protagonist of the period was the English East India Company.

After the end of the Cold War, the British armed forces went through a period of downsizing and reorganization. The downsizing in the 1990s was perhaps as dramatic as the planned 21st century downsizing. Continuing the well-established private military tradition, the British private military industry integrated the released soldiery into the sector. Thus, in the 1990s the UK cemented its position as the world’s leading supplier of Private Military Companies together with the United States.

There are currently about 200 corporate identities in the UK employing former service members and in virtual possession of private military capabilities. Many of these companies deliver private military, security, or intelligence services worldwide. Like in decades past, like in the 1990s, the released soldiery will boost and enhance the private military sector over the next decade. Moreover, as many of the released soldiers, in addition to those retiring early because of low morale, are senior and experience personnel, they are likely to lead the creation of new corporate identities. A 20% expansion of the private military sector and 100 new corporate identities in possession of private military capabilities seems to be a moderate estimate of how much the UK private military sector is likely to grow by the end of the decade.

The UK economy is at a standstill and the AAA credit rating of the country is for the time being history. However, an unseen benefit of the downturn is that the British private military sector is thriving and its AAA status will be maintained for yet another century.

The British Ceremonial Army

As a direct consequence of the global financial downturn and its impact on British public finances, the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) was forced to reinvent itself. Please interpret “reinvention” largely as “downsizing.” It was inevitable. However, the gap between the political rhetoric underpinning the foundations of the new force and the actual shape this force is taking keeps widening.

The 2010 Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) outlined the beginnings of the planned reinvention:

• Royal Navy – reduction of about 5,000 personnel to about 30,000 by 2015.
• Royal Air Force – reduction of about 5,000 personnel to about 33,000 by 2015.
• British Army – reduction of about 7,000 personnel to about 95,000 by 2015.

By July 2012, the reinvention of the British Army has evolved into plans for a further reduction of regular troops from about 102,000 people to roughly 82,000 by 2020. Any of the top-ten American football stadiums can comfortably seat the British Army; that is its actual size. Please do not be surprised if in the next rounds of reinvention, the leaner and smarter force shrinks even further. Periodic announcements by MOD seem to be already adding substance to the claim: the reinvented British Army will be by 2020 a compact force indeed.

Along this downsizing path, we find the MOD headings outlining what the reinvented British Army is expected to achieve: “To succeed in Afghanistan,” “To continue to fulfill our standing commitments,” “To succeed in other operations we are required to undertake at home and overseas.” The maths simply do not add up. When jihadists keep finding new world corners where to set home and thrive, the Arab Spring is fast turning into a long and chilly Winter, China and Russia are fast strengthening their military muscles, the situation in Syria is deteriorating by the hour, nuclear Iran, etc.,  it is hard to imagine that the shrinking British Army can ‘succeed in any other operations they are required to undertake.’

Let’s not forget. To fill the gap, the British government is planning to double the size of the reserve force from about 15,000 to 30.000 people and to start using them in front-line duties along with Territorial Army personnel. The plan calls for a partnership with industry, so that reservists can stay away from their jobs with some ease while on deployment. Down this path, the meaning of being a reservist (called for duty only during times of crisis) and the meaning of being a member of the “territorial” forces goes out of the window. What is the meaning of maintaining a professional and dedicated military class then?

Add all these points up, the shrinking numbers, the diluted meanings, the unimpressive pay soldiers take home, and we finish with a formula not for a smarter force, but for a ceremonial army.

Official documents will not document a component of British state defense and security likely to play a greater role by 2020. This “private” component calls for a greater use of Private Military Companies (or Private Security Companies if you prefer the milder term) by the British enlarged and thriving private security and private military sectors. Which will be at the forefront of British defense and security by 2020, the ceremonial army or properly staffed PMCs and PSCs?

Made in China: a perilous cycle

This is a perplexing story and hardly a fairy tale.

Once upon a time, we avoided things made in China. It might have been the fact that those things were made by people living in a Communist state or that they were poorly made and ultimately disposable. Then two trends converged and, eventually, gave rise to a perilous cycle.

Firstly, mighty corporations decided to shift production to a place were labor was beyond cheap; never mind that the chosen place was located at the other end of the planet and the questionable status of that country’s political leadership. The whole issue was to generate more profits. Initially, the goal was to generate more profits for the benefit of shareholders. Thereafter, the profits were needed not just for shareholders, but also to pay the higher and higher wages of a handful of executives at the top of the corporate ladder. Now, with a dwindling consumer base in the West, profitability is also linked to the penetration of the Chinese market –global brands, but the products are largely manufactured in China.

Secondly, everyone wanted to have more for less. Why to buy one top quality item when we can buy ten made in China for peanuts on every shopping trip? We forgot why we used not to buy made in China and became accustomed to the new rule: nearly everything is made in China, so why bother checking labels to see where the products we buy are made.

The story starts to sound familiar. This is partly the reason why we finished living in the financial mess that the second decade of the 21st century has become.

It is perplexing, but while importantly contributing to make modern China, the West has also become increasingly dependant on the heath of the Chinese economy --and western corporations dependant on the outlined perilous cycle. We support free trade and capitalism, but we cannot see much of a levelled field and fair game here.

Please stop reading for a few seconds and see the connection between the two outlined trends! Please also keep them in mind while you read the rest of the post.

Among the consequences of this perilous cycle, we can identify the massive transfer of technological know-how to China, which through natural assimilation or industrial espionage has contributed to China consolidating a solid technological lead –the process will not be reversed. While the U.S. and its allies engaged in costly military incursions in Afghanistan and Iraq, China quietly consolidated its resurgent technological base and started to exercise greater control over the supply of natural resources. They went shopping in Africa and elsewhere and since the recession, the shopping trips have also included prime real state in the West along with important industrial assets.

You might ask yourself what all of these has to do with security?

• China will increasingly own (or continue to copy) strategic technologies. Please bear in mind that unlike the West and emerging democracies, China bypasses international law whenever they consider it necessary. Yet, they are starting to call the tunes and the U.S. and Europe look increasingly impotent whenever they infringe copyrights, patents or the like.

• What about state-sponsored technological espionage? What about the growing number of incidents involving the (state-sponsored?) hacking of the servers of top online providers and even the websites of state agencies? Do you sense the impotence of the U.S. and Europe when it comes to dealing with these concerning and escalating cyber attacks?

• While the U.S. and its allies continue to hemorrhage money in Afghanistan, China has the surplus resources required to build an enormous and sophisticated defense apparatus. Probably in the second decade of the 21st century, China might invade Taiwan. Perhaps sooner that that, China might engage in trial naval skirmishes with Japan. What the U.S. and Europe can do about it with their more than exhausted budgets, their faltering economic growth, and their growing dependence on the health of the Chinese economy

• On top of the amorphous security component the Chinese deploy overseas to protect their interests, which has included the use of convicts in Africa and quasi-mafias, they already have an answer to Private Military Companies in the form of state-sponsored security companies. These Chinese forces are hardly part of development strategies or attempt to promote values oppressed people aspire to such as democracy and justice. What are we doing about it?

The list of security concerns that the perilous made in China cycle has engendered is long indeed. The point here has been simply to highlight a problem we all created and for which so far there is no escape. Any idea how we can break free from this cycle?

Adverse Forces vs Private Military-Security Companies

The motivation to expand PrivateMilitary.org to incorporate a segment focusing on Adverse Private Forces (APFs) originates in a key argument put forward in Dr. C Ortiz’s book Private Armed Forces and Global Security. The author, a well-known commentator on the Private Military/Security Companies (PMCs/PSCs) subject, argues that a dichotomy in the private realm has emerged and implies that PMCs/PSCs now legitimately and formally collaborate with state and multilateral forces. In particular, these “security partnerships” are established with the aim of deterring or counteracting the predatory advances of APFs. As in the cited book, the types of APFs covered by this new segment of PrivateMilitary.org are terrorist organizations, rebels and insurgents, mafias, drug trafficking organizations, and maritime pirates. In addition to terrorism, insurgency and rebellion, organized crime, drug trafficking, and maritime piracy, our new APFs segment also covers emergent security issues such as the emerging South China Sea conflict, exploration and exploitation of the Arctic region, insurgency in particular regions, food security, cyber crime and cyber warfare. As it is our tradition, this segment will remain a free resource, growing organically and based on your feedback.

 The first stage of this large project has been completed: upgrading the templates and creating the master directories. Guided by the many unfolding events in which APFs and security partnerships are becoming the key conflict players, for example the hostage crisis in Algeria and the descent of Mali into chaos, we are currently populating all the sections.

Unlike other online resources overloaded with pop up ads and jargon, we are pleased to offer you a straight-forward search logic (by region or the name of the particular APF covered). Be your project a college paper, professional research, or simply fostering your knowledge on critical global security issues, we hope you will find this new segment useful and informative.

 We have many other plans for the APFs segment. We are thinking that perhaps it might be useful to list PMCs and PSCs offering particular services alongside particular types or APFs or security issues. However, this next step will be based on your feedback. So please be patience while we complete the work throughout 2013, but do please visit the new sections and give us your opinion.

Olympics 2012 Security: to G4S or not to G4S, That is the Question?

And so the story went that that G4S and the British government would swiftly elevate their partnership to marriage after G4S’s successful operation securing the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Newspapers throughout 2011 reported on the as many as 18,000 security guards that G4S would supply for the Olympics. This is the mother of all private security contracts in Europe. One wondered from where in the U.K. G4S would get all those guards. Channel 4 News recap: “Locog [organizers of the Olympics on behalf of the U.K government] originally contracted G4S to provide 2,000 security guards out of the 10,000 required. But when Locog re-estimated the total number needed to 23,700, G4S agreed in December to supply 10,000 personnel total out of 23,700. The new contract is worth an estimated £284m.” Clearly, Eastern Europeans and individuals from other nationalities would have to be drafted. Then, the question also became how G4S and the U.K government will manage the vetting of such a large force. Some of the answers were provided today July 19, 2012. Two weeks before the start of the Olympics, G4S has been unable to provide the 10,000 (note the shrinking figure) or so security guards agreed to in a (non-public) contract. The U.K Army has stepped in to fill the gap with about 3,300 troops in addition to 10,000 already tasked for the Olympics. Over the next few weeks, we will be covering private security news related to London Olympics 2012 in our home page. Here at Private Military Ecology, we will be commenting on some of the questions people have asked on related issues, e.g. has G4S grown beyond a healthy and manageable size?

Mass migration, the Arab Spring, and multilateral management – with or without PMCs?

In May 2010, The Guardian broke the story of the boat with 72 would be refugees from Africa practically left to die whilst on route to Europe. The dinghy drifted back to Libya's coast 2 weeks later. 63 people died. Today, March 29, 2012, The Guardian revisited the event upon the publication of a formal investigation. The investigative report is very critical of NATO’s involvement and multilateral management. In light of our previous post, the fear of mass migration into Europe, is seems prudent to reflect on the tragedy.

To recap, visit the interactive presentation created by The Guardian: GO>>

The Guardian wrote today "Despite Nato's initial claim that none of its ships received a distress signal regarding the migrant vessel, the report reveals that distress calls were sent out by the Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre (MRCC) in Rome and should have been passed on to at least one ship under Nato command – the Spanish frigate Méndez Núñez, which was in the immediate vicinity of the migrant boat and equipped with helicopters. A rescue would have been "a piece of cake", said one Nato official." >>MORE

The Council of Europe (Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons) investigation into the tragedy, Lives lost in the Mediterranean Sea: who is responsible, raises the issue that "Of particular concern to the Assembly was the worrying failure of a military helicopter and a large military vessel to intervene and rescue the boat after they had come into contact with it. The same applies to at least two fishing vessels. None of these have as yet been identified with any certainty." (para 9) >>MORE

We wrote on our related blog post: "The reader can fill in the gaps and feel free to add other countries in transition such as Syria, Egypt, and perhaps Lebanon in the near future into the equation. The social and economic costs of a North African exodus into Europe would be astronomical and, we adventure to suggest, might have become the chief issue underpinning the growing role of Europe in the Libyan conflict." GO>>

How much has changed since our original post of April 22, 2012? A month before The Guardian broke the story on the refugee vessel.

How much will change in the near future now that Syria is next on the list and Egypt's Spring is heading to an ambiguous Autumn. Some food for though? Survivor of migrant boat tragedy arrested in Netherlands: GO>>

Had a highly experience Private Military Company, or an umbrella contract involving several strategically located contractors with proven maritime skills, been involved, this tragedy would not had happened. NATO –EU would have retained authority over the contract, but rescue and patrol efforts would have been centrally managed and efficient. Perhaps it is time to think on ways of making better use of PMCs given what is likely to be a permanent issue in the 21st century for Europe.

Delta One and Operation Twist

Private security seems to be the only immediately available alternative to alleviate the widening security gap engendered by Delta One-like financial activity and Operations Twist.

Delta One finance
In terms of revenues, Delta One is perhaps the fastest growing segment of large financial institutions. Think of a small corner of a large financial institution where mathematical geeks and cowboy traders get together to engineer even more complex financial products that make disproportionably huge profits out of tiny deviations in indexes, for example those tracking the prices of commodities or values of currencies. Further layers of complexity are added to the already unstable mix and take the form of obscure derivative products, hedges, and securities, which, again, can be re-engineered and then sold and bought in the market. Hard to understand? Yes. Hard to explain? Yes, but that is the point. The CEOs of those financial institutions (and authorities) have no clue about what really goes on in Delta One. Hence, USB realized last week that it lost at least $2.3 billion from ‘unauthorized’ trading at its Delta One unit. No real capital is generated by Delta One, no backbone, just fat to feed the ever growing profits of those involved financial institutions (and the pockets of about 1% of their workforce), and fad to please and appease financial authorities.

Delta One imbalances
Have not Western governments learned about the risks that the merry-go-round of overly speculative finance such as Delta One pose to the global economy? The answer is simply no; they have not learned. Zillions and billions were poured into financial institutions when they brought the global economy to a standstill at the beginning of what will surely be a decade long financial downturn. A large proportion of those zillions and billions were supposed to filter down somehow to ordinary businesses and people, in order to kick start a return to economic growth. It never happened. The zillions and billions were used by financial institutions as the basis for a return to old days. If Western governments could print out money under the guise of “quantitative easing,” then they surely could have concocted something like “synergic (public-private) partnership finance,” whereby financial institutions could have been intervened and forced to lend the given public money to the ultimate desired beneficiaries. This action may have averted the crisis we seem to be sinking deeper by the day. Will the new round of $400 billion of quantitative easing in the U.S., called Operation Twist, make any difference with a government without teeth and synergic partnership finance? See similar initiatives launched throughout the G20 group of nations over the next few weeks and ponder the same question.

Delta One insecurity
The basic economic imbalances of the global economy brought about by overly speculative finance and the insatiable greed of financial institutions were never solved: no real capital (and jobs) created, just figures in balance sheets. Perhaps it is possible to think about the brotherhood of large financial institutions and its incestuous relationship with credit rating agencies as a new and unforeseen type of quasi-sovereign governance. Large financial institutions ultimately decide important aspects of your life and affect your well-being, but like governments now, they seem to be disconnected from what happens to ordinary people, in the real world. You are often hopeless if you want to bring banks to account. Large financial institutions are quasi-sovereign entities because in spite of national and international regulations, they seem to do as they please and governments are afraid of them. Nevertheless, the quasi-sovereign actions of these financial institutions are consequential and it is possible to argue that they have contributed to the climate of ongoing insecurity in which petty crime, civil disorder, and anarchism are fast becoming the order of the day.

Operation Twist law enforcement
As the economic outlook deteriorates, insecurity is on the rise. Indeed, the time might come when people start getting mugged for their supermarket shopping or a liter of milk. Under these circumstances, common sense would dictate a more robust approach to law enforcement. Really? While Operation Twist and other similar initiatives will hypothetically inject rejuvenating energy into the faltering global economy, none of the printed-out money is likely to impact law enforcement. The same situation happened during the previous rounds of quantitative easing and will happen again after whatever follows Operation Twist in the U.S.– probably a direct loan from China. In fact, in tandem with deteriorating public finances, law enforcement budgets have shrunk in real terms since 2008. Although only available for a price, private security is an available alternative for those newly concerned about their safety. Please do not think that Delta One-scale profits are being made in the domestic private security business (we are not talking here about homeland security and counter-terror), as rates have not experience a dramatic increase. Far from that, wages in the security sector have gone down in comparison to other areas of the economy due to an abundant labor supply, for example soldiers returning from Iraq and police officers made redundant to save public money.

Operation Save Yourself private security
Operation(s) Twist and quantitative easing generally have been the answer by state governance to our economic woes so far. However, the connection between rising insecurity and the collective actions of financial institutions (the new type of governance), and between rising insecurity and the need to spend more on law enforcement and policing, evades state governance. Can you think of any other alternative than the private security and military industries to fill the security gap? Quite frankly, we can not. That is to say, unless you believe that vigilante squads and armed neighborhood patrols are a good idea. Private Security Companies (PSCs) and Private Military Companies (PMCs) are correspondingly expanding their footprint in the domestic front and tailoring services to cater for a variety of budgets and needs because more and more people are demanding their services. Given that traditional governance fails to address people’s concerns about the need for more security, and financial institutions couldn’t possible care about it, this is a positive development. It is time to embrace Operation Save Yourself and think more positively about this new bread of private security.

London riots: civilian and private security

Three short paragraphs to help us reflect on the riots in London and other parts of the United Kingdom over the last week. As the response of society and the private sector to the riots has shown, these citations illustrate three trends rapidly consolidating and converging on one another.


From Private Armed Forces and Global Security:

On a different level, through many parts of the world, particularly the West, programs have emerged that empower citizens to take on law enforcement roles. These programs vary from country to country, but often they involve community police officers dealing with minor offences, members of voluntary organizations trained to respond in case of natural or terrorist disasters, and varied forms of crime awareness reporting. While for the most part these programs are designed to add to state efforts and encourage citizens to be alert, they in effect form part of the broader reconfiguration of the monopoly of violence. As well as ordinary citizens becoming part-time police officers ...

Taken from Ortiz, Carlos. Private Armed Forces and Global Security. A Guide to the Issues. Santa Barbara CA, Praeger, 2010, p. 158.

From our previous blog post, The Coming Global Revolution and Private Security:

Government’s outdated initiative and the re-engineering of collective security

Government has lost the plot and more and more people are loosing patience worldwide. As people increasingly look for alternatives for the growing list of security issues government is not longer able or willing to address, security is likely to start incorporating a broader range of non-state suppliers. While for the most part we have in mind security contractors when we think about non-state security supply, the time is coming for civilianized forms of security (neighborhood groups and militias for example) to compete systematically with established public and private security supply. This is the further branching out of an already bifurcated public-private security structure, which remains and under-researched and under-regulated area.

From The Telegraph’s story ‘London riots: 'we can't cope', police admit:’

The Met [The Metropolitan Police of London] suggested that businesses take “precautionary measures”, including conducting regular checks of their buildings and patrolling the surrounding area, adding: “Where possible, retail premises should be suitably staffed with security guards.”

We will not connect the dots for you, but we are sure you can imagine the opposing poles here: active private and civilian security and law enforcement adopting a more ‘ceremonial’ role.

2 May 2011 - Osama bin Laden killed - a day to remember

Also known as Usama Bin Muhammad Bin Ladin, Shaykh Usama Bin Ladin, The Prince, The Emir, Abu Abdallah, Mujahid Shaykh, Hajj, The Director, >> Osama bin Laden was killed by US Special Forces on a compound in the city of Abbottabad, Pakistan:

May 2, 2011: a good day for freedom, a day to remember!

In memory of the victims of 9/11 and 7/7:
http://www.privatemilitary.org/911.html

Libya Uprising Update 2: The fear of mass migration into Europe

The administrations of Prime Minister David Cameron (U.K) and President Nicolas Sarkozy (France) wanted the protagonist role in Libya, and so France and the United Kingdom got the job to impose a so-called “no fly zone” on behalf of the fragmented NATO response to the Libyan crises. Off course the no-fly-zone mission keeps metamorphosing by the day and now also embeds regime change and the training of rebels (by the U.K. as of today, but France and Italy signaled their intention to participate in the training as well); the latter task effectively implying a third-party involvement in a civil war. Haven’t we learned about the risks attached not to establishing at the outset and clearly the extent and scope of foreign military interventions since Afghanistan and Iraq? The answer is probably no. Considering that Europe (Germany aside) is still in the initial stages of economic recovery after the global recession, the question remains: why the UK and France got involved in Libya in such a bold manner, particularly considering that they seem to broaden their parallel and some may say competing roles by the day?

Human rights violations? Yes, that’s part of the reason. A little about oil reserves within close proximity of Europe? OK, probably that is part of the reason too. Moreover, there are also psychological connotations attached to the behavior of PM Cameron and President Sarkozy. PM Cameron was parading the Middles East on a business mission (together with key British defense contractors) when the Libyan conflict erupted - 10 Downing Street responded with amateurish PR. What followed was the debacle of the failed SAS mission to contact the rebels in which SAS personnel and British ‘diplomats’ got captured by the rebels and their sophisticated laptops with passwords practically next to them were seized (whoops again!). Leaving aside the fact that probably a good Private Military Company with their seasoned Special Forces personnel could do a better job for half the price, the debacle forced a more personal approach. Thereafter, once PM Cameron had a taste of military leadership for the first time in his premiership, which probably feels like a drug, it seems he got hooked on it. He is now in a moral as well as a military mission to heal Libya –let’s forget for a moment the fact that there is no money to sustain a long military campaign and hardly any sympathy from the British taxpayers who will ultimately pay for it. As for President Sarkozy, there is a nearly-messianic desire to be seen as a world leader.

We have already a potent mix behind the military intervention in Libya. For the time being, it looks like PM Cameron and President Sarkozy found their Iraq. In the background, however, there is a powerful issue that might help to explain better (and continue to guide) the European response to the Libyan crisis: the fear and longer term implications of mass emigration of Libyans, and Northern Africans broadly, into Europe. In this light, it seems prudent to ground empirically the issue. The figures below have been recorded by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):

• Over 500,000 fled Libya during the first month of the conflict; about 80% of them foreign workers. There are no figures available on how many Libyans were outside the country when the crisis erupted, but these expatriates are unlikely to return to the country for a long time if ever.
• As of April 12, about 500,000 Libyans had left the country by land and crossed the border into adjacent countries; about 200,000 went to Egypt, 236,000 to Tunisia, 36,000 to Niger, 14,000 to Algeria, 6,200 to Chad, and 2,800 to Sudan.
• There has also been a continuous influx of Libyans into Italy (particularly Lampedusa Island) and Malta by sea. For example, between March 26 and April 12, 3,358 people reached Italy and over 1,100 Malta from Libya.
• The growing influx of Africans into Europe by sea is not restricted to Libyans. For example, on the weekend 9-10 April, three boats carrying 1,008 mainly Somalis and Nigerians arrived on Lampedusa Island (Italy). Between January 15 and February 15, about 5,200 Tunisians reached Italian territory; the media reports that the total since January is at least 25,000.
• Libyans want to go to Italy and Tunisians to France, their respective former colonial masters. Last week, Italy granted temporary permanent residence to about 25,000 Tunisians in Italy, so that they could transit freely within Europe and reach France. France denied entry to the first train carrying them in mass. If France eventually grants Tunisians entry, probably the French will be happy for them to reach the ferry terminal in the west coast so that they can head to the U.K.
• Europe is the prime destination word-wide for potential refugees. According to UNHCR, of about 358,800 asylum applications in the industrialized world in 2010, Europe received 269,900 of them (about 75%).

The reader can fill in the gaps and feel free to add other countries in transition such as Syria, Egypt, and perhaps Lebanon in the near future to the equation. The social and economic costs of a North African exodus into Europe would be astronomical and, we adventure to suggest, might have become the chief issue underpinning the growing role of Europe in the Libyan conflict. We do not need the next round of Wikileaks to make this point.