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47 German Y.B. Int'l L. 502 (2004)
Outsourcing War: Private Military Companies and International Humanitarian Law

handle is hein.journals/gyil47 and id is 503 raw text is: Outsourcing War - Private Military Companies and International Humanitarian Law By Nicki Boldt A. Introduction War, in a non-technical sense, implies continuous fighting conducted by or- ganized militaries which engage the responsibility of governments.' Outsourc- ing means purchasing a significant percentage of intermediate components or services from outside suppliers.2 Outsourcing war therefore means purchasing needed military components and services from so called private military compa- nies (PMCs).3 Today, outsourcing of military functions by States like the United States of America or the United Kingdom has reached a scale that was not predictable ten years before. From 1994 to 2002, the US Defense Department entered into over 3,000 contracts with US-based PMCs with a value of more than $ 300 billion.4 These figures will rise to new unknown heights in 2003 and 2004 due to the conflict in Iraq.5 A third of the US budget for the war in Iraq is reportedly spent 1 Lothar Kotzsch, The Concept of War in Contemporary History and International Law, 1956, 56. 2 Gretchen Morgenson/Campbell R. Harvey, The New York Times Dictionary of Money and Investing, 2002. ' Often known as Private Military Contractors, Private Military Firms or Private Se- curity Companies. 4 According to Laura Peterson from The Center for Public Integrity, Privatizing Combat, The New World Order, 2002, available at: http://www.publicintegrity.org/bow/ report. aspx?aid= 148. ' International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), The ICRC Is to Expand Con- tacts With Private Military and Security Companies, 2004, available at: http://www. icrc.org/Web/Eng/siteeng0.nsf/iwpList74/21414DE8FCAF2645C1256EE50038A63 1; Peterson (note 4).