Talk:Executive Outcomes

Founder
The introductory text hosted on the .mil site contradicts this article's claim that Simon Mann founded EO: "When researching EO, it must be understood that Eeben Barlow, its founder...." It also makes it clear that the company was founded in 1989, not 1993 as the Wikipedia article wrongly states.

It's also worth nothing that the Army page's links are woefully outdated and many, if not most, of the links are dead.

The content seems to concentrate more on Mann than EO, which are distinct entities. From my reading on EO, I can't find evidence that Mann was the sole owner of EO.

What exactly constitutes "making a fortune"? This and other content sounds editorialized, as if the author intends to portray Mann as a nefarious war profiteer. While that may be the case, it should be made clear, rather than hiding under innuendo.

The CNN article (Aug 28, 2004) quoted in the article is a dead link. I tried searching CNN's site, but couldn't find this article. The other article that dealt with the EO scandal published on that date was http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/africa/08/28/equatorial.thatcher/index.html

I could not find the direct quote on CNN's site. Maybe the link should be changed or updated?

EO was prominently featured in: History Channel "Soldiers for Hire" documentary I took some of the information from that source.

I corrected, rewrote, and updated much of this article because of these issues.

--SamClayton 07:35, 10 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Sounds like a typical wiki argument. Eben Barlow has a book and an excellent blog specifically to correct much of the misinformation generated about EO. The truth and the facts are much less exciting than the speculation. Often the story the media tells has little to do with the actual events and company in question.

- EO was a South African company created to provide skills and training from ex military to private sector. There is nothing unusual or illegal at the time. There is some good information on this page about the early growth and structure. - EO contacted by Simon Mann and Tony Buckingham to liberate his oil gear in the port of Soyo. After some members were killed EO hit the world's media radar. - They were then hired to train the Angolan forces and provided a more robust role in combat. They made a lot of money very quickly and invested in in many strange ventures. None panned out as well as the original idea of providing ex soldiers to train and fight in bush wars. - The funds from that venture pushed EO into a more visible and commercial position. Simon Mann and Tony Buckingham can be viewed as clients and EO as the contractors for that venture. There were some attempts to legitimize the provision of military services using a front man (Tim Spicer) and South Africans to do the heavy lifting - There were attempts to create other "EO"'s some real, some fake, some overtly criminal. Just having South Africans on the payroll (like Tim Spicer and Aegis in Iraq or Simon Mann and his coup attempt) doesn't mean you are EO - EO worked in Angola, Sierra Leone, East Timor and with Sandline in Sierra Leone and Papua New Guinea - EO as a business was shut down due to pending anti-mercenary legislation which has never really been enforced - Simon Mann, Tim Spicer, Tony Buckingham and the rest of the non South Africans tried to create a legitimate umbrella or shell company for EO but failed magnificently in Sierra Leone and Bougainville. Sandline is dead and its offshoots are dead. - The coup attempt in EG involved some former EO and Sandline folks but Logo Logistics was Simon Mann's corporate entity (created after his and Tim Spicer's split with Sandline) You can read all about EO, Sandline, Logo Logistics etc and the modern versions in my book) Thatcher, Calil and Wales had nothing to do with EO but many of the same people have worked in many iterations of security firms who hired South Africans from the apartheid era (black and white) - Many of the same people who worked for EO currently work in Iraq and Afghanistan for private security firms. - There are plenty of excellent books that could be referenced to provide dates, names and facts - Opinions and conspiracy theories about EO are usually a waste of time since an "encyclopedia" should provide facts, the media can make up the rest :))

- RYP —Preceding unsigned comment added by RYP (talk • contribs) 22:48, 29 January 2010 (UTC)


 * There is no real conflict between the founding date of 1989 and the date when the company was registered in the UK in 1993 as a limited (LTD) concern. There is an intrinsic difference between founding a company and then officially registering it. There are no real complications with that at all and they are not contradictory. 5.56.31.175 (talk) 13:20, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

Minotaur Information Systems
I'm surprised there's no mention of the merger between EO and Minotaur Information Systems in 2000 according to the South African newspaper, the Dispatch. I'm sure it's the same EO PMC, since it mentions government and parastatal training and recruitment. The merged companies formed a new company called Cosmos.--YoungFreud 19:24, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * → This merger forming a company called Cosmos has nothing to do with Executive Outcomes the Private_military_contractor, but a small recruitment agency in the private sector, which latched onto the name Executive Outcomes to capatilise on the meme of the time. This has nothing to do with the EO of this article and the reference ought to be removed. There is no factual evidence to support the conjecture that this is the same company. Satur9 13:58, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Phoenix
→→ Also there are no citations for the statement beginning with "Other reports" under the phoenix heading, I am removing the entire section as it is pure conjecture and has no factual basis, unless someone can provide hard evidence of these "reports". Satur9 14:09, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
 * The Northbridge Services bit is referenced under external links, so should stay.Phase4 22:20, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Which external links in particular? Just pointing us to "external links" is not exactly all that useful... &mdash;  Imp i  22:58, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Publications
A very good book for this is Bloodsong, by James Hooper which goes alot into the their operation in Angola. I'll try to find my copy and get more info abou this. Philbentley 04:18, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Operations in East Timor
Does anyone's knows if EO has been operating in East Timor for sure? given to the political sensitivities of its bigger neighboors like Australia, im doubtful if they were ever present there(EO attempt to help PNG in bougainville crisis,ended in failure due to objections by Australia). If so, can anyone indicate what role that EO participated on?

Koevoet, Thatcher and the Zim issue
Phase4, I must admit to being rather surprised that you reverted my edits. Is it really in question that Koevoet was not a SADF unit, that Thatcher had no known links to Executive Outcomes and that EO was long-defunct by the time of the 2005 Zim/Equatorial Guinea incident? Let's go through the changes I made:
 * Clarified that Koevoet was not part of the SADF, that 32 Battalion was not "Barlow's" (plus the Recon Wing was actually pretty small, many of EO's personnel came from the main unit) and that neither units were technically 'special forces'. The only actual special forces units in the SADF were the Reconnaissance Regiments. Care to explain why this is so objectionable that it requires an outright revert?
 * Removed mention of Mark Thatcher. Again, this is hardly contentious since there's absolutely no known links between Thatcher and EO. At best, he was involved in a plot with a single guy who was once part of EO (in a rather nebulous capacity), long after the company became defunct. He doesn't belong in this article, in fact we should probably remove the external link referring to him as well.
 * Removed mention of the Zimbabwe/Eq. Guinea plot. EO ceased operations in 1998, long before the events in Zimbabwe were likely even under consideration. Even if it did morph into Northbridge Services Group (which is rather unlikely), the latter company has never even been implicated in the Zim incident, let alone conclusively linked to it. At most, the only link EO has with the Zim incident is that a single guy who used to be involved with the firm was captured in Zim. Fact is, details about Mann's own life *after* leaving EO belong solely in the article about him and the coup plot, not in the EO article. &mdash; Impi 20:30, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * The thing is, Impi, the article correctly says that EO was formed out of a number of units, including disbanded Koevoet, former SADF special forces and other elite troops. Why are you making a fuss about this rather obvious fact?


 * You admit that Simon Mann was inextricably linked to EO, and to the Equatorial Guinea attempted coup. Thatcher was not just involved but convicted in relation to the same failed coup attempt. You seem to be trying to airbrush out a number of inconvenient truths, and you might wish to take time to reconsider before making any further deletions from the EO article.Phase4 21:30, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Surely you jest. What the article actually says is: "...SADF special forces from Barlow's elite 32 Battalion Reconnaissance Wing and Koevoet, were disbanded" which clearly implies that both 32 Battalion and Koevoet were SADF special forces. My edit, though imperfect (some EO personnel also came from the Recce regiments and the CCB), was nonetheless far more accurate than the one you reverted in favour of. The correct response from you should've been to improve my edit, not revert back to a far worse one.


 * And frankly, I couldn't give two hoots about Mann and Thatcher's shenanigans in Zim. Your attempts to imply an agenda on my behalf through the selective parsing of my words are pointless and misguided. All I'm really interested in here is whether or not Thatcher had any link to EO (he did not) and whether Mann's post-EO activities have any place in this article. Again, they do not. This article is about Executive Outcomes, a mercenary corporation that existed from 1989 to 1999. It's not about Mann (except in his capacity until 1999 as an EO employee), it's not about Thatcher and it's not about the Zimbabwe/Eq. Guinea plot. We already have articles dedicated to all three, which is where such non-EO information belongs. There is no airbrushing of inconvenient facts in my edits, despite your arbitrary accusation; there's only the cleaning up of unrelated information from an article. Now how about you provide me with some proper and reasonable reasons as to why my edits had to be reverted. &mdash; Impi 23:26, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Memory
As I recall they did a job stopping civil war with 300 men and then the UN came in with 5,000 men and were run off?? Anyone with details? Gerald anthropologist —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.247.186.104 (talk) 00:54, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I remember seeing this on the History channel, I believe it was in Sierra Leone or Liberia, and they wiped out the rebel group who had recently captured one of the major cities, I think this led to them being disbanded, I'll see what I can find Vladiator 04:52, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Right here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sierra_Leone_Civil_War has mention of it Vladiator 04:55, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

FAA
I recently read this article and could not determine what the FAA is, even though it is mentioned twice. You can't just throw acronyms in without telling the reader what they are. Even if we understood every acronym used by mankind in every language, how are we supposed to know which FAA this refers to? Hopefully you aren't talking about the FAA that oversees airline passengers here in the states, amazing that EO trained them too!

Spelling errors, unprofessional descriptive adjectives ('including weapons purchased from lucrative sources' - What the hell is a lucrative source!?). This may be the worst wikipedia article written.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.162.24.8 (talk) 00:42, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Singirok forced Chan to do what?

 * The Commander of the Papua New Guinea Defence Force, Jerry Singirok - who had not been consulted - ordered the detaining of all the mercenaries on their arrival, and forced the Prime Minister Sir Julius Chan with Papua New Guinea coming close to a military coup.[1]

Apart from the link being dead, there's the mystery over what Singirok forced Chan to do. Round up the Mercenaries? Cancel the contract? Kiss on a first date? MartinSFSA (talk) 17:00, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Neutrality
The introductory material (before the list of contents) clearly suffers from political bias. Indicators of bias: I would delete the second and third paragraphs entirely, or at least move them into their own section and edit them heavily to remove the bias. Anseljh (talk) 06:06, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
 * more than half of the introduction focuses on controversies and opinions
 * tone and language
 * irrelevant discussion of "IMF and World Bank reforms"

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