Hazard pay U.S. soldiers eyeing lucrative jobs in Iraq

TIKRIT, Iraq -- Spc. Thomas Daniels' one-year stint in Iraq as an Army engineer is almost over. But the 24-year-old is already making plans to return -- without a gun and, he hopes, with a lot a more money.

Daniels has applied online for construction work with Washington's military contractor in Iraq -- Kellogg, Brown & Root -- eyeing a job he says will pay more than twice his current salary of around $1,700 a month.

"That's where I am going. It's where I need to be," said Daniels, from Wilmington, Del. "I know I can't stay in the Army. It doesn't pay enough."

Daniels is one of many soldiers at this military base being lured back to Iraq when their term of service ends -- not by re-enlisting but by taking up private work with companies contracted by the Pentagon.

To an extent unprecedented in previous conflicts, the United States has outsourced much of the logistical and operational support for its occupation of Iraq to private companies in order to ease the burden on its stretched armed forces.

KBR -- whose corporate parent, Halliburton, was formerly headed by Vice President Dick Cheney -- is the biggest private employer in Iraq, with some 15,000 workers in the country and neighboring Kuwait. That work force is more than the 11,000 troops deployed by Britain, the largest U.S. coalition partner.

Perks for workers

Besides higher pay, soldiers, reservists and retired officers are attracted by perks like tax-free salaries, better living conditions and regular home leaves -- a major draw for soldiers as one-year deployments become the norm.

Alongside jobs in cafeterias, construction, engineering and communications, demand is high for armed security guards. Iraq is awash with ex-soldiers from around the world working for private security firms.

Former British, American and Nepali soldiers guard U.S. engineers, visiting VIPs and State Department workers, and escort trucks and convoys traveling the country. They are authorized to carry pistols and automatic weapons.

"It's a great opportunity ... to make your money and run," said Ellis Monk, a former Army Ranger from Huntsville, Ala., who works for one of the leading security firms, DynCorp.

Contractors for U.S. companies also operate missile defense batteries, pilot unmanned aerial vehicles and analyze intelligence data.

At the base in Tikrit, civilian contractors in work boots and baseball caps cruise the well-manicured streets in Ford trucks and live and work in neat bungalows.

More menial jobs on the base are increasingly filled with workers from low-wage countries, or Iraqis. Indians and Bangladeshis serve up the chow here in Tikrit as elsewhere in Iraq.

KBR workers say soldiers regularly approach them to ask about the possibilities of joining the company.

The KBR Web site lists thousands of vacancies. KBR regional spokeswoman Melissa Norcross said more jobs were likely as the company takes over more tasks from the military.

Sweeping personnel cuts

Ex-soldiers aren't the only ones getting positions, but they're in high demand because of their experience and willingness to work in a war zone, she said.

"It's just the way it is," Norcross said in a telephone interview from Kuwait. "They (ex-soldiers) can cope with the environment. They are willing to come over."

The boom in private contractors follows sweeping personnel cuts in the Army that has seen it shrink from 2.1 million in 1990 to 1.4 million now.

"They want us to be soldiers first, logisticians second," said Maj. Roderick Sanchez, chief of contracting for the Tikrit-based 4th Infantry Division. "That's where the focus is going."

Private companies now provide much of what Sanchez used to procure for the 30,000 U.S. troops in the region. Sanchez, from Las Cruces, N.M., said he has had plenty of offers from private companies and, so far, has turned them down.

"They have asked me," said Sanchez, who is up for retirement soon. "I said come and talk to me in three years."