"With such a stake in the region, Washington keeps close watch as governments rise and fall, and the facts surrounding such events are often as murky as the state finances of some oil-rich African states." "Oil has historically been a cause of coups and conflicts in the region. It does bring out the worst in people... and — time and again — the beneficiaries seem to loiter in West London ...", says Edouarde.

"In the uncertain political environment of the post-Cold War world in which countless military specialists have been released onto the free market, the professional soldier of fortune has again become a key player in the business of death. The modern condottieri are not the lawless guns for hire who turned the Congo into a free for-all thirty-five years ago. Men like Mike Hoare, Jacques Schramme, and Bob Denard have been phased out in favour of new corporate identities which are, in effect, the logical extension of a borderless global business environment."

"The mercenary organization which was the first to take advantage of the opportunities available in post-Cold War was Executive Outcomes (EO). EO was registered in the UK in September 1993 by Simon Mann, a former troop commander in 22 SAS specializing in intelligence and South African director of Ibis Air, and Tony Buckingham, another Chelsea-based businessman. EO was one of more than eighteen firms, including international oil, gold and diamond mining ventures, a chartered accountancy practice, an airline, foreign security services, and offshore financial management services, managed from a modern, glass-fronted building at 535 King's Road, London, known as Plaza 107 ..."

"Tony Buckingham is pulling now the strings as chief executive of: Heritage Oil and Gas, European Representative Office, 34 Park Street, London W1K 2JD ..." "The company, originally British, now registered in the Bahamas, is associated with a Canadian oil corporation, Ranger Oil. Both companies had drilling interests in Angola ..."

..."Angola is a country that since the mid 1970s was torn by civil war between the Marxist MPLA government and UNITA rebels who were covertly assisted by the South African special forces."

"One of the centres of the oil industry in Angola is the town of Soyo, which was under the control of UNITA forces in the early 1990s. In January 1993 Mann and Buckingham commissioned EO to seize the town. A force of fewer than one hundred men, led by Laffras Luitingh, a former major in South African 5 Reconnaissance Commando, succeeded in March that year, but UNITA quickly recaptured the town after EO pulled out. The Angolan government then asked Ranger and Heritage to hire a larger force in exchange for oil concessions. Ranger allocated US$ 30 million for the operation and placed the contract with Mann and Buckingham."

"They commissioned an EO team of five-hundred men which performed so effectively that EO commenced the 'restructuring and retraining' of the entire Angolan army in August 1993. The contract with the Angolan government was initially for one year. That was extended for a further year and then on a month-by-month basis for a final four months. During that period EO is widely credited with crippling UNITA, its former ally, forcing the rebels to the bargaining table, and being responsible for the cease-fire signed in November 1994. EO officially left Angola in January 1996, having earned in excess of US$ 100 million through its services. Many members stayed, moving to SRC partner security firms such as Saracen Angola..."

'the diamond dogs of war'

... "The next operation was in Sierra Leone, where the rapacious and corrupt military junta of Valentine Strasser was under siege from the bloodthirsty and anarchic Revolutionary United Front of Foday Sankoh. EO deployed its first 170 men in Sierra Leone in May 1995. The force came equipped with two MI17s and an MI24 Hind helicopter gunship, two Boeing 727 transports and an Andover casualty-evacuation aircraft. The foreign professionals turned the war around completely. In March of 1996 the Sierra Leonian people in their first election for 28 years voted in Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, a career United Nations bureaucrat, as president; Strasser's junta retired into exile; and in May Sankoh sued for a cease-fire. The importance of the EO presence for stability in the country was graphically illustrated when, less than six months after EO withdrew from Sierra Leone in February this year, the military seized power in another coup."

"EO performed some public relations work in Sierra Leone, such as ferrying the local football team to the African All Nations Cup in Johannesburg. But their real interests were strictly commercial. The fee for EO services included US$15 million and, of greater long term significance, a stake in the coveted Kono region diamond mines, which produce an estimated US$250 million of diamonds a year."

"This commercial enterprise has given EO its nickname; 'the diamond dogs of war'. A recent United Nations report noted that once a firm like EO is able to establish security in an area 'it apparently begins to exploit the concessions it has received by setting up a number of associates and affiliates' which engage in 'legitimate' businesses. Such firms thus acquire 'a significant, if not hegemonic, presence in the economic life of the country in which it is operating'."

"One of the Plaza 107 group firms is Branch Energy (BE), an English corporation which registered in the Isle of Man, a tax haven, in April 1994. EO is a major shareholder in BE, with 60 per cent of BE Angola, 40 per cent Of BE Uganda, and 40 per cent Of BE Sierra Leone. In June 1996 BE merged with Carson Gold, controlled by Canadian mining magnate Robert Friedland, to form Diamond Works Inc. This company, which has prospecting rights in Congo, Namibia, Botswana and Senegal, and is now the second largest concession holder in Angolait, was recently awarded the Alto Kwanza diamond exploration concession in Bie Province, covering an area of more than 18,ooo sq. km. In July 1996 the Sierra Leone government awarded the company a twenty-five-year lease to the Koidu diamond fields in the Kono region 'liberated' by EO. Diamond Works has contracted Lifeguard, another SRC subsidiary, at US$ 60,000 a month to protect its diamond fields in Sierra Leone ..."

... "These are just some examples of Africa's experience with private military forces collaborating with monopoly-players in a global spider-web", Edouarde says. Gertrud asks: "And who is the mastermind of this spider-web?"