Five eyewitnesses to a Sept. 16 shooting incident in Baghdad involving the private security firm Blackwater USA insisted that company guards fired without provocation, forcing civilians and Iraqi police to run for cover, and that the Iraqi officers did not return fire.

The eyewitnesses and a senior Iraqi police official close to an investigation of the incident contradicted initial accounts provided by the company and the State Department, which employs Blackwater to protect U.S. diplomats. At least 11 Iraqis died in the shootings, which have focused attention on the actions of largely unregulated security companies operating in Iraq.

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If you read a bit further on you’ll find that at least one of merceneries did in fact fire on a simple feeling of threat - why not ‘eh…. if a nation will listen to their homeland security czars gut why wouldn’t a feeling of a threat be justification for opening fire in the streets?