Blackwater's 'little birds' pack a sting in Baghdad

Blackwater's "Little Bird" helicopters that patrol the skies of Baghdad are icons that "stir emotion," writes Joanne Kimberlin of the Virginian-Pilot, a paper that services the big military readership of the Hampton Roads, Norfolk and Virginia Beach area. The gutsy pilots provide reconaissance, air cover and emergency ferrying for the State Department people they protect - and they often come to the rescue of others, including US troops.

Kimberlin writes a fine story about the fearless Blackwater pilots of the Little Birds. Excerpts follow:

"The Little Birds can symbolize all that's right or wrong with the war. To the enemy, they are an evil to be struck from the sky. To an ally in trouble, their inbound buzz is the blessed sound of a second chance.

"To do the job, the Moyock, N.C.-based outfit fields a private army of hardened men, weapons and vehicles. Wings and rotors are a critical part of the equation. None, however, turn more eyes than the handful of teardrop-shaped Little Birds that supply aerial surveillance and cover for ground convoys, ferry the occasional senior staff, and swoop in shooting when things get critical.

"Stationed at LZ Washington, a landing pad inside Baghdad's Green Zone, the Little Birds are just big enough for a four-man crew. They're painted solid black with a single silver stripe. Tail numbers - customary for identification - are absent. Blackwater's bear-paw logo is nowhere to be found. . . .

"Positioned just behind the pilot and co-pilot, tethered by 'monkey harnesses,' one gunner hangs out of each side of the cockpit, feet braced on the skids. With assault rifles at the ready, they dangle in mid air, scanning for the hint of an unfriendly move below.

"It's a good thing they're strapped in. Their chopper was designed with maneuverability in mind. With no heavy armor or built-in weaponry, its best defense is careening, erratic flight that's tough for the enemy to draw a bead on. Five-bladed rotors produce a here-and-gone 'whir' that sounds like a whisper next to the thunderous 'whup-whup-whup' of the bigger two- and three-bladed choppers. A Little Bird can hug the terrain, duck into twisted alleys and head for the sun at 34 feet per second. . . .

"The Little Birds are not invincible. Like all helicopters, they're vulnerable to a single well-placed bullet from the ground, not to mention the surface-to-air missiles that sometimes turn up in the insurgent arsenal. Since May 2003, more than 60 U.S. choppers have gone down - seven in the last six weeks, most from enemy fire.

"On Jan. 23 [2007], Blackwater lost its first Little Bird, and the lives of five contractors. Collectively, the men had spent roughly 80 years in uniform before going private. They were killed inside two Little Birds scrambling to cover a State Department convoy under attack. One door gunner took a bullet to the head. Four more were killed when their chopper went down under heavy fire.

"Contractor deaths are often lost in the litany of war casualties. Not so with the Little Bird men. Ambassador Khalilzad, who is sometimes secreted across the city in a Little Bird, showed up at the Green Zone hospital morgue to pay his respects. [Marine blogger] Batty and his buddies grieved: 'We all reacted the same way when we heard the tragic news. Crestfallen faces, and an emphatic, disbelieving "No way!"... It wasn't just a machine that fell out of the sky that day.... It was that sense of being part of something special.'

"Blackwater's 'rotorheads' know the risks - and their aircraft - intimately. The company plucks many of its pilots from the Army's elite 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, where Little Birds figure heavily in covert warfare.

"In Iraq, they are famous for pushing the chopper to its limits.

"'They're very impressive pilots,' said author Robert Young Pelton. 'Completely fearless.' Private contracting is the subject of Pelton's book Licensed to Kill. He's no stranger to the sound of war drums. The World's Most Dangerous Places is one of his best- known works. In Iraq, he spent a month hanging out with Blackwater.

"Its Little Bird pilots, he said, 'do some of the most insane things I've ever seen. The most dramatic thing is when they fly at night, completely blacked out, wearing night vision goggles - and anybody who's ever looked through a pair of those knows they're limited.'

"Pelton said the pilots were particularly fond of buzzing a rooftop terrace at Blackwater's Baghdad compound, a popular off-duty spot for knocking back a few. 'We'd be up there drinking, in the pitch dark, and suddenly there they'd be, like 10 to 15 feet over our heads.' Pelton says the military occasionally 'yells' at Blackwater for such antics. So does the State Department.
'They're sticklers for how things are done,' Pelton said of the government folks. 'They look at Blackwater as cowboys. Show offs.'

"It's a different story when bullets fly, Pelton said.

"'There's not a single person over there, that if they were in a shootout, would not be relieved to see a Little Bird coming. It's like, "Whew. Here comes the cavalry."'

"Dan Laguna says the Little Birds will come to the aid of any ally.

"Laguna manages Blackwater's aviation program in Iraq. His brother, Art, was among the five killed in January. An e-mail written by Laguna to his hometown TV station in Utah shortly after the attack provides glimpses into the operation: 'We are the QRF (Quick Reaction Force) for just about everyone. The military takes too long to respond because of the approval they have to get all the way up the chain of command. I am the only one that makes the decision to go or not to go and we always go when someone is in harm's way.'

"Sometimes, that someone is the military itself. In recent testimony submitted to a congressional committee, Blackwater told of an incident that happened in October [2006]. Two Little Birds returning from a mission spotted an Army motorcade that had been hit by a roadside bomb.

"According to the company, one helo landed so its crew could help the wounded while the other provided cover overhead. Even the Little Bird, however, is out of its element in Iraq. It was designed for low-elevation, high-speed scouting over the jungles of Vietnam.
When tapped for convoy escort in Baghdad, it's often forced into a slower orbit over urban areas where the enemy blends in with a sea of innocents.

"'When taken together, that's not to the pilot's advantage,' said Guy Ben-Ari, a defense industrial specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. 'It's a deadly combination. Literally. These aircraft were not intended to be able to withstand a lot of fire, and it only takes a moment to bring a weapon to bear.'"

". . . No doubt, the cool factor of the Little Birds helps. As Batty the Marine wrote: 'The soldiers around me always say the same thing whenever Blackwater is overhead: "Man, I would do anything to have that job."'

"In the love-'em-hate-'em universe of hired guns, Batty simply admires the Little Bird's contribution to esprit de corps in a place where morale tends to flatline fast."

Here's the full text of the Joanne Kimberlin's article: http://content.hamptonroads.com/story.cfm?story=120357&ran=135888.

Photos show pilot skill in rescuing Polish envoy

Photos of the dramatic October 3 rescue of Polish Ambassador Edward Pietrzyk show just how risky the maneuver was for the skilled Blackwater helicopter pilot.

It's no small thing to land a helicopter with its spinning rotor blades into a city street. Apart from possible terrorists and insurgents, the real dangers to the crew were the many lightposts and telephone and electrical lines that bordered the landing area.

In the top photo, the Blackwater "Little Bird" is shown landing, with high lamp posts on the right and what appear to be telephone or electrical poles on the left. Down the street, fire engines spray water on the burning wreck of Ambassador Pietrzyk's armored vehicle.

The middle photo shows Blackwater gunners on either side of the helicopter after stepping off the skids and onto the street. The fire engines are behind the one on the right. (The same guard can be seen standing in the skid in the top photo.)

The lower photo shows the helicopter near the fire engines, with phone or electrical wires stretching across the street. The slightest pilot error, shift in weight or unexpected wind could have caused havoc with the helicopter and with the people on the ground. The mission, however, was a complete success.