Russia is using private armed forces more and more — and it could bring major powers to the brink of conflict
Alexander Demianchuk/Reuters
- An incident in a military base in Syria earlier this year resulted in the death of an estimated 100 Russian private armed forces.
- Russia denied involvement in the deployment of these private combat providers.
- The continued use of PMSCs (private military and security contractors) in the current Syrian conflict threatens to exacerbate interstate rivalries and potentially start a war between major powers.
Russian and Syrian troops carried out a ground assault on a military base in Deir ez-Zor, Syria, on February 7. However the base was occupied by US soldiers, and the attackers were beaten back by a US air strike. Around 100 Russians were ultimately killed. And yet, diplomatically speaking, almost nothing happened: no threats, no sanctions, no war of words.
What prevented the situation from escalating was the fact that the attackers were not in fact members of the Russian armed forces, but private military and security contractors (PMSCs). This gave both sides the benefit of plausible deniability. Russia pretended not to know about Russians in the area, while the US denied any knowledge of Russian involvement.See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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