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Coming Under Fire
In Fredericksburg, Va., contractors undergo DynCorp's firearms training in preparation to train police in Iraq and Afghanistan.
(Photos By Melina Mara -- The Washington Post)
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As his colleagues peeled away in search of home base, represented by a orange stick hidden in the brush, Carson studied the gadget and adjusted his glasses: "Come on, baby, take me home." (Carson would be among the last to finish the course more than half an hour later.)
Those who make it through the Fredericksburg session are sent to Fort Bliss in El Paso for three days of cultural and other studies.
On arrival in Iraq and Afghanistan, they get a week of orientation and briefings from the military and DynCorp. Once they're on the job, DynCorp employees are teamed with U.S. troops for the field training of Iraqi police officers.
DynCorp got into the police-training business in the mid-1990s when it was tapped by the State Department to provide peacekeepers for Haiti. Over the next decade, assignments took the company's hires to Bosnia and East Timor.
The contract has ballooned and now makes up nearly 40 percent of DynCorp's annual revenue. Besides police training, it includes conducting drug-eradication programs in Afghanistan and construction of living facilities in Iraq.
Along the way, the situation on the ground has required adjustments.
Trainers initially were deployed to Iraq without weapons, Lagana said, but now carry the M4 carbines with them.
And to bring them in line with the soldiers they work alongside every day, last year the company banned a familiar comfort from home: alcohol.
Staff writer Ernesto Lodoño in Iraq contributed to this report.
