Originally Posted by Pleasurepays

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Outcomes - read about these guys, where they faught and how and you will appreciate it more.

"In March 1995 an Executive Outcomes team went to the aid of the rebel-beleaguered Kono diamond mines in Sierra Leone. The force was assembled and in action by April, taking just 11 days to drive the rebels away from the capital and, using helicopter gunships, chase them out of the diamonds fields. The most interesting aspect of all this, however, is perhaps the method of payment. The chronically impoverished government of Sierra Leone apparently paid for these services by giving a company called Branch Energy the concession to operate the Koidu diamond field (the Sierra Leone government retains a 60-percent ownership). Reputedly, Branch Energy is owned by Strategic Resources Group, a British company based in the Bahamas, that in turn owned Executive Outcomes. It seems that the firm was able to barter its services for large shares of a client nation's natural resources and commodities. According to a British government evaluation reported by Inter Press Service: "On present showing, Executive Outcomes will become ever richer and more potent, capable of exercising real power, even to the extent of keeping military regimes in being. If it continues to expand at the present rate, its influence in sub-Saharan Africa could become crucial."