http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/...contractor.php
"The report by the Congressional Budget Office says that about one out of every five dollars spent on the war in Iraq has gone to contractors for the U.S. military and other government agencies. Employees of private contractors now outnumber U.S. troops in the war zone.
...
Contractors now employ at least 180,000 people in Iraq, forming what amounts to a private army, larger than the U.S. military force, whose roles and missions and even casualties have largely been hidden from public view."