Erik Prince

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Erik Prince
Born
Erik Dean Prince

(1969-06-06) June 6, 1969 (age 54)
Holland, Michigan, United States
NationalityAmerican
EducationU.S. Naval Academy
Hillsdale College (B.A.)
Known forFounder of Blackwater USA
Spouses
  • Joan Nicole Prince (d. 2003)
  • Joanna Ruth Prince, neé Houck
    (m. 2004; div. 2012)
Children7; 4 from his first marriage and 3 from his second
Parent(s)Edgar D. Prince and Elsa Prince-Broekhuizen
RelativesBetsy DeVos (sister)

Erik Dean Prince (born June 6, 1969) is an American businessman and former U.S. Navy SEAL officer best known for founding the government services and security company Blackwater USA. He served as its CEO until 2009 and later as chairman, until Blackwater Worldwide was sold in 2010 to a group of investors. Prince currently heads the private equity firm Frontier Resource Group and is chairman of Hong Kong-listed Frontier Services Group Ltd. He lives in both Middleburg, Virginia and Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

Early life and education

Prince was born on June 6, 1969 in Holland, Michigan, the son of Edgar D. Prince and his wife, Elsa (Zwiep),[note 1] and the youngest of four children.[6] The family name, "Prins", was at some point anglicized to "Prince", and Prince is of Dutch ancestry on both sides of his family.[citation needed] He graduated from Holland Christian High School.[7]

Prince's father had started as a salesman making 40 cents an hour, who founded a die cast machine manufacturing firm, Prince Machine Corporation, in 1965, which became a supplier to the automobile manufacturing industry and eventually a billion-dollar company;[8] As business "exploded" Prince began to invest some of the profit through the Prince Group into other types of car parts and shopping malls, creating a network of companies and real estate worth a billion dollars.[4] In the early 1970s, Edgar Prince's company patented a sun visor that could light up and sold 5,000 to General Motors. In the '90s, the company produced 20,000 a day.[9] Prince and his father toured the world together, visiting the German concentration camp Dachau, a divided Berlin, and Normandy. According to his mother, these trips "made a big impression" on the young Prince.[10]

Prince was accepted into the United States Naval Academy and attended it for three semesters before leaving, citing that he loved the Navy but disliked the Academy. He went on to receive his B.A. in economics from Hillsdale College in 1992.[11] During his time at Hillsdale, Prince served as a volunteer firefighter and as a cold-water diver for the Hillsdale County Sheriff's Department.[12] Prince eventually became an emergency medical technician.[13]

In 1990, Prince secured a low-level internship in the White House under George H.W. Bush,[14] but soon left to intern for California congressman Dana Rohrabacher, President Ronald Reagan's former speechwriter. Rohrabacher described Prince as "a bright, driven young man." At the age of 21, Prince volunteered to search for a mass grave in Nicaragua, to expose killings under President Daniel Ortega and later said that he had found one.[15]

After college, Prince was commissioned as an officer in the United States Navy via Officer Candidate School in 1992. He went on to become a Navy SEAL and deployed with SEAL Team 8 to Haiti, the Middle East, and the Balkans. He credits the SEALs for being an outlet for his entrepreneurial spirit. In his autobiography he states that it was during the Yugoslav Wars of the early 1990s that he realized the need for private training facilities for special operations.[16]

Prince ended his U.S. Navy service prematurely in 1995 when his father died. Erik assumed control of daily operations at Prince Machine Corporation for a year until 1996 when his mother sold the company for $1.35 billion in cash to Johnson Controls.[17][18]

Prince moved to Virginia Beach and personally financed the formation of Blackwater Worldwide in 1997.[19] He bought 6,000 acres (24 km2) of the Great Dismal Swamp of North Carolina and set up a school for special operations.[20] The name "Blackwater" comes from the peat-colored bogs in which the school is located.[21]

Career

Prince credits the 1994 Rwandan genocide with his decision to start Blackwater. He told an audience in his native Holland, Michigan, "It really bothered me. It made me realize you can't sit back and pontificate. You have to act."[22]

From 1997 to 2010, Blackwater was awarded $2 billion in government security contracts,[23] more than $1.6 billion of which were unclassified federal contracts and an unknown amount of classified work.[24] From 2001 to 2010, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) awarded up to $600 million in classified contracts to Blackwater and its affiliates.[25] It became the largest of the State Department's three private security companies, providing 987 guards for embassies and bases abroad.[26] Prince built a shooting range on his rural Virginia land to serve as a nearby training facility to CIA headquarters in Langley, Va.[23] In his memoir Prince says that he provided the CIA with links to Afghan warlords who helped topple the Taliban and drive al Qaeda into hiding."[16]

Blackwater came under increasing criticism after the Nisour Square massacre in September 2007, in which Blackwater employees opened fire in a crowded square in Baghdad, killing 17 Iraqi civilians and seriously wounding 20 more. Three guards were convicted in October 2014 of 14 manslaughter charges, and another of murder, in a U.S. court.[27]

The criticism continued after president Barack Obama took office in 2008. Prince said he believes that much of this criticism stems from politics. "I put myself and my company at the CIA's disposal for some very risky missions," Prince told Vanity Fair for its January 2010 issue. "But when it became politically expedient to do so, someone threw me under the bus."[28]

Nevertheless, in 2010 the Barack Obama administration awarded the company a $120 million United States Department of State security contract and about $100 million in new CIA work .[24]

Prince has defended Blackwater's work, pointing to the fact that in 40,000 personal security missions, only 200 involved guards firing their weapons. He has said, "No one under our care was ever killed or injured. We kept them safe, all the while we had 30 of our men killed."[22]

Prince, according to Robert Young Pelton, reportedly thinks of Blackwater's relationship to the military as something similar to FedEx's relationship to the U.S. Post Office: "an efficient, privatized solution to sclerotic and wasteful government bureaucracy."[29] He credits his father's competitive streak in the automotive business with the inspiration to design a lighter, faster army.[30]

Prince resigned as CEO of Blackwater on March 2, 2009, and remained chairman of the board until he sold the company in late 2010 to a group of investors.[31]

Disclosure as part of a covert CIA task force

Prince was part of a CIA task force created to kill terrorists. Allegedly, the House intelligence congressional committee leaked his name to the press.[32] Prince has said that he is convinced that former CIA director Leon Panetta outed him as a CIA asset, after shutting down the covert CIA training operation in 2009.[23] Prince compared himself to the target of the similar government leak of Valerie Plame:

Valerie Plame's identity was compromised for political reasons. A special prosecutor [was even] appointed. Well, what happened to me was worse. People acting for political reasons disclosed not only the existence of a very sensitive program but my name along with it.[32]

Private security for the United Arab Emirates

After Blackwater faced mounting legal problems in the United States, Prince was hired by the crown prince of Abu Dhabi and moved to Abu Dhabi in 2010. His task was to assemble an 800-member troop of foreign troops for the U.A.E., which was planned months before the Arab Spring.[33] He helped the UAE found a new company Reflex Responses, or R2, with 51 percent local ownership, carefully avoiding his name on corporate documents. He worked to oversee the effort and recruit troops, among others from Executive Outcomes, a former South African mercenary firm hired by several African governments during the 1990s to defeat violent rebellions in addition to protecting oil and diamond reserves.

In January 2011, the Associated Press reported that Prince was training a force of 2,000 Somalis for anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden. The program was reportedly funded by several Arab countries, including the United Arab Emirates and backed by the United States. Prince's spokesman, Mark Corallo, said Prince has "no financial role" in the project and declined to answer any questions about Prince's involvement.

The Associated Press quotes John Burnett of Maritime Underwater Security Consultants as saying, "There are 34 nations with naval assets trying to stop piracy and it can only be stopped on land. With Prince's background and rather illustrious reputation, I think it's quite possible that it might work.".[34]

Private equity investor in Africa

Prince currently heads a private equity firm called Frontier Resource Group and is chairman of Frontier Services Group Ltd, a Bermuda-incorporated logistics and transport company listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.[35] Frontier Services Group is backed by China's state-owned CITIC Group and Hong Kong-based investor Chun Shun Ko.[36][37] Prince's ventures advise and support Chinese investment in oil and gas in Africa.[38] Of his strategy, Prince stated:

Africa is so far the most unexplored part of the world, and I think China has seen a lot of promise in Africa. But the problem is if you go alone, you bear the country risk on your own. You have to get support and maintenance there.[39]

In May 2014, it was reported that Prince's plan to build a diesel refinery in South Sudan, in which $10 million had already been invested, was suspended. The halted refinery project was reported to be supported personally by the country's president, Salva Kiir Mayardit.[35] Frontier Services Group was reported to be paid $23.3 million by South Sudan's Ministry of Petroleum to transport supplies and perform maintenance on oil production facilities.[40]

As part of Prince's Africa-focused investment strategy, Frontier Services Group purchased stakes in two Kenyan aviation companies, Kijipwa Aviation and Phoenix Aviation, to provide logistics services for the country's oil and gas industry.[35] In October 2014, the Kenya Civil Aviation Authority denied Kijipwa Aviation an aviation license renewal.[41][42][43]

Prince also purchased a 25% stake in Austrian aviation company Airborne Technologies. In 2014, Prince commissioned the company to modify Thrush 510G crop-dusters with surveillance equipment, machine guns, armor, and other weapons, including custom pylons that could mount either NATO or Russian ballistics.[44] One of the modified crop-dusters was delivered to Salva Kiir Mayardit's forces in South Sudan shortly before a contract with Frontier Services Group was cancelled. Frontier Services Group owns two of the modified Thrush 510Gs, but since executives learned the craft had been weaponized by Prince, the company has declined to sell or use the aircraft to avoid violating U.S. export controls.[45]

Personal life

Political views

Prince describes himself as a libertarian and practicing Roman Catholic.[28] He describes his political views as follows:

I'm a very free market guy. I'm not a huge believer that government provides a whole lot of solutions. Some think that government can solve society's problems. I tend to think private charities and private organizations are better solutions.[46]

Prince credits his time as a White House intern with some of his political views. He said that "having that White House internship responsibility and badges, I walked around some of these other cavernous federal agencies, and you want to talk about depressing? Walk through HHS or HUD or Commerce, you name it. Leviathan realized."[46] Speaking of his internship, Prince said, "I saw a lot of things I didn't agree with--homosexual groups being invited in, the budget agreement, the Clean Air Act." Disenchanted, Prince became a backer of Presidential Candidate Pat Buchanan.[47]

Prince has advocated for a leaner, more efficient military. He suggests several ways to make the military more efficient without compromising security. His suggestions include: greater accountability of costs, using appropriate equipment for each job, reduction of overhead, and operational and procurement reform.[48]

In 2017 Prince advised the Trump transition team on matters related to intelligence and defense, including weighing in on candidates for the Defense and State departments.[49]

Political donations

Between 1998 and 2007, Prince donated more than $200,000 to Republican and third-party causes.[50][51] In 2006, Prince contributed money to the Green Party of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.[51]

Charitable work

Prince serves as vice president of the Edgar and Elsa Prince Foundation, which his family founded. Prince has donated heavily to both Christian and Islamic causes, building mosques at Blackwater's overseas bases and supporting a Muslim orphanage in Afghanistan.[28] He financed the film The Stoning of Soraya M.[52] Between July 2003 and July 2006, the foundation gave at least $670,000 to the Family Research Council and $531,000 to Focus on the Family,[53] headed by James Dobson. The foundation is a major donor to Calvin College,[54] a Christian institution in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Family

Prince is the brother of United States Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, [55] and the brother in law of former Alticor (Amway) president Dick DeVos.[56]

His first wife, Joan,[57] died of cancer in 2003.[58] He married his second wife, Joanna Houck, in 2004. They later divorced.[59] In his 2013 memoir, titled Civilian Warriors: The Inside Story of Blackwater and the Unsung Heroes of the War on Terror, Prince writes that he was having an affair with Joanna.[60]

Prince has seven children. His youngest child, Charles Donovan, was named after William "Wild Bill" Donovan.[58]

Bibliography

  • Pelton, Robert Young (2006). Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror. New York: Three Rivers Press. ISBN 1400097819.
  • Simons, Suzanne (2009). Master of War: Blackwater USA's Erik Prince and the Business of War. New York City: Harper. ISBN 978-0-06-165135-9.
  • Pelton, Robert Young (November 2010). An American Commando In Exile. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help) – Prince spends his last two days in America with Pelton.
  • Scahill, Jeremy (2007). Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army. ISBN 978-1-56025-979-4.
  • Prince, Erik (June 1, 2008). Inside Blackwater: The True Story of the World's Most Controversial Company by the Man Who Founded It. Regnery Publishing. ISBN 1596985577. Hardcover, 256 pages.
  • Prince, Erik (November 2013). Civilian Warriors: The Inside Story of Blackwater and the Unsung Heroes of the War on Terror. Portfolio/Penguin. ISBN 978-1591847212.Hardcover, 416 pages.

Notes

  1. ^ At the time of their marriage, she was known by her maiden name, Elsa Zwiep. Following her marriage to Prince, she was known as Elsa Prince. After Prince's death in 1995 she married, in 2000, a minister, Ren Broekhuizen, and was known as Elsa Prince-Broekhuizen.

References

  1. ^ Johnson, Charles (November 26, 2013). "On Why Private Militaries Are the Future". The Daily Caller.
  2. ^ Shapira, Ian (January 1, 2015). "Blackwater founder Erik Prince goes to war against a former business partner". The Washington Post.
  3. ^ Risen, James (August 17, 2010). "Blackwater's Erik Prince Moves to Abu Dhabi". The New York Times.
  4. ^ a b Pelton 2006, p. 291
  5. ^ "Erik Prince: Blackwater, Xe, the New Christian Crusade". TruthisTreason.
  6. ^ Ready for battle by Jim Schaefer, M.L. Elrick and Todd Spangler, The Detroit Free Press, October 7, 2007.
  7. ^ "Profile: Blackwater's Restless Erik Prince". Newsweek. Retrieved February 1, 2017.
  8. ^ http://www.newnetherlandinstitute.org/history-and-heritage/dutch_americans/edgar-d-prince/ accessed 11-20-13
  9. ^ Simons, Suzanne (2009). Master of War. Harper Collins. p. 10.
  10. ^ Simons 2009, pp. 11–2 harvnb error: multiple targets (3×): CITEREFSimons2009 (help)
  11. ^ "Erik Prince exclusive interview".
  12. ^ [1][dead link]
  13. ^ Simons 2009, p. 19 harvnb error: multiple targets (3×): CITEREFSimons2009 (help)
  14. ^ White-Collar Mercenary Under Fire by Marc Pitzke, Der Spiegel, October 3, 2007,
  15. ^ Pelton, Robert Young. "An American Commando in Exile". Men's Journal. Men's Journal. Retrieved June 3, 2011.
  16. ^ a b Civilian Warriors: The Inside Story of Blackwater and the Unsung Heroes of the War on Terror Hardcover by Erik Prince.Portfolio Hardcover (November 18, 2013) ISBN 978-1591847212
  17. ^ Robert Young Pelton (November 30, 2010). "An American Commando in Exile". Men's Journal. Archived from the original on June 14, 2011. Retrieved May 28, 2011. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |newspaper= (help); Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  18. ^ Pelton 2006, p. 291
  19. ^ The Virginian-Pilot, Hampton Roads, "Blackwater's top brass" Archived August 29, 2007, at the Wayback Machine, July 24, 2006.
  20. ^ "The Man Behind Blackwater". Newsweek, October 23, 2007, pp. 36–9.
  21. ^ Simons 2009 harvnb error: multiple targets (3×): CITEREFSimons2009 (help)
  22. ^ a b Photos by Mark Copier (May 5, 2010). "Protests outside, cheers inside as Blackwater founder Erik Prince speaks in Holland". MLive.com. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
  23. ^ a b c Blackwater founder works on next chapter.By Dion Nissenbaum. The Wall Street Journal,page B4, Nov 18, 2013.
  24. ^ a b Strobel, Warren P. (June 28, 2010). "Obama spares Blackwater on Sudan violations". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
  25. ^ Prince's business covertly won U.S.contracts.Grand Rapids Gazette, April 9, 2010. http://www.mlive.com/grpress/frontpage/pdfs/A1_Saturday.pdf
  26. ^ Sengupta, Kim (June 9, 2010). "Blackwater founder to sell up as criticism takes its toll". The Independent. London.
  27. ^ U.S. Jury convicts Blackwater guards in 2007 killings of Iraqi civilians, The Guardian. October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 23, 2014.
  28. ^ a b c Ciralsky, Adam. "January 2010: Adam Ciralsky on Blackwater". Vanity Fair. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
  29. ^ Pelton 2006, p. 2
  30. ^ Pelton 2006, p. 3
  31. ^ "Blackwater Founder in Deal to Sell Company". The New York Times. December 16, 2010.
  32. ^ a b Ciralsky, Adam. "January 2010: Adam Ciralsky on Blackwater". Vanity Fair. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
  33. ^ Mazzetti, Mark; Hager, Emily B. (May 14, 2011). "Secret Desert Force Set Up by Blackwater's Founder. Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater, has a new project". The New York Times. Retrieved November 18, 2013.
  34. ^ Blackwater founder trains Somalis[2] Archived January 24, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  35. ^ a b c Gridneff, Ilya (May 28, 2014). "South Sudan Chaos Halts Prince's Plan for Oil Refinery". Bloomberg News. Archived from the original on August 17, 2014. Retrieved November 10, 2014. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  36. ^ Ng, Eric (January 14, 2014). "DVN shares surge as former Blackwater owner named chairman". South China Morning Post. Archived from the original on August 5, 2014. Retrieved November 10, 2014. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  37. ^ Eisenhammer, Stephen (February 2, 2014). "Beyond Blackwater: Prince looks to resources in Africa". Reuters. Archived from the original on November 10, 2014. Retrieved November 10, 2014. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  38. ^ "Blackwater Founder Prince Now Working With China". Bloomberg Television. January 31, 2014. Retrieved November 10, 2014.
  39. ^ George Chen george.chen@scmp.com (November 19, 2012). "Into Africa: Ex-navy SEAL sets trail for investors | South China Morning Post". Scmp.com. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
  40. ^ Gridneff, Ilya (December 18, 2014). "South Sudan Hires Ex-Blackwater Chief to Restore War-Damaged Oil Facilities". Bloomberg News. Archived from the original on December 18, 2014. Retrieved January 11, 2015. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  41. ^ Herbling, David (October 27, 2014). "State denies American company aviation licence". Business Daily Africa. Archived from the original on October 28, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  42. ^ Lamothe, Dan (October 28, 2014). "Blackwater founder Erik Prince: Combative, secretive and expanding in Africa". The Washington Post. Retrieved November 10, 2014.
  43. ^ "Kenya refuses to renew Blackwater founder's Kijipwa Aviation ASL". ch-aviation. November 6, 2014. Archived from the original on November 7, 2014. Retrieved November 10, 2014. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  44. ^ Cole, Matthew (April 12, 2016). "Report: Blackwater CEO Tried to Sell Armed Planes to South Sudan". The Takeaway. WNYC. Retrieved January 27, 2017.
  45. ^ Scahill, Jeremy; Cole, Matthew. "Echo Papa Exposed: Inside Erik Prince's Treacherous Drive to Build a Private Air Force". The Intercept. Retrieved January 27, 2017.
  46. ^ a b Simons, 20
  47. ^ Scahill, Jeremy (May 26, 2011). Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army. Profile Books. ISBN 1847654789.
  48. ^ Beck, Glenn (2010). Broke: The Plan to Restore Our Trust, Truth and Treasure. New York, NY: Mercury Radio Arts, Inc. p. 405. ISBN 978-1-4391-8719-7.
  49. ^ Jeremy Scahill: Notorious Mercenary Erik Prince Is Advising Trump From the Shadows, The Intercept, 17 January 2017
  50. ^ Mike Barker, AP, "Testimony Lifts Veil on Blackwater Boss", October 2, 2007.
  51. ^ a b Grilled Blackwater chairman a major GOP donor Archived October 11, 2007, at the Wayback Machine by Andrew Malcolm, The Baltimore Sun, October 4, 2007
  52. ^ Simons, Suzanne (2009). Master of War: Blackwater USA's Erik Prince and the Business of War. New York City: Harper. p. 253. ISBN 978-0-06-165135-9. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  53. ^ The Bush administration’s ties to Blackwater, by Ben Van Heuvelen, Salon, October 2, 2007.
  54. ^ "Calvin College: Calvin News". Calvin.edu. October 29, 2001. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
  55. ^ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/07/us/politics/betsy-devos-education-secretary-confirmed.html
  56. ^ The Virginian-Pilot, Hampton Roads, "Blackwater's top brass", July 24, 2006. Retrieved from the Internet Archive March 27, 2016.
  57. ^ "Blackwater, behind the brass". POLITICO. Retrieved February 1, 2017.
  58. ^ a b Ciralsky, Adam (January 2010). "Scandal: Tycoon, Contractor, Soldier, Spy". Vanity Fair. Condé Nast. Retrieved April 30, 2013.
  59. ^ Dimascio, Jen (July 20, 2009). "Blackwater, behind the brass". Politico. Retrieved December 22, 2015.
  60. ^ Sizemore, Bill (November 18, 2013). "Blackwater founder takes aim at his critics in memoir". The Virginian-Pilot. Retrieved December 22, 2015.

External links