Making a Killing

Between coalition troops and the Iraqi security forces lies an unnamed and uncounted third column:  soldiers of fortune.  In September 2003, James Ashcroft, a former British Infantry captain who served in West Belfast and Bosnia, landed in Iraq as a 'gun for hire'.  It was the beginning of an 18-month journey into chaos.  Ashcroft provides a first-hand view of the secret world of private security where ex-soldiers employed to protect US and British interests can make up to $1,000 a day.  But he also reveals a new kind of warfare where the rules - if you can call them that - are still being written.