State Department axes guard firm for Kabul embassy and ArmorGroup gets a raise

Huffington Post March 17, 2011  Associated Press

WASHINGTON — The State Department has fired a contractor hired to provide security at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, less than six months after the company won the $274 million job.

The department ended its agreement for embassy security with EOD Technology of Lenoir City, Tenn., because the company was not going to be able to start work on May 1, as the contract required, the State Department said Thursday in a statement.

ArmorGroup North America will continue to guard the embassy for at least the next four months until a replacement for EOD Technology is found.

Vetting the Employees

The State Department said in 2009 that it would not renew its contract with ArmorGroup after its guards were caught engaging in lewd behavior and drinking excessively at their living quarters.

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Financial Times two days ago on Nick Buckles, the 3.8 million dollar a year man, says:

“The failure of a competitor to take on security at the US Embassy in Kabul will see G4S stay on at the expense of the failed incumbent, at an improved rate.

(“improved” over that 1 million a month they were losing due to allegedly underbidding the contract)

Gordon’s lawsuit alleges that Michael O’Connell, ArmorGroup North America’s vice president of operations, emailed Sauer on March 11, 2007, “AGNA bid this at a very low price and a very low margin,” adding the next day that the timelines and resources given to State in its proposal “don’t match up,” but it wasn’t “a big deal unless” the State Department contracting officer’s representative “calls us on it”.

The contract rollover has been won in spite of controversy over the recruitment and behaviour of staff by ArmorGroup, a subsidiary acquired by G4S in 2008, which led to a critical report by the US State Department over the running of the contract.