Ex-Blackwater to teach US spies survival skills

The Pentagon has awarded Academi, the security company previously known as Blackwater, part of a $20 billion five year contract to train military intelligence agents. It comes despite the firm earlier being fined by a US court for illegal arms trade.The US Defense Intelligence Agency announced on Thursday that it would hire six private security companies, including Academi, for the contract. The contractors are to train agents “before they leave on overseas deployments, to provide them with a foundation of hard and soft skills relevant to living and working in hostile and austere environments,” the document says.Academi declined to comment on the contract when asked by Wired’s Danger Room blog, saying it is not finalized yet. But it may be one of the first US governmental contracts it received after changing ownership and re-branding for a second time. Blackwater dropped its scandal-tainted name and became Xe Services in 2009, but in late December 2011 changed it again. Read more…