The owner of this armed mercenary company had an office and owned a house in Santa Fe through 2004.
Before he hit it big in Iraq, Michael A Janke was hawking his experiences as an elite military commando to conference rooms full of corporate nobodies; a 2003 Plastics News magazine write-up of Janke’s presentation to 1,000 home remodelers at a convention in Baltimore quotes the “former U.S. Navy SEAL commando who now operates Special Operations Consulting in Santa Fe” throwing around buzzwords like “know zone” and “5 percent predators.”
A year later, The New York Times was quoting Janke as a source of first-hand accounts of the fighting in Iraq. His corporate-warrior persona shifted to something like an action hero, the leader of a mercenary force in America’s not-yet-unpopular war in Iraq.
An archived page from an old SOC-SMG website, dating to 2004, contains answers to some “frequently asked questions”:
“What is SOC-SMG doing in Iraq?
“We are providing security support to US Defense Contractors to recover and dispose of Captured Enemy Ammunition… As you have all probably seen on any of the major news programs the Iraqi Army under Sad[d]am Hussein has amassed a huge arsenal… This is a monumental and extremely important task that requires professional and effective security…
“What are SOC-SMG Rules of Engagement?
“We fall under the DOD Rules of Engagement. Basically, if threatened, respond with the necessary force to resolve the threat…"
“What type of weapons does SOC-SMG have available?
“Currently each security person is outfitted with an M-4 [carbine rifle], ACOG scope, surefire [tactical flashlight], and 9mm pistol. We use Squad Automatic Weapons”—mounted machine guns.
In short, Janke’s men were heavily armed and engaged in the same kinds of combat as regular uniformed soldiers. Obama’s recent speech declaring “the end” of the war in Iraq, and the removal of “combat forces,” masks a simultaneous increase in the number of private security companies like Janke’s.
Signs of trouble arose quickly—and seem all the more obvious in retrospect. In May 2004, Janke’s company, SOC-SMG, reportedly arrested an American citizen for suspected “crimes against the coalition” near Najaf; according to the Times, military officials expected the man Janke’s guards arrested to be cleared of wrongdoing. SFR could find no record that the man Janke’s men arrested—himself a subcontractor to Parsons, a construction company working for the US Army Corps of Engineers—was ever charged with a crime."
By 2009, Janke’s company was high on the list of private security contractors whose lucrative work in Iraq warranted a special audit,
according to a May 8, 2009 report
by the Pentagon’s Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.
Unlike the other companies in SFR’s list, SOC-SMG’s contracts were awarded under the somewhat opaque procedures of wartime contracting in Iraq, and so SFR was unable to determine how much money the company made from the US military in the last two fiscal years. But last year, the Special Inspector General’s Office estimated SOC-SMG had won more than $272 million in Defense Department contracts since 2003.
Records indicate Janke has abandoned the City Different. His two Santa Fe phone numbers, listed in a directory of contractors published by the US Embassy in Iraq, were disconnected when SFR called last week. Janke and his wife sold their $586,000 home near Las Campanas to another couple in 2004, Santa Fe County property records show. Janke did not return SFR’s email.
The New Mexico affiliate of his company, SOC LLC, is now registered to a Philadelphia security firm, Day & Zimmermann International. A report to the US Congress by the Defense Department Office of the Under Secretary for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics shows the
military approved the acquisition of SOC-SMG by Day & Zimmermann in 2007
. According to its website, SOC-SMG maintains an office and training center in Nevada.
Although this mercenary firm’s founder may have left town, the size of his business and the violent nature of its work warrant Janke’s place at the top of SFR’s list.
