WASHINGTON — Hundreds of contractors working for America's biggest defense companies are taking on a broader role in helping Iraq's military learn to use new weapons in a growing battle against Islamist insurgents. Over the next few months, the U.S. government is expected to begin sending more than $6 billion in military equipment to Iraq. The latest deal includes 24 Apache attack helicopters made by Boeing Co. and nearly 500 Hellfire missiles produced by Lockheed Martin Corp.
While the helicopters may not arrive in time to help with the current fighting, the missiles are expected to be used by the Iraqi military in the battle to uproot Islamic fighters from Ramadi and Fallujah, cities that were the focus of major U.S. military operations during the height of the war in Iraq. When the U.S. begins sending the first batch of Apache helicopters and additional Hellfire missiles this year, more than 200 private defense-company personnel will be on hand.
They won't be alone.
Across Iraq, military specialists are helping the Iraqi military maintain its growing number of surveillance drones, attack helicopters and powerful missiles. Thousands more support the U.S. government as security guards, analysts, drivers and cooks.
The strategic deployment of defense contractors in Iraq underscores the shifting security landscape as the U.S. downsizes its military presence around the world. With fewer than 200 American military personnel in Iraq, continued U.S. military support there relies increasingly on the presence of contractors.
The role for the military contractors, which has dwindled along with the U.S. presence in Iraq, could become more important in the coming months as the Iraqi government seeks billions more in international military support to combat a growing threat from Islamist militants.
Employees of Bell Helicopter, a unit of Textron Inc., TXT -1.37% are training Iraqi forces to fly and repair light attack helicopters stationed at a military base in the so-called Sunni Triangle northwest of Baghdad, where the Iraqi military is battling resurgent Islamist fighters..
Two dozen Lockheed employees are helping the Iraqi military keep their C-130 transport planes in the air. The company is also sending nearly 500 Hellfire missiles, which are being increasingly used in the fight against al Qaeda militants.
And more than a dozen employees with Beechcraft Corp. and General Atomics maintain a fleet of "Peace Dragon" surveillance airplanes used to track insurgent activity around the country.
The U.S. spent more than $200 billion on contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade as its reliance on private support grew, according to congressional estimates. In all, more than 5,000 contractors now work in Iraq as intelligence analysts, security guards, military trainers, translators and cooks.
"You have a situation where the government has become dependent on contractors," said Allison Stanger, a political-science professor at Middlebury College. "It's a real quantum shift."
Most U.S. contractors working in Iraq are unlikely to get involved in direct military operations. Along with U.S. legal restrictions on civilians engaging in combat, foreign military sales contracts often include provisions preventing contractors from being involved in direct combat, said Anthony Cordesman, a defense expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"Almost all of them will be protected from being asked to, or participating in, combat," Mr. Cordesman said. "You can't require anyone to have any kind of direct combat role."
Still, contractors serve in dangerous areas. In Afghanistan, more civilian contractors were being killed than U.S. soldiers by 2012, according to an analysis by Steven Schooner, a professor at George Washington University Law School. Now, he said, the traditional U.S. military role has been supplanted by civilians who are training and equipping the Iraqi military.
"The military task has, in fact, been outsourced in Iraq," he said.
The U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq in 2011 brought the war to an official end. But the U.S. still retains a large presence at the embassy in Baghdad, which is still one of the biggest American diplomatic facilities in the world.
Over the past few years, the U.S. has been scaling back its presence in Iraq, and even the contractor force has dwindled.
As of January 2013, the U.S. had more than 12,500 contractors in Iraq, according to State Department and Pentagon figures. The U.S. has significantly reduced that number over the past year.
Of the roughly 5,000 contractors supporting the American diplomatic mission in Iraq, the State Department said, more than a third of them are U.S. citizens. They work for companies like Triple Canopy Inc., which provides security guards for U.S. diplomats, and L-3 Communications Holdings Inc., LLL -0.90% which helps the State Department vet Iraqis seeking jobs with the U.S. Many serve as cooks, translators and janitors.
Those numbers don't account for scores of military contractors working in Iraq as part of U.S.-approved foreign military sales that provide the Iraqi government with helicopters, missiles and other critical support.
U.S. lawmakers, led by Sen. Robert Menendez (D., N.J.), had blocked the Apache helicopter sale because of concerns that the Iraqi government would use them to crack down on minority groups.
Those concerns have now been allayed and the U.S. is stepping up its help as the Iraqi government tries to quash Sunni militants in Anbar province.
