Private contractors outnumber U.S. troops in Iraq - Los Angel...

"These numbers are big," said Peter Singer, a Brookings Institution scholar who has written on military contracting. "They illustrate better than anything that we went in without enough troops. This is not the coalition of the willing. It's the coalition of the billing."

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Private security contractors, who are hired to protect government officials and buildings, were not fully counted in the survey, according to industry and government officials.

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no single agency keeps track of the number or location of contractors.

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The number of private security contractors in Iraq remains unclear, despite Central Command's latest census. The Times identified 21 security companies in the Central Command database, deploying 10,800 men.

However, the Defense Department's Motsek, who monitors contractors, said the Pentagon estimated the total was 6,000.

Both figures are far below the private security industry's own estimate of about 30,000 private security contractors working for government agencies, nonprofit organizations, media outlets and businesses.

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"People tend to think that these are contractors on the battlefield, and they're not."

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