More: The root of that distrust dates to the mid-1990s, when thousands of white officers left South Africa's security agencies during the transition from apartheid to majority black rule. Unemployed soldiers and police joined private security companies that got embroiled in African wars from Angola to Sierra Leone.

A wheelchair-bound man who owns an SUV with vanity plates that proclaim "Baghdad," Brink lost a leg and fingers in 2005 to a mine that exploded under his armored vehicle in Baqouba, a hotbed of the Iraqi insurgency. Since returning to South Africa, he has been encouraging wounded colleagues to apply for U.S. worker's compensation under the U.S. Defense Base Act, which applies to all workers, American or foreign, who are subcontracted in war zones by Washington

Brink was advising them on how to file for U.S. worker's compensation.

I'll buy a farm if I can collect on my claim, said Gouws, 45, But I don't recommend this method of getting a farm to anyone else

Isn't there is a history among these forces for a great acceptance of torture in South Africa? Does that have implications for their behavior in Iraq?

America is just feeding a pack of thugs. One day they will be knocking on our own door.