In an unassuming pocket of Covent Garden, within close proximity to a CafeÌ Nero, a Zara and an Irish pub, is the kind of anonymous office building that barely registers. This is home to Dryad Global, one of the surprising number of private security firms and advisors operating out of London right now. There’s also G4S and Aegis Defence Services — two of the biggest in the world — which share a home, according to Google Maps, in the very same block tucked behind Victoria Station. AKE, meanwhile, is just near London Bridge, and Team Fusion is nestled between the members’ clubs, tailors and car dealerships of Mayfair.
It’s probably not what you think of when you think of private security firms. Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group —which, unlike these legally compliant London companies, can be described as mercenaries — is the best-known in the world right now. For a hot minute this summer it was Wagner forces that, allegedly, attempted to stage a coup to overthrow Putin. Because these guys don’t work for him. They work for whoever’s paying them the most.
It’s a big business. Security service revenues worldwide are expected to increase 4.4 per cent per year to £231 billion in 2026, according to Freedonia Group. And G4S, one of the top five groups in the world along with Aegis, is the second largest private employer in the world behind Walmart, with a presence in 125 countries. But where did they come from, who do they employ and what are they doing?
As late as the 19th century, private personnel were deployed with regularity around Europe, with Britain hiring 15,600 foreign mercenaries to join it in the Crimean War in 1854. However, with the development of Europe’s nation states, the notion of fighting for one’s own country solidified. Fighters such as those in the French Foreign Legion and Hitler’s 2,000 Danes were notable exceptions.
By the 1960s and 1970s, smaller wars in the global south were piggybacked by a boom of British private military companies. A Foreign and Commonwealth Office document published by a select committee in 2002 explained that these actions ‘were either seen as an attempt by Western capitalists to retain control of a mineral rich region or as colonialists attempting to retain power’ and called for better regulation. Within months the largest mercenary operation of modern times began in Iraq with the deployment of 48,000 security contractors — including at least 1,000 Blackwater operatives. Today, mercenaries are deployed in Yemen, Nigeria, Ukraine, Syria and Iraq. Putin is allegedly trying to regularise up to 30 mercenary groups in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The UK outlaws fighting for another country if that country is fighting against a country we’re at peace with. So private security companies technically should not send Britons to hostile environments in order to seek out combat. But it’s not always that simple. One former military personnel member who has worked in the private security sector explains: ‘[it’s] about how far you stretch the definition of “security”.
‘At what point does protecting a convoy or extracting civilians from somewhere turn into an armed confrontation with whoever is the threat? There’s also training and mentoring work — if a company ends up doing “forward mentoring”, that means they’re not only training the guys; they’re also going out on the ground with them. Again, at which point does the mentor become an active participant once their team gets contacted?’
And Simon Cassey, senior vice-president at security industry insurance broker Chesterfield Group, explains: ‘A lot of people think they’re mercenaries, and they’re definitely not. Mercenaries make war, are paid to cause trouble, to assist in political aims of governments. These men, however, are specifically supporting armies and governments in beneficial and certainly mostly good causes.’ That said, his work does deal in ransom insurance and insurance for loss of life and limb. Indeed, he explains that ‘although these men should know what they’re getting into, some of them attempt to bring cases against their employer but few succeed.’
So what’s the draw of this risky business? Military veterans don’t always have many career options. Iain Overton, an investigative journalist and executive director of charity Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), explains: ‘The problem is, if you’re a 35-year-old bloke who spent 18 years of your life working in the Paras, and then you might well leave and think that either your next work choice is join the police, or join a security company.’ There are also, he adds, the ‘Walter Mitty types’ up for an adventure but lacking relevant credentials.
With so many British private security groups having boots on the ground in the Middle East and English-speaking African countries, there is also a sense of familiarity. Andrew Jackson, managing director of ex-military recruitment website SaluteMyJob, says: ‘Many ex-military people go into maritime security, for example, or into or back to places like Iraq and Afghanistan, where they’re often supporting either Nato UK forces that are out there, or businesses that need security or risk management, particularly the energy industry.’ The alternatives, security guard work or police work, are ‘generally not very well paid’. For those who wear their experience and seniority slapped on their lapels, Overton explains that private security roles allow them to maintain prestige.
Once employed by these private security companies, personnel can be working on anything from armed security guards to maintenance and operation of weapon systems, combat support, running prisons and interrogations, intelligence and research. Cassey explains that private security companies can work on stabilising countries that have recently seen conflict, for example, protecting the building of girls’ schools in Afghanistan, where ‘the Taliban would wait until they’re 85 per cent constructed then come down from the hills and try to destroy them. Well, the security companies prevent them from doing that.’ He hastens to add: ‘This work is defensive, not offensive.’
How far do you stretch the definition of ‘security’? At what point does extracting civilians turn into an armed confrontation with whoever is the threat?
Transparency around pay is unclear, though, as with any private service, these organisations operate outside of public scrutiny. Rates can vary, Overton tells me, from £125 a day on guard jobs to ‘eye-watering sums’ if they’re protecting high net worth individuals. AOAV has found Britain has spent £50m on private security companies annually since 2004. Despite such big business, Overton explains: ‘There’s no real industry standard or quality control on this.’
The UK military’s deployment is increasingly democratically driven as MPs vote on military action abroad, individuals are subject to court-martial rules and military data — where it wouldn’t pose a security risk — can be made available to the public via Freedom of Information rights. I contacted each of the London-based private security companies mentioned in this article with simple questions, such as, ‘Does your work ever take in hostile environments?’ and, ‘What work can employees be expected to do once there?’ — however, companies like G4S are under no legal obligation to give me any information. This lack of transparency means, the AOAV’s 2018 report states: ‘It is impossible to determine what the companies are actually capable of.’
In some prominent cases the truth has outed; Keenie Meenie Services is currently under investigation by the Metropolitan Police for alleged war crimes committed in Sri Lanka. In 2005, Aegis was alleged to have shot at Iraqi civilians. Later, a former Aegis director admitted that the organisation hired Sierra Leonian fighters — because ‘at some point you say I’m afraid all we can afford now is Africans’ — without assessing if they were former child soldiers.
The International Code of Conduct for Private Security Service Providers has been introduced but critics point out that it is self-regulating and few have signed up. A joint statement provided to ES Magazine by the Ministry of Defence and the Home Office says: ‘The Security Industry Authority (SIA) is responsible for the regulation of the private security industry in the UK...[it] has no role in relation to the provision of security services overseas.’
In a crowded market, the cachet of British military men’s experience on the ground in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan is dwindling as the years pass. And besides, the future is digital. Cassey explains: ‘The cyber climate is heating up... a lot of the boots on the ground type security companies are looking for that more intellectual work that involves the protection of data from cyber attack.’ It could prove more lucrative, too. But, Overton warns, transparency could wane further still: ‘We’ll see more of the Cambridge Analytica-style approach, digital intelligence services, and more surveillance-type work. That’s probably where the real money is... it obviously works hugely in the shadows [...] this is a world of disinformation and misinformation warfare.’ As Horace wrote, it is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country. To defend the land of another one’s country is a more complicated game altogether.
