The Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 put an end to the long-standing European warfare which lasted for nearly thirty years.
The shape of the modern state was among other things the treaty achieved, and after that the most powerful star of mercenary armies – whose presence and role prevailed from the thirteenth century to the fifteenth century – disappeared.
The need of bishops, popes, rulers, and fiefs for security or influence was growing. The use of mercenaries by one side led the opposite side to use a parallel army, such as the “mercenary companies”, the German Landsknecht (the servant of the earth), Italian Condottiero and other companies which became entities parallel to the regular armies.
Westphalia thus played a significant role in promoting the principle of state monopoly of violence after it was available to mercenary groups in most parts of the European continent.
The Modern Mercenary introduced some of the modern states to what Sean McFate calls “neo-medievalism“, where states began to introduce the element of mercenaries to the heart of the military industry system, because neo-medievalism began to be talked about with the launch of the US security company Blackwater.
The company developed a bad reputation for its work in Afghanistan and Iraq, which led it to change its name to Academi.
But before Blackwater, in 1994, a security company called Executive Outcomes emerged in South Africa, and operated outside its borders in Angola and Kenya until South Africa banned such companies in 1998.
Later security companies appeared in other countries, such as the Russian Wagner Group, which was present in Ukraine in 2014, Syria in 2015, and Libya after 2020.
The Turkish SADAT International Defense Consultancy Inc. was founded in 2012 by 23 officers and headed by retired Brigadier General Adnan Tanverdi of Turkey, who is close to President Erdogan.
General Haftar’s forces have been accused of involving SADAT in supporting the al-Sarraj government, as well as its role in training the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army.
Security companies have the necessary legal licenses which keep them from being classified as mercenary armies, but Blackwater is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and is subject to government laws and policies just as Wagner and SADAT.
Although they fall under the purview of the national military industry, their description as mercenaries remains accurate despite their legalization, because they engage in wars outside their territory and get money and wages for their military service.
The criterion for classifying “employees” of security companies of different nationalities does not make them multinational companies, such as oil companies and other industries, but rather reinforces doubts about the idea of multiple nationalities of combatants/employees as hired mercenaries.
Despite the thin line that separates security companies from mercenary armies, there is a terrible situation for the rise of the neo-medievalism, which is run by Turkey and based on Syrian militias, and the subject is easy to explain:
Citizens of a third country (Syria), whose country is not at war with the second state to which the first state (Turkey) brings them to work for a monthly wage and without a formal contract, as in the case of security companies, are brought to the front lines, which meets the UN definition of a mercenary.
Mercenaries differ in their classification from terrorist groups, as the mercenary does not follow a religious, ethnic or racial extremist ideology, but ultimately follows its operators, whether a foreign government or a foreign security company.
Perhaps the example of the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army fighters who participate in the battles in Libya and Azerbaijan reveals the essence of the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army militias, which have turned into a transcontinental army.
International reports and objections have not discouraged Turkey from using these fighters in combat to interfere with internal problems of independent countries.
And if the issue of designating the Syrian National Army as a mercenary army met with many objections and arguments, given that the focus of its war work is Syria despite the clear role of the Turkish operator, sending these fighters to other countries removed the thin veneer that encapsulated their role.
Those who justify the phenomenon of Syrian mercenaries argue that they need money to support their families, so the humiliation of murder and fighting becomes justified. The justification for committing crimes out of the need for money is essentially an affirmation that we are talking about mercenaries.
Turkey began, through the gate of pro-government security companies and reliance on the abundance of Syrian mercenaries, the stage of entering the region into the era of the neo-medievalism.
So, the end justifies the means, and the ruling parties and groups would have their own armies which shape the future of the region and push the entire region to attain the Turkish experience and possibly develop it or build on it.
This four-way interchange between the government, the militias, the mercenaries, and the security companies is an introduction to the evolution of the idea of unnecessary war and military industries.
In addition to the drones, the countries have in their account their mercenary forces which have become part of its military industry, where fighters of other nationalities or loyalty and whose death does not provoke local/national anger. Therefore, the wars of the future in the region would largely remove the traditional armies in favor of mercenary armies, if they were to abdicate the responsibility of governments for the domestic human cost imposed by wars, or to evade the legal responsibility imposed by the papers of the United Nations in the absence of state interference in the affairs of other States