You. Hello im sammys a them this is counting the cost of aljazeera the weekly look at the world of business and economics this week private contractors as russia uses mercenaries in conflicts from syria to libya and china stepped up efforts to protect its workers overseas whats the future of. Whats a few 100000000000. 00 here and there isnt worth 2 trillion dollars that is the saudi state owned oil company relevant. Google and apple are muscling in on Computer Gaming with their own platforms what does that mean for the multibillion dollar gaming ecosystem. Increasingly nations are deploying private security contractors to troubled and remote parts of the world beyond the scope of democratic accountability and operating beyond and around International Law theyre proving to be useful agents of the plough missy and proxy wars but there have been some well publicized failures in 2007 Blackwater Contractors killed 17 unarmed iraqis and injured 24 others blackwater went on to change its name to a cabin me and continues to provide services to the pentagon around the world also in iraq the pentagon hired c. A. C. I. Premier technology to run the infamous abu ghraib prison the Logistics Company is alleged to have told military police to soften up prisoners for interrogation. And its estimated the u. S. Government lost as much as 60000000000. 00 to fraud by contractors right now the industry is estimated to be worth up to 249000000000. 00 many nations are deploying most in areas to reshape battlefields russia has used the wagner group in ukraine libya and syria as nicolas hoc reports exclusively from the Central African republic russias training Government Forces at the request of the president nick was given unprecedented access to their military trainers and durango south of the capital bangui. A staged attack on the grounds of an abandoned palace deep in the Central African republic. These are master russian fighters somewhere in ukraine others in syria or chechnya now theyre training an army that has lost control of the country after armed groups took over part of this mineral rich nation the size of france vladimir not his real name says discipline is one of the problems sectarian violence fueled by militia groups has divided muslims and christians. The russians are training men who once fought each other to unite under a government so far too weak to secure its own borders. The special advisor to the countrys president was this patch by moscow after president ouattara called putin for help. Im here is to avoid a blood shed so ive traveled the country and meet with the various rebel leaders to get them around the table but in july 2 10183 russian journalists were killed in the Central African republic they claimed these russian in structures are in fact mercenaries working for a private Security Company called back in or which has close ties to the kremlin the journalists accuse them of profiting from the countrys minerals. Denies these claims. Wagner this is just an urban legend these are russian reservists nothing more. Wherever they are 30 years after the fall of the soviet union the russians are stepping back in the heart of africa in october african heads of state gathered in sochi during the event Russian Security firms like wagners patriot or shields attempted to learn new business opportunities. Over the 5 hes mutual trains between russia and various african countries more than doubles to exceed 20000000000. 00 whether that is a lot of my call he called it great numbers but i cannot a great do not think its enough to be away had to ladies and gentlemen 7700000000. 00 of that comes from a trade with egypt which is about 40 percent of the total at the request of president twitterer the Security Council approved imports of russian weapons last december now theyre providing both arms and training the instruction is happening in russian and the soldiers have been trained to understand the russian language. A good time when the west and notably france the former colonial power and the United States are retreating with more weapons and in structures on the way this may be just the beginning of russian expansion into Africa Nicholas hawk for counting the cost to baringo the Central African republic. Well joining me now via skype from washington d. C. Is dr sean mcfate hes a professor at Georgetown University and the author of the new rules of war lets start if we can with shady groups like the wagner group do we know with any level of confidence just who runs it and how close it is to the russian president so ratner who is run mostly by the chair you which is the Russian MilitaryIntelligence Organization and its founders and its popular share are russia and Russia Special ops and russians have connections to moscow but the most of their group comes from all over the russian speaking world theyre mostly associated with Russian Foreign policy but russia uses them where they want to for plausible deniability as they send them in step places like syria or ukraine or rumored to be in venezuela to do things that thats not so special forces or f. S. B. May not want to be caught doing how justified that concerns that these kinds of groups could accidentally start a war between countries you know the reports im referring to russian outfits apparently attacking u. S. Posts in syria. Yes so in february of 2018 there was an interesting showdown in Eastern Syria where 500. 00 mercenaries of thought her attacks an outpost that was defended by u. S. Special forces but it wasnt just any special forces it was Delta Force Rangers green berets marines and they called in the 50 choose f. F. T. Apache helicopters ac with pretty gunships drones and this battle lasted for hours for hours in this in this battle the American Forces killed 20250 russian mercenaries but the fact that theyre you know 500 immerses went up against the u. S. Has very best military and still took 4 hours to beat them back is a cause for concern a case the u. S. Had to face 5000. 00 mercenaries fortunately that day it didnt drag the u. S. And russian so or but heres the big fear is that if theres a it could be accidental warfare or an accident will escalate in that except 2 powers into a nuclear war that was not dissipated its not a russia or is it chinas about only being sucked into the game with the road belden initiative requiring it apparently to use private security firms to write. Thats right so you know chinas one about one Road Initiative is taking them in places of political instability it but a call in security and theyre lying increasingly on private Security Companies these companies are thought to be mostly there are chinese and theyre thought to be an arm of the same sort of like little green men but little you know i mean that in many places but again theres always a problem of them engaging in a conflict by accident perhaps i could suck china or beijing into a war in a place like the congo or in the salan africa or the part of the middle east so this is the danger of using mercenaries or contractors is that they can get in and scraps or and fight that others into a larger. Conflict and sometimes some of these contractors are incentivized by profit you along gate those conflicts for money now is same the use of private security and in scandals in court cases in Court Rulings but ultimately how much accountability is there for private these way and you take into consideration for example many would argue the erik prince after all the blackwater went through hes still in the business. Right so mercenary is accountability and safety of mercenaries has been a problem from the start and mercenaries some would say is the 2nd oldest profession so how do you control mercenaries and her prince is a great example so air france was the former u. S. Navy seal who started blackwater which everybody remembers from baghdad a few 1000 sat and waited lap water kill 17 iraqis and and there was no accountability for marshals under the jail there are principles that times as easy as if youre american and you dont work for america and then suddenly he leaves and now works for china in africa and hes in charge of a Company Called the french air Services Group of which china is the major shareholder hes an africa these days working on the one belt one Road Initiative and hes an example of what a modern mercenary looks like now together around some of the rules and laws were seeing floating being created so that the transfer can take place to some of these proves that creating new legal as well as moral challenges. You know we dont have a Good International framework to deal with modern mercenaries in fact our International Law is very thin and the will to enforce it is very small so we have mercenaries for example everywhere and you have it now who is going to go in and arrest all those mercenaries because member mercenaries can shoot your Law Enforcement that so even if you had laws on the books you still would have a problem and forcing them and examples of mercenaries that you say are floating armories you also have mercenaries trained drones into kamikazes making sort of mercenary air forces we even have cyber mercenaries pap backed companies and they will hack those who hack you so mercenaries are expanding and 21st century yet we dont have any sort of Legal Framework or norms to competently deal with this problem when you look in your crystal ball does the future look is the industry set to and the grow the industry will only grow because theres nothing to stop it and a people is russia the u. S. And china are using mercenaries everybody else will eventually to the Extractive Industries looking at them or more of like an oil gas ever again to an era were going back to the future because you know a 1000 years ago if you 1000 years ago mercenary for how wars were fought and this introduces a lot of different problems because thats only going to have or is about states anybody whos rich enough to hire mercenaries can become a superpower so the super rich can become a super power and this will change not just warfare as we know it will change International Politics to what does this tell us about the future of war that how is that going to change. Well its a great question and warfare as we know its going to completely change so when most people in the last think about warfare i think about world war 2 and they think about the future as world war if you had Better Technology but the future is not going to look like it works you have Better Technology and as a National Alliance thinking warfare is going to become a lot more sneaky in the future those with money whether it be all of guards or multinational corporations or rich states they can wage war for any reason they want like these mercenaries mercenaries allowed to you know they give you good possible deniability so they can create the fog of war so i think were going to see more of it sneakier and much more diverse around the globe all right thanks so much fair analysis on that. Thank you. In the end it wasnt the blockbuster it was made out to be savvy state owned Oil Giant Aramco isnt worth 2 trillion u. S. Dollars theres plenty of blame to spread around for such misplaced exuberance a guarantee of 70 5000000000. 00 in dividends every year for the next 5 years wasnt enough to attract International Investors they couldnt stomach the crown Prince Mohammed bin the son mans ambitious valuation but it was a price put together by Investment Bankers desperate to cash in on the biggest initial Public Offering of the year so now the plan is only to sell shares to saudi nationals and investors from the gulf region the value could be as high as 1. 7 trillion dollars but as a ram co becomes a Public Company its promise to deliver massive dividend may put it at odds with opec which is trying to boost the price of crude you may think the 2 are not incompatible but they are opec wants to cut production around counties to sell more oil to pay diffident lets pick through some of the issues of race with professor coma luciana from the graduate institute of International Development studies in geneva where he runs the executive Master Program in oil and gas leadership well theres a lot of issues to pick through here 1st of all whos to blame for so badly getting this wrong well its always difficult to estimate the reaction of america so far on this. Initially it was announced by the crown prince for us it. Has not been that we did. But its a. Bit of a really shall we say wild over estimate then compared to what the markets willing to pay the gaps quite big yes theyve got a bit. More say there in the international. Experience lead. Valuation i was always being either excessive. It is certain to be said it does being very brutal on the fires of the ground or is announced. At the very beginning without any. Analysis of the market. What you think is the National Investors have been reluctant. Well there are actually nurses i think also have been very luck that last year on his leave the saudi government as a means to encourage. Both offering. Return errors as they have done and also putting pressure on that link then that the National Duty to do such as share seems. Despite to going public gets very much state owned company does not put it at all to the opec possibly yes we have all the opec got bodies that are also. Factually for irately all and. The Russian Companies and now they said our show is now being offered for the just as important for opec as any of the men but there are also companies also have. Shares floating on the stock market so its something that can be managed but certainly the investors know that property is not the view of profit maximizing now by floating around is this a move towards transparency and accountability for the company for the nation or is that going too far possibly saw but. Certainly we know much more about saudi aramco that we used to so there has been a. Degree of openness and transparency but you know whether this will be enough to attract more investors it is not clear the the basic public the domestic investor public is not. Strong enough to pressure around for him to substantiate. And how relevant is that in the world thats trying to move away from hydrocarbons in a world where wealth funds are trying to sell off their stocks yes well find. Many. d divesting from. States. But there are plenty of or there investors. Or there are objective in their investment. Decisions and so. I think although confined needs are. Waiting waiting certainly not as well as the. Com companies. Are committing where now the question is was the holes that there was not on a par with Major InternationalOil Companies just shale or b. P. Or x. On all of these are paying dividends which are there as we hire them what was proposed place and we are all good to get your thoughts on this thanks so much professor thank you. Alfabet better known the world over as google is using its Cloud Computing might to muscle into the lucrative video gaming industry where its been dominated by microsofts x. Park sonys play station and nintendo it should come as no surprise the entertainment industrys worth 135000000000. 00 and by 2025 could be worth 300000000000. 00 Google Stadia platform will be streamed from the cloud and does away with expensive consols apple will introduce its arcade service 2 of the existing giants of the industry in not taking the challenge lightly microsoft and sony surprised many with a partnership to develop their own clouds aleutian its estimated more than 2 and a half 1000000000 people play Computer Games every year and esports enjoy an audience of 458000000 a year so what does this mean for traditional Game Developers and im delighted to say we have on one hand the cofounder of no code studios code is behind bafta winning science for all trouble observe ation stories on told our plight so what does stay the arcade mean for your industry armor or seen war more services nobody move to the clouds and so its not surprising that were sorry to see a. Platform just being streamed directly from the quote is that going to change the Way Companies like you do business i guess for for us we would just look at it as the canal the potential platform is another thing you that you could potentially. Sail so games on. In terms of the way that we specifically make games some of these developments in there might not have a huge impact to begin with because the types of games that we are going to develop in him i have 23 year. Cycles so were usually can go look in. You know yes we are looking forward to seeing what would be sort of. Pretty future is actually going to be going to be going sometimes in especially for us we are primarily just kind of making good content that content can be delivered to lots of different formats so you for example we can develop play games for p. C. For p s 4 for x. Books and then hopefully that should be able to get into ported over to Google Stadia so in the meantime we can still produce games similar minus the meta 4 but. Because it means that theres another potential that we could potentially sell or seems on so more business maybe for people like you when they heard the Business Models though talking of business of playstation intend on. Well i think that one of one of the biggest benefits is that youve got youve got the added competition because i know that if i actually got more competition from other players who whether its google for the apple come in and then just means that. I think where it will always come to. Is that the rush to content whos got the best content on their platform. And then virtually such a can it good for developers because it then means that you know you may see better exclusivity deals for for Different Developers or for different games you know whether that sony or microsoft or google or apple kind of trying to can appeal for the exclusive content and i think ultimately like gamers they may not mind so much for. Which platform they actually use but they they want to play the games that they want to play and so a lot of it will be driven by the content. On each platform is this still room for stop. Tops in the market today to take on some of the big players yeah i mean the one thing that we discovered as well is that you know for us. Were not we dont set out to compete with that the biggest games out there you know we should being true to yourself we are actually your doing. Games that we know that you know certainly have a place in the industry i mean its a Huge Industry and when you look at the types of platform you. Like a huge mobile game insect so youve got huge console game and say sort of p. C. Sector its not just about half in like youre huge hundreds or 5000. 00 or games there so the so much space in the industry for smaller players to actually coexist. And to send extent yes youre always competes in against any other game but theres going to be a huge audience some people want to play you different styles of games so we just be true to yourself and say well this is the type of game that we know that we can create we know that were good at and weve now got a track record so. And thats the thing is once you start to get once you start to develop your niche once you actually start to get good at what you do then there will be an audience for you you know we had a lot of really great support from our publisher great great reviews from journalists so that we know that she can the world working on the production for the next game that there will we will have a co off interest from a very very beginning so we dont have to necessarily compete with the kind of the big boys but having said that you know theres because theres so much room for maneuver and industry then there are certainly very kind of fast moving industry so yes Smaller Companies can come up the you know its going to be tough to compete with the in the the big studios or you already have a huge established kind of fun base but the great thing about the industry people come up with new ideas all the time the technology is improving you look at whats going to happen in v. A. R. Over the next of 5 to 10 years and its a really exciting. Speaks what about esports what potential do you see and what do we learn from the fortnight competition in your thoughts going to start to mature over the next few years its going to get even bigger you know the the Adoption Rate for people going into esports. I think is going to be massive all right thanks so much. Thank you. And thats our show for this wave remember you can get in touch with us via twitter use the hash tag a. J. C. To see when you do or drop us an email counting the cost around 0 dot net is our address and theres more for you online and out to syria dot com slash it and see take you straight to our page which has individual reports links and entire episodes for you to catch up on. Thats it for this edition of counting the cost im sam is a than from the whole team thanks for joining us news and aljazeera is next. Descend on aljazeera as this year comes to an end we look ahead to 2020 and the stories that may shape the people in power investigates the shocking treatment of disabled people in Eastern Europe is an explosive look at the Worlds Largest conference on h. I. V. In rwanda will be efforts achieve an aids free africa a 2 part series charging chinas rise as a 21st century superpower. Un leaders will gather in spain to discuss issues about Climate Change and examine the possible Global Solutions join us for live coverage to sound on aljazeera. A chinese casino empire is transforming cambodia green plants money Rapid Development and criminology sano one a few the winners and losers in cambodia to see how the sun aljazeera. The. Un peacekeepers opened fire as protesters stormed a United Nations compound in the democratic republic of congo 2 people have been killed in the breast. 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