Why didn’t anyone think of this 4 years ago? Oh that’s right…..this administration has no thinkers. And when they do think, they can’t recall what they thought anyway. Too little too late baby. How many Iraqis are dead because of Blackwater? Oh and b the way, did NO ONE in Congress, prior to this incident, think there should be a little oversight? Oh that’s right, that’s why they’re under the umbrella of the state department….so there would be no oversight.

The State Department, seeking to retain its relationship with Blackwater USA while trying to bring the company’s armed guards under tighter control, said Friday that it would now send its own personnel as monitors on all Blackwater security convoys in and around Baghdad.

The department will also install video cameras in Blackwater armored vehicles to produce a record of all operations that could be used in investigations of the use of force by private security contractors. The State Department will also save recordings of all radio transmissions between Blackwater convoys and military and civilian agencies supervising them in Iraq.

In outlining the measures announced Friday, a State Department spokesman said they had been approved by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice based on the initial recommendations of Patrick F. Kennedy, the department’s director of management policy. Mr. Kennedy is the leader of a team Ms. Rice appointed to look at the way Blackwater and other private security contractors operate in Iraq.

More at the NY Times