HUMAN TERRAIN WORKERS FEDERALIZED

"... Since the inception of the project in 2006... interpreters, researchers and managers, deployed overseas (in Iraq and Afghanistan) as part of the Army’s social science program, the Human Terrain System... have been generously-paid contractors, serving as cultural counselors to combat units... (Now) they’re all becoming government employees... Which means that Human Terrain pay is suddenly not all that generous. One linguist, previously pulling in an annual salary $270,000, will now make about $91,000 — if that person continues his warzone work for the Human Terrain project... The dollar amount reduction is more than 60%... the switch was ostensibly triggered by the American military’s new Status of Forces Agreement with the Iraqi government. The pact, which went into effect in January, gives Baghdad officials broad new powers to control contractors on their soil (but not U.S. civil servants)..."
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/02/more-hts-mania