Linguist Recruitment

So I received a partially handwritten letter from a Recruiting Specialist from Aegis (Mission Essential Personnel) who are a Federal Sub-Contractor for the US Military and “looking for individuals who are fluent in both Pashto and Dari to provide translation support to the US military in Afghanistan.” They are offering a starting package of $210,000 with benefits I was interested in “bridging critical communication gaps, as well as providing a tremendous service” to the armed forces. In addition, they are offering $2,000 for any individual I can refer to them from my contacts in the “Afghan-American” community.

You always hear about these things from the news or something online but rarely get something in the mail regarding. Now I don’t know a single word of Pashto or Dari so the decision for me is quite easy but I wonder how successful their recruiting efforts are especially in today’s waning economic days. They offer quite a salary with complete benefits… could be very enticing.

First thing I thought of when I read the name Aegis was the XBox Live arcade game called “Aegis Wings” that I played a lot with my buddies Joe and Chad but turns out that these guys have one of the bigger contracts in Iraq, nevermind Afghanistan. Except for that quote below, I can’t say I know much else about this company but I’ll be sure to keep an interest in them.

Aegis, one of the biggest security companies operating in Iraq. The company was recently awarded a £220 million security contract in Iraq by the United States government. Aegis conducts a number of security duties and helped with the collection of ballot papers in the country’s recent referendum.Source

I have also included the contents of the entire letter below if anyone is interested in reading it.

LOOKING FOR PASHTO/DARI LINGUISTS

Hello,

My name is xxxxx xxxxxx and I work for a company called Aegis MEP. We are a Federal Sub-Contractor for the U.S. military and are searching for individuals who are fluent in both Pashto and Dari to provide translation support to the U.S. military in Afghanistan. This is an excellent opportunity for helping reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan by bridging critical communication gaps, as well as providing a tremendous service to our armed forces.

I wanted to inquire to see if you would be interested in working on a referral basis for any contacts that you have in the Afghan-American community that are interested in this opportunity. I can offer you $2,000 per individual that is hired. We offer a very competitive compensation package with pay starting at $210,000 per year with medical, dental and insurance benefits. We feel our employees are the focal point of continued success.

Please let me know if you are interested, and I can offer you more details regarding the position.