[This has a horribly familiar smell to it]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A858-2003Nov4.html
U.S. Shifts On Creation Of Security Unit in Iraq
Bremer Sets Conditions For Paramilitary Force
By Rajiv Chandrasekaran
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, November 5, 2003; Page A01
BAGHDAD, Nov. 4 -- The U.S. administrator of Iraq has decided to
conditionally support the creation of an Iraqi-led paramilitary force
composed of former employees of the country's security services and
members of political party militias, according to U.S. and Iraqi
officials.
Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council wants the force, which would
pursue resistance fighters who have eluded American troops, to include
a domestic intelligence-gathering unit and to have broad powers to
conduct raids and interrogate suspects. Such characteristics would
make the proposed force different from those created under other
security initiatives undertaken by the Americans, who until now had
expressed opposition to the idea.
The council leaders contend that Iraq's municipal police departments
are too weak -- and American soldiers too lacking in local knowledge
-- to combat the supporters of former president Saddam Hussein,
Islamic militants and foreign guerrillas who are attacking American
forces and Iraqis cooperating with the U.S.-led occupation. "We need a
security force that is run by Iraqis, that is more heavily armed than
the police and is able to act quickly," said a senior official of the
Iraqi National Congress, whose leader, Ahmed Chalabi, has participated
in discussions about the new unit.
Although the U.S. administrator, L. Paul Bremer, had initially opposed
the creation of a paramilitary force under the control of the
country's interim interior minister, he has softened his position as
attacks, particularly on Iraqi targets, have increased. Bremer no
longer has "any objection in principle" to the force, but wants to
ensure several conditions are met in vetting, training and supervising
the participants, a senior U.S. official here said.
The Governing Council implored the U.S. government Tuesday for more
authority to deal with security issues, saying in a letter to
President Bush that Iraqis "are more able than others to handle this
matter."
"We appeal to you, Mr. President, to transfer more authority to
Iraqis, so they can run their own affairs and combat the forces of
evil that are trying to destabilize Iraq," Jalal Talabani, the current
holder of the council's rotating presidency, wrote in a letter of
condolence to Bush in response to the deaths of 15 American soldiers
in a missile strike on a transport helicopter.
As the council made its plea to Bush, Iraq was wracked by another day
of violence. Three explosions, caused by mortars or rockets, occurred
inside the supposedly secure headquarters zone of the occupation
authority in Baghdad, wounding four people, military officials said.
One soldier from the Army's 1st Armored Division was killed by a
roadside bomb in the capital. And in the northern city of Mosul, an
Iraqi judge was shot and killed outside his home.
The escalating violence prompted Spain, which is contributing 1,300
troops to the U.S.-led military force, to withdraw most of its
diplomatic staff from Iraq. Britain, the second-biggest contributor to
the force, said one of its marines was killed by hostile fire on
Friday, the first fatality in more than a month among the 10,500
British military personnel in Iraq.
The unit that the Governing Council wants to create would be the most
powerful domestic security force in Iraq, fueling concern among some
U.S. officials that it could be used for undemocratic purposes, such
as stifling political dissent, as such forces do in other Arab
nations.
Council leaders said they wanted the force to be drawn primarily from
former members of the military and police, as well as members of the
security and intelligence wings of five political organizations: the
Iraqi National Accord, the Iraqi National Congress, the Shiite Muslim
Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and two large
Kurdish parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic
Union of Kurdistan.
"We have very well-established intelligence networks," the Iraqi
National Congress official said. "If we can act on that information
right away with a strike force, instead of waiting for the Americans
to receive our reports and act on it, we can catch a lot more people
than the Americans are now."
Occupation authority officials have expressed concern that such a
force would give the five political groups unrivaled power in the
country's internal security apparatus. But U.S. and British officials
involved in security matters here say they believe the risks are
outweighed by the potential gain of having Iraqis assume a more active
role in hunting down resistance fighters. Until now, Iraqi police
officers, most of whom lack adequate training and equipment, have been
reluctant to take up that task.
"It would be good to have a group of Iraqis who are well-trained and
well-armed and well-disciplined participating in the fight," one
occupation authority official said. "Every bit helps."
Bremer would approve, the senior official said, if the members were
carefully screened by the Interior Ministry and by the occupation
authority, and received police training, not military instruction. In
addition, the official said, Bremer would require that
command-and-control issues with U.S. forces be resolved and that the
force could not grow beyond more than a few thousand members.
Political party security organs and other militias could not join the
force en masse, but members could join as individuals, the official
said. "We're not going to have a process whereby militias are
institutionalized here," the senior official said. If that happens, he
said, "we will not have a unified Iraq at the end of the day."
Setting up this force, the official said, "will have to done very
carefully."
Although Bush administration officials want to increase Iraqi
involvement in pursuing resistance fighters, the entities created so
far by the occupation authority -- a police force, a force to guard
buildings, border police, a civil defense corps and an army -- are all
subservient to Bremer. The civil defense units, which are recruited
and trained by American soldiers, take their orders from U.S.
commanders. While the police have more autonomy, they usually do not
involve themselves in hunting down resistance fighters.
The creation of an Iraqi-run paramilitary unit would be a significant
step toward giving Iraqis more power to tackle the escalating
guerrilla activity and rampant crime that have shaken the faith of
many Iraqis in the U.S.-led effort to reconstruct their country and
form a democratic government.
"We need to be equal partners with the Americans in promoting
security," said Adel Abdel-Mehdi, a senior leader with the Supreme
Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, whose militia, the Badr
Brigades, has been patrolling cities in southern Iraq. "They want us
to take responsibility. They need to give us the authority."
In his letter to Bush, Talabani wrote that "Iraqis are more able than
others to handle this matter because they are well aware of the course
of events in Iraq, more knowledgeable about the situation, the
complexities of Iraqi society and the nature of Saddam Hussein's
terrorist regime."
© 2003 The Washington Post Company