„Wir stellten im Allgemeinen Terroristen“ an
Salon - Aug. 6, 2008 | BAGHDAD, der Irak - hellgelbe Hemden mit irakischen Markierungsfahnen anziehend, nähte auf dem Kasten, dem Alah Al-Janabi und dem Mahmoud Al-Samorai, das vor kurzem in der mit Blasen bedeckensonne am gedrängten Eingang zum hastenden Dora Markt gestanden wurde. Al-Janabi, 30, zeigte stolz eine glänzende schwarze Pistole auf seiner Hüfte an; Al-Samorai, 25, umschlang sein Kalashnikov Angriff Gewehr über seiner Schulter, während er hinunter einen Käufer tappte, der den Markt einträgt. Neun Monaten, verbanden die zwei Männer die Söhne vom Irak - die US - finanziert, meistens Sunni Organisation von 103.000 bewaffnetem Schutz, die als Teilnachbarschaft Sicherheit Uhr und paramilitärische Kraft vor des Teils arbeitet, und sind in der Gewalttätigkeit des Abdämmens unten im Irak instrumentell gewesen.
Was diese Männer vor dieser Arbeit - als taten, warfen sectarian Milizen und irakischen die Sicherheit Kräfte, die gekämpft wurden, Schlachten durch die Dora Nachbarschaft, Tötung und Verwundenkerben der Leute - ist unklar. Als gebeten, betrachteten die zwei einander und zuckten. „Es gab keine Jobs,“ das schließlich gesagte Al-Samorai. Möglicherweise er und sein Kollege versteckten sich in ihren Häusern während das sectarian Kämpfen draußen gerast. Aber es ist auch, daß sie neben den Sunni Milizen kämpften, wie viele Söhne der Irak der Mitglieder möglich, entsprechend amerikanischen Kräften, die den Bereich patrouillieren.
„Als das SOIs oben stand, stellten wir im Allgemeinen Terroristen an,“ sagte Leutnant. Justin Chabalko mit dem militärischen Akronym für die Söhne vom Irak. Die Infanterie-Bataillon 2-4 Chabalkos der 4. Brigade, 10. Gebirgsabteilung patrouilliert häufig den Dora Markt.
Die Söhne vom Irak waren 2007, als Sunni Stammes- Führer gebildet, ermüdet von der Gewalttätigkeit und ernüchtert mit islamischen Fundamentalisten wie Al-Qaida im Irak, angeregte Stammes- Mitglieder - einschließlich einige ehemalige Milizmitglieder - um Sunni und gemischte Nachbarschaften gegen übernahme zu schützen von den sectarian Gruppen. Die Amerikaner kündigten die Kreation der Söhne vom Irak als diplomatischer hauptsächlicherfolg an und waren damit einverstanden, die Organisation zu finanzieren und zahlten jedem Mitglied ein Monatsgehalt von $300, trotz der Proteste von der Shiite-vorherrsch irakischen Regierung, die nie die Idee des Legitimierens der Sunni-vorherrsch kämpfenden Kraft mochte.
Die Kraft geholfen, den Sunni Aufstand in Baghdad und des Iraks in den Stammes- Heartlands, wie der restive Anbar Provinz zu unterdrücken. Vor aber einem welchem Jahr, das wie eine leuchtende Lösung zur sectarian Gewalttätigkeit ausgesehen wird, jetzt wie eine Zeitbombe aussieht. Many of the force’s members once fought alongside al-Qaida in Iraq and other Sunni insurgency organizations against American troops and the predominantly Shiite Iraqi security forces. And now, a joint U.S.-Iraqi government plan to disband the force could put up to 80,000 men out of work — and leave them armed and disgruntled.
As Iraq becomes safer, the Sons of Iraq are less essential to security. Under a draft plan by U.S. forces and the Iraqi government, 20 percent of the force will be gradually folded into Iraqi security forces, after careful screening and additional training. The rest, Americans say, will be offered basic vocational training, which would allow them to take up such jobs as janitors, secretaries, electricians and plumbers. As of June, approximately 17,000 Sons of Iraq members have joined Iraqi security forces.
But conversations with the Sons of Iraq members and their leaders suggest that the majority of them do not want to do anything that does not involve carrying weapons, traditionally an honorable status in Iraqi society.
“A lot of them would prefer doing that because it gives them power of carrying a weapon and providing security,” said Capt. Emiliano Tellado, a member of the 2-4 Infantry Battalion.
Potentially, 80,000 armed and trained fighters could soon find themselves unemployed, or employed in jobs they do not want — and angry at the American forces and Iraqi government because they didn’t get picked for service in the security forces.
Al-Janabi and al-Samorai applied for jobs in the Iraqi police nine months ago for the first time, and reapplied twice since. They have not heard back from the Iraqi government, and they could well be among the many thousands who don’t get to join Iraqi security forces. But both dismissed the idea that they would lay down their guns and take up other work tools.
“That is not my job,” al-Samorai responded, firmly.
“I want to defend my people,” said al-Janabi.
A key question is, to what extent have members of the Sons of Iraq such as these severed their past allegiances. Working as U.S.-paid neighborhood guards was supposed to rehabilitate those who once fought against American and Iraqi forces, said Capt. Brett Walker, the spokesman for the 2-4 Infantry Battalion. Over time, approximately 18,000 Shiite members joined the force as well, working mostly in Shiite and mixed neighborhoods and ostensibly bringing some sense of sectarian rapprochement.
But some of the organization’s Sunni members may still be cooperating with sectarian militias, acknowledged Tellado. Even if the Sons of Iraq continues to function in its current format, the organization is a wild card as far as its members’ loyalties are concerned.
Several months ago, the 2-4’s soldiers detained one Sons of Iraq leader who was once associated with al-Qaida in Iraq, Tellado said. “He had a bad background, and it finally caught up with him,” he explained. “There was a possibility that he was still active” in the extremist Sunni organization. The man is now in Camp Bucca, a giant American detention center in southern Iraq.
“Sometimes they don’t reform,” Tellado said.
Chabalko said that some Sons of Iraq in his area use their positions “as an opportunity to play both sides of the fence, usually the guys at checkpoints.” American soldiers say that Sunni members of the force extorted money from Shiite civilians and attacked people they believed were members of Shiite militias.
In Baghdad’s religiously mixed Risala neighborhood in May, U.S. Army medics treated a man who had been beaten and kicked in the face and torso by Sons of Iraq, who believed that the man was an informant for the Mahdi army, the militia loyal to the anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The man survived because the local Sons of Iraq leader, Karim al-Gortani, happened by and ordered them to stop, said U.S. Army Capt. Sean Chase, whose soldiers treated the man. Chase suspects that Gortani, a former Iraqi army colonel under Saddam Hussein, at one point was either a member of al-Qaida in Iraq or Jaish al-Islami, another Sunni extremist group.
In Dora, where 450,000 people live, the Sons of Iraq have not carried out any overt acts of violence, U.S. soldiers say — at least not to the Americans’ knowledge. But that could be because Dora, a middle-class neighborhood that is home to many former officials of Saddam Hussein’s government, is almost homogenously Sunni.
Yet, even here the Sons of Iraq have a potential nemesis — the Iraqi National Police, a SWAT-like organization that patrols Dora. On many streets, members of the two armed groups man checkpoints together, but there is little amicability between them. “At first there was no open conflict, but there was open verbal conflict,” Tellado recalls.
In order to create a rapport between the Sunni guards and the Shiite officers, who also enjoy little trust from Dora’s Sunni population, the Americans have made the Sons of Iraq formally subordinate to the police force.
“On payday, I hand the money over to the [National Police] supervisor, and he hands the money to the SOI leader, and that guy hands the money to SOI members,” Tellado said. “It literally takes place in the same room.”
American military leaders understand the fragility of the peace between the Sons of Iraq and Shiite security forces, and the importance of keeping the Sunni force happy. “We’re gonna continue to pay the SOI guys until the government takes over or until they transition into other jobs,” said 4th Infantry Division Lt. Col. Steven Stover, the spokesman for American troops in Baghdad.
“These Sons of Iraq will eventually go away, and now the most important thing is to find jobs for all those individuals,” Lt. Col. Timothy Watson, the 2-4 commander, recently told a gathering of Sunni leaders in Dora. “It’s just as important providing jobs as it is security.”
Nonetheless, local leaders say the Sons of Iraq remains suspicious of the policemen. Hashem Ajili, one of the senior neighborhood leaders in northern Dora, said American presence is crucial to mediate any potential conflicts between the two groups.
“Currently the relations are getting better — with the support of coalition forces,” Ajili said. If the Americans leave, will the two groups be at each other’s throats? Ajili smiled, and responded diplomatically: “If the coalition forces go back to the States, I am afraid I don’t know what will happen between those two elements.”
Eddie Bello, an Iraqi-born cultural advisor to the American military in Iraq, was more specific. “It is like sitting on a volcano,” he said. “You never know when it will explode.”
Anna Badkhen has reported from Iraq, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Somalia, the West Bank and Gaza. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband, David Filipov, and their two sons.
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