- RAMADI -- American troops
have ceased regular patrolling in many Iraqi cities, leaving anti-insurgent
operations to poorly trained local security forces in a high-risk strategy
marking the official end to their occupation of the country.
-
- "It's targeted operations now, not four or five
hours on patrol, we don't do that any more" said Lt Col Mike Cabrey,
the commanding officer of 1/5 Field Artillery in Ramadi, the capital of
Al-Anbar province in western Iraq.
-
- "We have stopped exposing ourselves to threats and
are giving the Iraqi police a chance to show what they are made of. They
were the thugs of the earth under Saddam. We need to get the credibility
aspect done and then work on their abilities."
-
- No one in the multi-national force chain of command believes
that those abilities are anything like those of the American or British
armies. But generals hope that placing Iraqis in control of local security
will help to undermine the insurgency.
-
- "My commanders are reporting that there's a much
better rapport between the population and the Iraqi police and Iraqi National
Guard," said Lt Gen Thomas Metz, the head of the multi-national force
in Iraq.
-
- "To me that is very encouraging. Also, the commanders
are reporting that there are more frequent and more accurate reports of
actionable intelligence from the population."
-
- In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, he outlined
a three-stage plan of giving Iraqis local, regional and then strategic
control before an eventual withdrawal of American and British troops.
-
- "Our goal is to enter the [Iraqi national] elections
in January of '05 with them in regional control. Strategic control is dependent
on the threat to the country externally."
-
- A senior British officer conceded that "this is
not without risk". Soldiers on the ground have little confidence in
the Iraqi security forces and fear that the insurgents could exploit their
weakness and corruptibility to mount more effective attacks.
-
- Capt Kelly Royer of the US marines, a company commander
in central Ramadi, said: "At the very least, it allows them [the insurgents]
to stage [attacks] closer to us. Have we had more attacks since we stopped
patrolling? Yes."
-
- But he added that the attacks had been ineffective and
at some stage the Iraqis had to be given responsibility for their own country.
"It's event driven. If they can't manage it then I guess we'll be
here a lot longer."
-
- Staff Sgt Jeremy Viands, a US army squad leader, said
the Iraqi police had shown a marked reluctance to get involved when the
house of an insurgent suspect was identified. "We tried to get the
Iraqi police to go in and search it but they didn't want to.
-
- "A car had exploded and they were basically scared
something else was going to happen. We had to take them by the hand into
the house but they still didn't want to do anything even, when we said,
'This is your area, your scene'."
-
- There are also fears that many Iraqi policemen are in
league with the insurgents. On a day in April when Capt Royer's men were
ambushed they searched the residences of many Iraqi policemen.
-
- "We only found two in their houses. Most were not
in. So where were they? There were badges, complete uniforms but no guns.
What would you surmise from that?"
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- © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2004.
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- http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004
- /07/10/wirq10.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/07/10/ixworld.html
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