Iraqi Government Refusing "Sons Of Iraq"

by: Chris LeJeune

Mon Aug 25, 2008 at 12:23:41 PM EDT

BAGHDAD - A key pillar of the U.S. strategy to pacify Iraq is in danger of collapsing because the Iraqi government is failing to absorb tens of thousands of former Sunni Muslim insurgents who'd joined U.S.-allied militia groups into the country's security forces.

American officials have credited the militias, known as the Sons of Iraq or Awakening Councils, with undercutting support for the group al-Qaida in Iraq and bringing peace to large swaths of the country, including Anbar province and parts of Baghdad. Under the program, the United States pays each militia member a stipend of about $300 a month and promised that they'd get jobs with the Iraqi government.

However, the US government had never planned on keeping these guys on the payroll forever.   The second part of the plan was for the Iraqi government to then hire them into government positions and integrate them into the police and military forces.  Unfortunately, considering the Sunni background of these ex-insurgents, the Iraqi government is now refusing to hold up their end of the bargain.

American military officials here have always said that the creation of the Sunni militias was at least as important to the precipitous drop in violence as the presence of 30,000 more U.S. troops, and that incorporating them into the security forces would go a long way toward bringing about the sort of reconciliation needed for long-term stability.

After initially embracing the idea of bringing the militia members into the security forces, however, Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki hasn't followed through. A committee that Maliki formed to organize the militias' transition to full-fledged government security troops fell apart and was reconstituted only recently. U.S. officials acknowledge that the hiring of the Sunnis has slowed to a crawl.
U.S. and Iraqi officials agree that the Maliki government never agreed to hire more than 20 percent of the militia members. A Maliki ally said it was unreasonable to expect otherwise.
"All the Americans are doing is paying them just to be quiet," said Haider al Abadi, a leading member of Maliki's Dawa political party and the head of the economic and investment committee in the parliament. The Iraqi government, he said, can't "justify paying monthly salaries to people on the grounds that they are ex-insurgents."

But the resistance of these groups by the Iraqi government is just the beginning.  Not only are they refusing to hire them, they are actively working against them.

The Los Angeles Times reports today on the Iraqi government's desire to disband the U.S.-funded Sunni paramilitaries, made up of former insurgents, who helped halt the country's open sectarian war. The U.S. military has watched as the government has dissolved the Sons of Iraq movement in the Baghdad suburb of Abu Ghraib and severely restricted it in the city of Baquba.

The Iraqi army has arrested fighters, credited with bringing calm to the country, while others are on the run or now living in exile,   like Abu Abed, who was the first man in Baghdad to wage a successful revolt against Al Qaeda in Iraq.

The Iraqi government is lobbying to end the Sons of Iraq as soon as possible.

An Iraqi commander explains further:

"We cannot stand them, and we detained many of them recently," said one senior Iraqi commander in Baghdad, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to discuss the issue. "Many of them were part of al Qaida despite the fact that many of them are helping us to fight al Qaida."

He said the army was considering setting a Nov. 1 deadline for those militia members who hadn't been absorbed into the security forces or given civilian jobs to give up their weapons. After that, they'd be arrested, he said.

Some militia members say that such a move would force them into open warfare with the government again.

"If they disband us now, I will tell you that history will show we will go back to zero," said Mullah Shahab al Aafi, a former emir, or leader, of insurgents in Diyala province who's the acting commander of 24,000 Sons of Iraq there, 11,000 of whom are on the U.S. payroll. "I will not give up my weapons. I will never give them up, and I will carry my weapon again. If it is useless to talk to the government, I will be forced to carry my weapons and my pistol."

Some argue that most SoIs would not revert to violence. Maybe. Perhaps most are tired of fighting. Perhaps most are deterred by the fact that the U.S. military (and perhaps the Iraqi government) have their biometric information. Perhaps most will be satisfied being plumbers. But here's a news flash: since there are 100,000 of these guys with guns, it wouldn't take most to revert to violence to cause a big problem. A mere 5-20 percent could cause a heck of a fireworks show. Remember, for years the U.S. military estimated the entire Sunni insurgency to be 8,000-20,000 guys.