When the US marines rolled into Fallujah two weeks ago, the Iraqi police force and Civil Defence Corps (ICDC) abandoned their stations while angry mobs freed prisoners and stole equipment.
The chief of police, Brigadier General Abud, went absent without leave, and marines reported that men dressed in police and ICDC uniforms were fighting alongside the insurgents.
The US project of building up an independent Iraqi security force took a devastating hit when security forces jumped ship. As some police officers and ICDC rematerialized in Fallujah on Tuesday, US marine Major Geffrey Cooper, 51, in charge of supervising police in al-Anbar province, was thinking long and hard about what went wrong.
"There are going to be eight to 10 stations to re-evaluate, including whether they are even still standing. Is the gear still there. How many want to come back to work. How many of them can be trusted," said Cooper, a reservist who serves as a deputy sheriff in San Bernardino County, California.
"We had approximately 830 working policemen in Fallujah. Right now the chief of police cant be found. He deserted his post. He put his tail between his legs and showed his true colours. He didn't protect his citizens."
Even as coalition officials and Iraqis spoke of handing back responsibility to police in the town, Cooper cautioned a huge overhaul was in the works for security forces in Al-Anbar, considered a haven of the anti-US insurgency.
"Were going to have to go through a new hiring process to pick a police chief and rebuild the force from the top down," he said.
The citys mayor and municipal council will interview candidates and select the next police chief, he said.
The major spoke of the total breakdown of authority outside the 25 percent slice of the city the marines controlled once they kicked off their offensive to crush the insurgency on April 5.
"At two police stations, I know a mob told officers to leave because they want to free the prisoners. They got the prisoners, ransacked the buildings and stole whatever they could," he said.
After witnessing defections to the insurgency during the two weeks of fighting, Cooper said the marines were calling for an extensive series of background checks and an interview process for current police and all applicants. Until now, if someone applied, the police automatically accepted the person, Cooper said.
"Its going to be a real challenge to identify trustworthy and loyal citizens who want to be policemen to provide protection and security for citizens all over Anbar province and all over the country really," he added.
Cooper pointed out there were many Iraqi police fighting side by side with the coalition, but warned that until the coalition implemented a thorough system of background checks, anti-US agents would continue to form a fifth column inside the Iraqi security forces.
"I think there are people who have infiltrated all areas of the Iraqi security forces. (This will continue) until we can do a proper identification process, until we can build a data base," Cooper said.
"It will take a while to identify the good guys and bad guys. It'll take several months. There are over 6,000 cops in al-Anbar province."
Cooper said plans were on the table to extend police training from three weeks to eight months. Currently, new recruits go to an eight-week training programme in Jordan or Baghdad, while veterans undergo a three-week retraining programme.
"We are looking at trying to make the academies longer, so we can put out quality policemen not just quantity," he said.
The proposal is currently being weighed by the marine command and Iraq's interim interior ministry. If approved it would mark a rethink of the US-led coalitions accelerated drive to rapidly churn out Iraqi security forces ahead of the June 30 date for the restoration of Iraqi sovereignty.
On a positive note, Cooper said coalition funds were finally starting to flow to the police for weapons, vehicles and bullet-proof vests.
Months of delay had prompted the 82nd Airborne Division commander, Major General Charles Swannack, to criticise the US-civilian controlled Coalitional Provisional Authority (CPA) for failing to get them the necessary funds.
"The CPA money started to come during April," Cooper said.
Comments
Comments are closed.