Advertisement

U.S.-Iraqi security effort is a tough sell in Baghdad

Share
Times Staff Writer

Rarely do U.S. military officials talk about the month-old security crackdown in Iraq without mentioning three words: “joint security stations.” The stations are considered crucial to the plan’s success because of their emphasis on giving Baghdad’s toughest neighborhoods a 24/7 troop presence.

Four years ago today, U.S.-led forces invaded Iraq to topple Saddam Hussein. The fears and distrust resulting from the subsequent warfare make it difficult, if not impossible, to persuade Iraqis to use the stations as they were intended: as friendly neighborhood cop shops where anyone can drop by with a tip on a suspected terrorist next door.

This is a country where working for foreigners can get a citizen killed for being a suspected collaborator. It is a country where people have little faith in the U.S. military’s commitment to providing them the electricity, jobs and improved lives they were promised as part of the American-led attack that began March 20, 2003.

Advertisement

Under the best circumstances, analysts say, classic counterinsurgency tactics can take years to work. Combine that with the limited U.S. troop levels in Iraq, and with security concerns that prevent the military even from telling people where the stations are located, and it becomes clear that in the context of Iraq in 2007, the simple idea of security stations is laden with complications.

“We are doing it, and all the other smart aspects of the new Baghdad security plan, very late in the day,” said counterinsurgency expert Kenneth M. Pollack, a former National Security Council official now at the Brookings Institution who was an advocate of the 2003 invasion. “It is going to be very difficult to build up the trust among the Iraqi public to make any of this succeed.”

The difficulties were evident in a series of interviews conducted by The Times and in a new nationwide poll by a British market research firm.

Only one-third of Iraqis surveyed in the Opinion Research Business poll said they believed the Bush administration’s troop “surge” plan, which will bring an additional 28,700 troops to Iraq by June, was intended to bring security back to the nation.

Of the 5,019 Iraqis surveyed, 22% said the new troops were part of a ploy to position the U.S. to attack other countries in the region. Five percent thought the Americans intended to take control of Iraq. More than half the respondents -- 53% -- said they expected the security situation to improve either a great deal or somewhat after U.S. troops left. Just under half said life was better than under Hussein.

Among Iraqis who say they would use the stations, several interviewed in various neighborhoods expressed doubts as to their effectiveness, a reflection of the hopelessness driving so many here to leave the country.

Advertisement

“For me, it is just one of the numerous promises we have heard about but that have yielded no results,” said shop owner Abu Qusai. “People are sick of new promises.”

If such opinions concern the commander of U.S. troops in Iraq, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, he didn’t show it during a visit March 13 to a joint security station in Ramadi, the capital of Al Anbar province, a longtime center of the anti-American insurgency led by Sunni Arabs. Petraeus touted the decrepit former school in a bleak, rocket-scarred neighborhood as an example of counterinsurgency at its best.

“You can’t commute to the fight,” Petraeus said as he toured the station, which houses U.S. and Iraqi forces. It is one of 32 such stations in Ramadi, some of which were established before the latest security plan began. There are 23 so far in Baghdad, and scores more are planned for the capital and Al Anbar.

If all goes as planned, military officials say, residents will come to know and trust the uniformed Americans and Iraqis living in their midst and provide valuable intelligence.

Pollack said the stations were perhaps the most important element of the latest security plan, and he cited Britain’s taming of sectarian warfare in Northern Ireland as an example of how such a strategy can work.

The effort in Northern Ireland, however, took years. And the four years of anger and security concerns built up among Iraqis, combined with America’s track record, will make it difficult to persuade them to accept the U.S.-Iraqi plan, analysts say.

Advertisement

“We’ve developed a reputation for coming in, whipping through and then leaving,” said Stephen Biddle, a military analyst at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. “All the civilians in Iraq have in the back of their minds that it might look safe now, but three or six months later, they’re thinking, ‘All the Americans are going to be gone and if I rat on Mohammed down the street, he’ll come and get me once they leave.’ ”

Abu Noor of the Sadr City district of northeast Baghdad said he was unlikely to visit a security station because he did not trust U.S. troops to treat Shiite Muslims such as himself fairly. He accused the Americans of using the security plan to target Shiites while giving Sunnis a pass. “Thus, I prefer to report to the Iraqi security or to the patrols, rather than go to the foreign troops at the JSS,” he said.

Another Shiite, a 32-year-old building foreman who did not want to be identified for safety reasons, agreed. Stressing that sectarian warfare between Sunnis and Shiites had not existed until the U.S. arrival, he said: “They are the source of our disease. They are the sickness itself, so why go and ask them for remedies?”

Haki Ismail Ibrahim, a Sunni living in the neighboring Shaab district, said he also would be reluctant to use the stations, but for a different reason. “We will be accused of being spies and killed at once,” he said.

Still, counterinsurgency experts say Petraeus’ approach is the best remaining option in Iraq, where militants live among the regular population.

The Army counterinsurgency manual that Petraeus himself drafted emphasizes the importance of stationing military troops in neighborhoods they have secured. The thinking is that if they stay on and provide security and basic services to help people recover from conflict, streetwise residents will warm to them.

Advertisement

But the manual also calls for a ratio of roughly one service person for every 50 civilians, something impossible to achieve with the U.S. forces at Petraeus’ disposal. Petraeus said the ratio was reachable if one counted Iraqi troops and private security workers contracted to do jobs that might otherwise fall to troops, such as protecting the U.S. Embassy.

He and other military officials here refuse to criticize their predecessors for not introducing elements such as joint security stations early in the war. They say conditions were different then, that they have learned from the past, and that these are tried and true methods.

During his visit to Ramadi, Petraeus was downright bubbly as he toured the station and listened to Marine Lt. Col. William M. Jurney explain how troops were getting the word of their presence out to locals: via a loudspeaker system like the ones used by mosques to summon people to prayer.

“Voice of Ramadi,” as they have dubbed the system, broadcasts everything from public service announcements to soccer scores to news from the BBC and Al Jazeera.

“You guys are living counterinsurgency, right here!” Petraeus told Jurney.

Such methods have worked in Iraq before, analysts say, notably in 2005 in the town of Tall Afar, about 40 miles from the Syrian border. A few months of stability resulted after U.S. troops drove out Sunni insurgents, moved into the area and began working with local leaders.

Then the Americans left, and the insurgents returned.

“That is one of the biggest flies in the ointment in Iraq today,” Pollack said. “If we’re not willing to stay for the months, if not years, it will take to regain the trust of average Iraqis, none of Petraeus’ smart moves are going to work.”

Advertisement

*

susman@latimes.com

Advertisement