Fallouja Police Fear Guilt by Association With U.S.

News crews beat a path Friday to this city west of Baghdad, drawn by a potential headline: Harassed U.S. Army Pulls Out of Troubled Iraqi Town.

That isn’t true.

But the real story -- that Iraqi police don’t want U.S. soldiers on their compound anymore -- appears just as disquieting.

Police, exercising newfound political freedoms, staged a demonstration here this week demanding that the Army leave the police compound downtown within 48 hours. The reason?

“We know the Americans are targets of the people here, so we don’t want them that close to us,” Officer Ali Mansour explained outside the station. “We don’t want the civilians to associate the Americans with us.”

In the new Iraq, or at least in the new Fallouja, it has come to this: The U.S. presence is so provocative that the Army’s ostensible chief ally -- local policemen, trained and outfitted by Americans -- would prefer to take the aid, the training and the paychecks but keep their distance.

It’s not personal, the police say. They have nothing against the Americans. They like trying to teach them Arabic words and picking up some English. It’s just that officers of the new Fallouja police force are terrified that citizens’ ire against the occupiers will be directed at them.

“We all think it would be better if the Americans stayed outside of the city limits and let us guard the city,” Police Chief Riyadh Abbas, an important U.S. partner here, said in an interview at the stifling police station, where yet another power blackout had left the ceiling fans limp. “These are our people here. We live in Fallouja. We know how to take care of our city.”

There is no need for any police official here to be reminded of what happened a week ago in nearby Ramadi, where eight young recruits were killed by a remote-controlled bomb placed practically in front of City Hall. This was the price the Ramadi police paid for cooperating with the Americans.

Their counterparts in Fallouja are fervid about avoiding such a bloodbath. “The Americans’ presence here has no benefit for us,” said Lt. Nisan Mohammed Ali. “We don’t want people to think we are instruments of the Americans.”

Just two nights ago, several rocket-propelled grenades were fired in the vicinity of the battered police headquarters, which suffered a direct hit in the spring. The Iraqis are convinced the attacks will stop once the Army contingents that park in back of the station clear out. U.S. troops have also guarded the mayor’s office, another favorite target of grenade-firing assailants.

But on Friday, there was no extensive military presence at City Hall. The tanks and Humvees were gone. Iraqi police, not GIs, greeted visitors and checked their credentials.

There were still a few U.S. military police down the street at the station, but they had heard that their presence was being phased out. “I guess it’s getting too dangerous having us around,” said one young MP from New England. Several soldiers and residents say patrols have been reduced, especially in town at night.

Rumors and exaggerated news reports had suggested that the Army might be pulling out altogether in Fallouja, a key trouble spot for U.S. forces. The Army says attacks have declined and relations have improved in recent weeks, but an explosion two weeks ago at a mosque compound -- described by U.S. authorities as a bomb-making factory -- raised tensions anew.

Just Thursday night, a tank crew helping to guard a dam fired a powerful anti-personnel round at attackers who had sent a grenade their way, the Army said. There was no word on casualties.

Farther west, in Ramadi, two mortar rounds landed inside the major U.S. compound in the city -- the ninth mortar attack in the last 10 days there. The Army has suffered one minor casualty in these attacks.

On Friday, a steady stream of journalists made their way to the vast Army compound outside Fallouja to find out if it was true: Was the Army pulling out?

“We’re not going anywhere,” said Lt. Col. Eric Wesley, who was charged with knocking down the rumor. “We are committed to Fallouja. I’m ready to chair the Chamber of Commerce.”

What the Army is doing is “scaling back” its presence downtown and turning over certain patrol and guard duties to Iraqi police, Wesley said. It’s a good-news story, he said.

“We want the Iraqis to take on greater and greater responsibilities,” Wesley said in his office on the base, the former headquarters of an Iranian insurgent faction sponsored by Saddam Hussein. “We see this as a very positive sign.”

The Iraqi police force has been deemed ready to take over certain duties from the Army, Wesley said. One such task is the guarding of certain “static sites,” such as banks and government buildings, including the police station and City Hall. The changeover has been in the works for several weeks, he said.

But this week’s protest by Fallouja police demanding a U.S. pullout from their headquarters appeared to catch the Army by surprise. Commanders were concerned about how the matter might play back home if the Army was seen as withdrawing under pressure.

“We were aware of the potential media misunderstanding about this,” Wesley said. “But we wanted to take the high road.”

That took the shape of discussions between Army representatives and police officials, including Chief Riyadh, the military said.

Police have been assured that the U.S. presence will be reduced at the headquarters, although a liaison officer will probably be assigned there -- and that an Army quick-reaction force will be at the ready should police need it.

Military officials insist there are no hard feelings. They know as well as their police colleagues that many Iraqis are enraged about the occupation, however much they despised Hussein. And some are determined to take it out on anyone who is seen as cooperating with U.S. forces.

“We do attract attention,” Wesley said. “No doubt about that.”