| |
US pays for intelligence
blunders
By Peyman Pejman
BAGHDAD - United States intelligence gathering
operations are being called into question following the
downing of a US helicopter in Iraq on Sunday, which
claimed the lives of 16 soldiers, adding to the already
high number of rocket attacks and suicide bombings that
occur in Iraq almost every day.
To many Iraqis
in the know, and even among coalition officials, the
answer is clear. "One of the biggest mistakes of the
coalition forces was to dissolve the army and the
security forces," Brigadier-General Mohammed Abdullah
Shahwani told Inter Press Service in Baghdad. Shahwani
left Iraq in 1990 and became a part of Washington's
covert efforts to topple Saddam Hussein.
"We had
a good intelligence network [then]," he said. "They knew
everybody, they knew the criminals. But they went home.
Nobody can do it anymore. If you start from the
beginning, you need time."
Both Iraqi and US
sources in Baghdad say that the order to dissolve the
army and other security services was a direct order from
the Pentagon, and not an idea promoted by L Paul Bremer,
Iraq's civilian administrator of the US-led Coalition
Provisional Authority (CPA). Dissolving the Iraqi army
also had severe economic consequences, one that many
Iraqis say that the US did not adequately consider.
The army is said to have had about 400,000
members. Saddam's Republican Guards numbered about
50,000, with about as many in other security organs.
Given that an average Iraqi family comprises six
persons, this order from the Pentagon generated 3
million unhappy Iraqis, accounting for about 12 percent
of the population.
Another serious security
aspect of dissolving the army was that it opened up
Iraq's vast land borders to foreign terrorists. "Iraq
has now become a battleground between international
terrorists and the US forces," said Hani Idriss, deputy
leader of the Iraqi National Accord, a coalition of
seven Iraqi groups that had opposed Saddam.
Many
Iraqis say that in the absence of a functioning security
apparatus, US forces adopted the "take control and go
solo" mentality. They wanted to take full charge and
excluded any Iraqi participation.
Spokesman for
the Iraqi National Congress Intifadh Qanbar said that
the signs came as early as the first days of the war.
"During the liberation of Iraq, when the US army was
moving from the south towards Baghdad, it was clear that
the Iraqi element as a partner was removed from the war
planning," he said. "Everything was handled completely
by the US military, and this is something that I think
was a mistake."
Idriss says that various
political parties have offered the coalition forces help
in setting up a security system, including recruiting
informers to gather intelligence to prevent attacks on
Iraqis and coalition members.
"On more than one
occasion, we have offered in our meetings of the
Governing Council with the coalition, especially Mr
Bremer himself, to let us help and offer our expertise,"
said Idriss. So far, they have not received any answers,
and he thinks he knows why.
"The coalition
forces insist on full control when it comes to making
decisions on security," he said. "They have not allowed
any role to the political forces in the security area.
They think of the political forces as militias and they
think they might use their guns, and there would [be]
civil war."
In addition, said Qanbar, the
Central Intelligence Agency has tried to recruit its own
informers and "intelligence assets", but this has not
worked.
"There was a massive effort to recruit
heads of tribes in the south, but clearly this did not
bring the results the Americans wanted," he said. "I
hear there are efforts here and there in Iraq but this
type of work always fails because these people
[Americans] do not know Iraq, don't understand the
complexities of the Iraqi society."
Other Iraqis
critical of the way the US has handled the security
situation say that the solution is for Bremer and the
CPA to make changes, and for Pentagon ideologues to
listen to the advice they get from Baghdad. "Mr Bremer
needs to have advisors and they need to be from inside
Iraq," said Saad Jenabi, an Iraqi businessman from a
well-known Baghdad family.
Jenabi became a
business partner of Hussein Kamel, Saddam's son-in-law,
and escaped with him to Jordan some years ago. But he
went on to the US after Kamel's return to Iraq and his
reported execution by Saddam. He is reported to have
played a role in the plans to topple Saddam.
"The problem with the CPA is that it is very
slow because most of the people here have never served
in the Middle East," said Jenabi. "They never served in
Iraq. They do not know the people. They come for two
months and by the time the start learning, they have to
leave."
(Inter Press Service)
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
