Fight Or Flight: Can Iraqis Do The Job?

When 1st Lieut. Raied showed up for work on April 4 at Camp Eagle, a U.S. Army base in the east Baghdad slum of Sadr City, he knew he wouldn't have much company. The executive officer of the 306th Battalion of the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps (ICDC), Raied and other battalion members had been warned by locals not to report for duty after fighting broke out between militants loyal to the Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and U.S. forces. Raied, who like his comrades asked to be identified only by his first name, estimates that only a third of his battalion was willing to brave their neighbors' threats. He was one. But when he got to Camp Eagle, Iraqi security guards manning the gate told Raied he wasn't needed, apparently acting on instructions from U.S. commanders. "When I heard that I was sick at heart," he says. "I knew that the real reason was that the Americans wanted to finish killing people in Sadr City. Our duty is to protect the people. But the Americans don't trust us."

The U.S. says only two Iraqis from Raied's company made it to work that day, after an ambush by al-Sadr's forces killed eight U.S. soldiers. Since then, about 100 of the 700 members of the 306th Battalion have gone missing in action. Of the rest, say the U.S. soldiers at the camp, 90% fail to show up on days of high tension. Those officers who have remained on the job--men like Raied, a former master sergeant in the old Iraqi army--say the bloody fighting that had gripped the country over the past month was a watershed; local people have turned against the U.S. and the ICDC. Morale has been shattered, and many Shi'ites, including members of the ICDC, have become hostile to the U.S. presence. Like most Iraqis, Raied believes the U.S. must give more responsibility to local forces if it hopes to quell the insurgency. But he concedes that his men are nowhere close to ready. "We started from zero. By early April we had got up to 75% of ideal efficiency," he says. "Now we are back to about 25%. If we continue like this I recommend we disband the ICDC, because it is doing nothing for the Iraqi people."