Just Who, and What, is Standing Up in Iraq?

As just about everyone knows, Bush has repeatedly asserted that “When the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down.” That is this administration’s “Plan for Victory.”

So, just exactly how is this strategy going and how are those Iraqi troops that we are waiting to stand up doing?

According to this piece in the Baltimore Sun, it is not going very well. In fact to borrow a term from the internet: FUBAR!

That's right the Iraqi troops that we are dependant on taking over the “Mission,” so that it can be “Accomplished,” are apparently out of control or, at the very least, under no one’s control.

Here is the headline:

Brutality, corruption pervade Iraqi police force

Documents allege officers involved in ai

ding insurgents and fatal beatings

Pretty scary, huh? Well, here is the whole thing a

nd then we will talk about how well this plan is working?

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Brutality and corruption are rampant in Iraq's police force, with abuses including the rape of female prisoners, the release of terrorism suspects in exchange for bribes, assassinations of police officers and participation in insurgent bombings, according to confidential Iraqi g

overnment documents detailing more than 400 police corruption investigations.

A recent assessment by State Department police training contractors underscores the investigative documents, concluding that strong paramilitary and insurgent influences within the force and endem

ic corruption have undermined public confidence in the government.

Officers have beaten prisoners to death, been involved in kidnapping rings, sold thousands of stolen and forged Iraqi passports and passed along vital information to insurgents, the Iraqi documents allege.

The documents, which cover most of 2005 and part of 2006, were obtained by the Los Angeles Times and authenticated by current and former police officials. The alleged offenses cover dozens of poli

ce units and hundreds of officers ranging from beat cops to generals and police chiefs.

Officers were punished in some cases, but the vast majority of offenses are either under investigation or were dropped because of a lack of evidence or witness testimony.

The documents are the latest in a string of disturbing revelations of abuse and corruption by Iraq's Interior Ministry, a huge, Cabinet-level agency that employs 268,610 police, and immigration, facil

ities security and dignitary protection officers.

After the discovery in November of a secret Interior Ministry detention facility in Baghdad operated by police intelligence officials affiliated with a Shiite Muslim militia, U.S. officials declared 2006 "the year of the police." They vowed a renewed effort to expand and professionalize Iraq's civilian officer corps.

President Bush has said that the training of a competent Iraqi police force is linked to the timing of a

n eventual withdrawal of U.S. troops and a key element in the war in Iraq. (emphasis mine)

But U.S. officials say the renegade force in the ministry's intelligence service that ran the bunker in Baghdad's Jadiriyah neighborhood continues to operate out of the Interior Ministry building's seventh floor. A senior U.S. military official in Iraq, who was interviewed last month on condition of anonymity, confirmed that one of the leaders of the renegade group, Mahm

oud Waeli, is the "minister of intelligence for the Badr Corps" Shiite militia and a main recruiter of paramilitary elements for interior police forces.

"We're gradually working the process to take them out of the equation," the military official said. "We developed the information. We also developed a prosecutorial case."

Bayan Jabr, a prominent Shiite, was in

terior minister at the time of the investigations detailed in the documents and has been accused of allowing Shiite paramilitaries to run rampant in the security forces under his watch.

U.S. officials interviewed for this article said the ability of Jabr's replacement, Jawad Bolani, to deal with the pervasive corruption and militia influence in the police will be a crucial test of his leadership.

The huge challenges facing Bolani, a Shiite engineer who has no policing experience and who entered politics for the first time after the U.S.-led invasion of 2003, are highlighted in a recent assessment by police trainers hired by the State Department. According to the report, corruption in the Interior Ministry has hampered its effectiveness and its credibility with Iraqis.

"Despite great progress and genuine commitment on the part of many ministry officials, the current climate of corruption, human rights violations and sectarian violence found in Iraq's security forces undermines public confidence," according to the document, "Year of the Police In-Stride Assessment, October 2005 to May 2006."

"Elements of the MOI have been co-opted by insurgents, terrorists and sectarian militias. Payroll fraud, other kinds of corruption and intimidation campaigns by insurgent and militia organizations undermine police effectiveness in key cities throughout Iraq," the report said.

The report increased tensions between the Pentagon, which runs the police training program, and the State Department, which has been pushing to expand its limited training role in Iraq, said a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity. (emphasis mine)

The report strikes contradictory tones, claiming that the Interior Ministry continues to improve and that its forces are on track to take over civil security from U.S. and Iraqi military elements by the end of the year, while outlining shocking problems with corruption and abuse.

Interior officials have taken steps to "improve detainee life," the report said. "However, there are elements within the MOI which continue to abuse detainees."

Referring to Sunni Arab insurgent groups and Shiite paramilitary organizations, the report goes on to claim that "these groups exploit MOI forces to further insurgent, party and sectarian goals. As a result, many Iraqis do not trust the police. Divisions falling along militia lines have led to violence among police.

"MOI officials and forces are widely reported to engage in bribery, extortion and theft," the report continues.

The report's findings are borne out in hundreds of pages of internal investigative documents.

The documents include worksheets with hundreds of short summaries of alleged crimes by police, letters referring accused officers to Iraq's anti-corruption agencies and courts, citizen complaints of police abuse and corruption, police inspector general summaries detailing financial crimes and fraudulent contracting practices, and reports on alleged sympathizers of Saddam Hussein's former regime.

The documents detail a police force in which abuse and death at the hands of policemen is frighteningly common.

Police officers' loyalties seem a major problem, with dozens of accounts of insurgent infiltration and terrorist acts committed by ministry officials. In one case, a ring of Baghdad police officers -- including a colonel, two lieutenants and a captain -- were accused of stealing communications equipment for insurgents, who used the electronics for remote bomb triggers. In another case, a medic with the Interior Ministry's elite commando force in Baghdad was fired after he was accused of planting improvised explosives and conducting assassinations.

In Diyala province, investigators were looking into allegations that a police officer detonated a suicide vest in the bombing of a police station, and in a separate case, a brigadier general, a colonel and a criminal judge were accused of taking bribes from a suspected terrorist.

Police officers have also organized kidnapping rings that abduct civilians for ransom -- in some of the cases, the victims are police officers.

In another case, the bodyguards of a police colonel in the Zayonah neighborhood of Baghdad kidnapped merchants for ransom, according to the documents.

And in the capital's Ghazaliya neighborhood, a lieutenant and his brother-in-law kidnapped a man and demanded $18 million from his family.

Police abuse is also a common theme in the documents. The victims include citizens who tried to complain about police misbehavior, drivers who disobeyed traffic police commands, and, in several cases, other police officers.

But detainees appear to be targeted most often. The U.S. military has been working with the Iraqi government to standardize detention facilities and policies, and the U.S. assessment claimed that several site visits turned up no serious human rights abuses. But the ministry documents reveal a brutal detention system in which officers run hidden jails and torture and detainee deaths are common.

The documents mention four investigations into the deaths of 15 prisoners killed by police commando units.

In the Rusafa area of Baghdad, a predominantly Shiite area known for its strong militia presence, police tortured detainees with electricity, beatings and, in at least one case, anal rape, according to the internal documents. Relief was reserved for those detainees whose relatives could afford to bribe detention officers to release them.

Female detainees are often subject to sexual assault. In August, the commander of a detention center in the Karkh neighborhood of the capital raped a woman who was an alleged insurgent. Also in August, two lieutenants tortured and raped two other detained women.

The removal of two provincial police chiefs are among the strongest reprimands detailed in the documents.

U.S. officials say they have known about Interior Ministry abuses for years but have done little to thwart them, choosing instead to push Iraqi leaders to solve their own problems.

Once again, we are reminded that the fate of our troops, and their future, is dependant upon the Iraqi police force. Also, take special note that the outfit training the Iraqis is the Pentagon. Is it any wonder that the folks who have brought us Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram, torture and rendition, Haditha, and the recent rape and murder of a young girl and her family in Mahmoudiya, are unable to train the Iraqis decently. And, I emphasize the word: DECENTLY.

As the article concludes, “U.S. officials say they have known about Interior Ministry abuses for years but have done little to thwart them, choosing instead to push Iraqi leaders to solve their own problems.”

That’s right; we should let the Iraqis sort this out. After all, if only they had been more civil and understanding when we invaded their country, destroyed their infrastructure, and toppled their government, we wouldn’t be in this mess now, would we “Ollie?”

So, I guess “Cut and Run” really isn’t going to happen, or is it?