Our plan is to turn security in Iraq over to its own police as soon as possible. I remain skeptical of their suitability for this task. If the U.S. military has had a hard time keeping order, how is a new outfit going to fare?
This weekend we’ve seen more evidence of the challenge. Iraqis assemble in a supposedly peaceful region to stage a jobs protest, and the next thing you know five people are dead. It’s unclear who fired the first shot, but the bottom line is that the police are responsible for maintaining order, and things were anything but orderly.
At the bottom of the story notice that two police officers, who failed to identify themselves, were killed by U.S. troops. Don’t know why that should be happening.
Add to these kind of incidents the fact that many police may be corrupt, or even “double agents,” and it seems to me we’re a long way from an autonomous Iraqi security force.
Well, ultimately Iraqi’s must provide their own security and the US must leave. So at some point, there has to be some kind of handover of responsibility. In terms of corruption, this is the hallmark of all government officials in all 3rd world countries as far as I know and I doubt it’ll ultimately be better in Iraq than anywhere else.