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| Iraq |
| Maliki orders pensions for Saddam's officers |
| 2007-04-07 |
| Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Friday ordered pension payments for senior officers of Saddam Hussein's military and offered a return to service for lower-ranking soldiers, a major step aimed at defusing the Sunni insurgency and meeting US benchmarks for his government. In a statement, Al-Maliki's office said the decision was made during a Cabinet meeting late last month. It was not clear why the information was only released Friday. Many former top intelligence, security and military officials are believed to have joined the Sunni insurgency after former US administrator L. Paul Bremer disbanded Iraq's 350,000-member military on May 23, 2003, a month after the regime Saddam's regime was ousted. The al-Maliki statement said that any former officer above the rank of major would be given a pension equal to that of officers now retiring. Former officers above major who wanted to rejoin the army were encouraged to check with the military command to learn if they were acceptable in the Iraqi army that is being rebuilt by American forces. Those who had the rank of major or lower may voluntarily return to the army. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #9 Now, now, Zenster, stick with the program (my program, just kidding). The idea is to "crush Sunnis first", which I believe was always the logical way to pacify the place. Take away the 95% of political violence for most of the post-invasion period that was Sunni-based, and of course you've changed the entire story, both in Iraq and back here. Maliki's not even in the top 10 of problems to solve. Take away the Sunni war of barbarism and you've still got a very different situation, one that undercuts the Shi'a militias in a fundamental way that can be produced through no other approach. OK, several years down the tubes while we did nothing of the sort, but it's not too late to engage that key dynamic. |
| Posted by: Verlaine 2007-04-07 23:48 |
| #8 Give all males over 10 the final dirt nap. There are too many muzzies anyway, we have to start reducing their numbers. |
| Posted by: wxjames 2007-04-07 13:15 |
| #7 Verlaine is absolutely right and I say we start with that waste-of-skin Maliki. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-04-07 12:59 |
| #6 Verlaine, good points - I would also say that, given the brutality and Sunni overlording of the Kurds and Shias, that a certain amount of payback HAD to happen, just as kicking the Sunnis out of Kirkuk (where they were installed in a Kurd-clearing policy by Saddam) is also a probably necessary action before the country can feel "made whole". Sunnis have just found out that payback's a bitch |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-04-07 11:28 |
| #5 Actually, Glenmore, there's a big difference. First, I'm talking about a totally systematic approach - every single human consuming oxygen who's on certain lists would be detained, duration depending on who they were and how interesting/cooperative they turn out to be. This would vary considerably, so that the detention burden would be nothing like the full number of former govt. types who are nominally "of interest". It's not rocket science, when you apply this sort of measure, to sort, split, and set them against each other using every trick in the book. Upshot is a lot of ability to ID the key bad guys, as well as the foot soldiers. Of course you have to apply your power once you know who the enemy is. Nobody would be killed unless they resisted arrest - of course being very generous in dispensing overwhelming force to those who DID resist arrest would have collateral benefits, too. As to the Shi'a death squad activity, I think there are at least two distinct types. Going back to '03, there has been some targeted killing of former Ba'athist types (presumably by Badr Corps and other groups organized before we arrived). I'm no expert on it, but let's say it was pretty limited and disappointing in its results - obviously, or no "insurgency" would have been sustained. After the Golden Mosque bombing a year ago, there was a well-known upsurge in larger, and often random, killings of Sunni and presumed-Sunni males, esp. in Baghdad. This is probably more the work of Sadr's type of crude, quasi-criminal gang network. I recall telling one of our Shi'a employees when this started that, if only the "death squads" hit the right people, it might actually help with the war and the country's people. He had an unfounded confidence that in fact the killers were gettting the "right" people - disappointing, as he was a pretty sharp guy. |
| Posted by: Verlaine 2007-04-07 11:20 |
| #4 What the top three commenters are suggesting sounds a lot like what has been happening with the series of 'death squad' abductions, tortures, and executions. Unless you think they were all just random sectarian 'hits'. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2007-04-07 06:50 |
| #3 Make Saddam's pensioners pick up their checks in person in the most remote & least settled parts of Iraq, every week, like some states do unemployment checks. Every day would be even better. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2007-04-07 02:32 |
| #2 Good job, Verlaine. CovertFloridian appreciates. Keep writing, you never know who reads what and advises what to whom in DC. |
| Posted by: covertfloridian 2007-04-07 01:50 |
| #1 OK. So one thing has bugged me from the get-go (say, fall of '03, when some kids were clearly starting to spoil things for the whole class). These former top intelligence, security and military officials all used to get paid, yes? Their names are/were probably on all sorts of rosters and other government documents, most of which we got when we rolled in, yes? Or, alternatively, could be very very easily reconstructed/traced through local research, bribes, interviews, ets., yes? So ..... why in the hell, in areas where there's clearly a problem, have not ALL of these people been offered free room and board - oh, no we REALLY insist, to the extent of mowing you and your house down with a Bushmaster if you don't come quietly - for an extended period? Why have we/the Iraqis been trying to lure likely or even dead-certain suspects behind the violence when we already have their names on lists? In this respect, this has to have been the easiest "insurgency" to crush in history. Wannabes and newcomers and average Omars and foreign jihadis are one thing - but for krissakes, these people are on lists of names of government employees, soldiers, etc. How could the noble resistance function if a huge number of its experienced/motivated cadres were preventively detained? Why wasn't this done, selectively, beginning the minute that organized trouble started in any Sunni areas? Dunno how this squares with Petraeus' new COIN document, or the Small Wars Handbook, etc. Doesn't matter. It's called common sense. One of the most widely accepted myths is that it was a big "mistake" to disband the already self-disbanded Iraqi military, which consisted of (1) mostly useless conscripts and (2) Sunni officers and others who were/are the enemy of the new Iraq. What no one ever asks is, why didn't we un-disband the Sunni portion of the military, and put them behind wire? Not a magic bullet, but probably a gigantic direct hit on the "insurgency's" ability to mount more than a desultory campaign of harassment. |
| Posted by: Verlaine 2007-04-07 01:33 |