Los Angeles Times
September 11, 2004
RAMADI, Iraq — The Iraqi military force formed by the Marines in a
last-ditch effort to pacify the restive city of Fallouja has been disbanded in
the face of continuing violence, assaults on government security forces and
evidence that some members have been working openly with insurgents.
The dissolution of the Fallouja Brigade, created during the spring to avoid an
all-out assault on the insurgent hotbed, marked a significant setback for the
U.S. military. The Americans had hoped that the brigade, composed of former
members of the Iraqi army and Saddam Hussein's special security forces, would
work alongside the new Iraqi government and help restore order.
"The
Fallouja Brigade is done, over," said Marine Col. Jerry L. Durrant, who
oversees the 1st Marine Expeditionary Unit's involvement with Iraqi security
forces. "The whole Fallouja Brigade thing was a fiasco. Initially it worked
out OK, but it wasn't a good idea for very long."
Durrant did not say
what the Marines might do next, but U.S. warplanes Friday bombed Fallouja for
the fourth consecutive day and the air campaign was expected to continue and
possibly intensify. Friday's air attack targeted earth-moving equipment being
used by insurgents to build fighting positions, a Marine spokesman said.
With the demise of the Fallouja Brigade — agreed to by the interim
Iraqi government and the Marines — the Marines are left with no attractive
options for rooting out Fallouja's entrenched insurgency. The rebel movement
has spread to surrounding villages and left the interim Iraqi government without
control of one of the nation's largest cities west of Baghdad. Marines remain
based as close as two miles from Fallouja, but the insurgents — local and
foreign fighters backed by firebrand Sunni Muslim clerics — have had
several months to dig in and make it more difficult for American troops or Iraqi
government forces to launch a ground attack.
The development comes as
U.S. forces try to reestablish Iraqi government control in several insurgent
bastions, including Samarra, to the north of Baghdad, just months before
scheduled national elections.
Gen. Abdullah Hamid Wael, the brigade's
latest leader, announced the dissolution Thursday night on instructions from the
Defense Ministry.
Speaking at an Iraqi military base west of Fallouja,
Wael read from a ministry statement that said "any member of the brigade can, as
an individual, join the Iraqi national guard or the Iraqi police."
Discontent rippled through the group, many of whose members had hoped that it
would remain intact and eventually become a unit of the new army. Judging by
members' comments, it seemed likely that some would openly rejoin the
insurgency, in which many had been involved before joining the brigade. In
doing so, they would be able to fight with weapons provided to them by the
Marines, who also paid them monthly salaries.
That will make it all the
more difficult for U.S. troops and Iraqi government forces to retake Fallouja
— currently a "no go" area for U.S. forces.
"We don't know where
to go now after this dismissal by the American troops and the Iraqi interim
government," said Brig. Gen. Tayseer Latief of the brigade. "They leave us no
other option but to join the resistance."
Defense Ministry officials
declined to comment Friday.
When the brigade was established, Marine
commanders acknowledged that many members either were insurgent fighters or had
connections to them. The insurgents waged intense battles against Marines for
weeks in April.
The goal in forming the force was to avoid a bloodbath
by allowing the Marines to withdraw from the city but leaving a proxy force to
tamp down insurgent activity and arrest those responsible for the killings of
four U.S. civilian security contractors March 31.
Initially, Marine
commanders said the brigade would root out anti-American forces and target
foreign fighters. The Marines hoped that the brigade members, with their
military training and pride in having responsibility for their town, would stand
up against those fighting the U.S. military and Iraqi interim government
forces.
Empowering a force made up of Iraqis would move "Iraqi
stakeholders … to try to contribute to solving some of the challenges and
problems," Marine Col. John Coleman said in a July interview.
Coleman
acknowledged that the brigade was "a nascent military capability at best," but
one that enabled the Marines to get out of the city where their presence had
become a rallying call for the insurgency.
In the month after the
brigade's formation, "the enemy activity in this zone dropped to almost zero,"
he said. But it then began to climb back to the level it had been before the
killing of the U.S. civilian contractors, whose remains were mutilated.
In the end, most brigade members' prior allegiance to the insurgency proved
impossible to sever.
The brigade made no effort to restrict insurgent
activities, members and the Marines said. Fallouja became even safer for
insurgents, who could take refuge, plot attacks and run manufacturing centers
for car bombs and other explosives.
Made up of 1,600 former members of
the Iraqi army and Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard, the brigade was formally
created April 30.
Four months later, as the brigade is dissolved, its
members are better armed, better equipped and better off. Monthly wages ranged
from $260 for low-level soldiers to $700 for generals, one of the brigade's
staff officers said. The Marines also gave brigade members new semiautomatic
rifles and vehicles and furnished a base for them.
For much of the
time, the brigade was technically under Marine command and its staff officers
were in touch almost daily with Marine officers at Camp Fallouja on the
outskirts of town.
"We're trying to go in and recover the stuff we gave
them, but I'm not sure it's worth it," Durrant said. "They've already stolen
the air conditioners."
He added that when two Marine helicopters
inadvertently flew over the Fallouja Brigade base several weeks ago, the
aircraft were riddled with bullets and "the pilot was shot in the face."
On a recent trip to Fallouja, it appeared that brigade members were mixing
easily with insurgents.
At several checkpoints, one or two Iraqi police
officers lounged under small palapa huts with a brigade soldier as a
couple of masked men with AK-47s leaned into each car looking for
Westerners.
Last week, several Fallouja Brigade members in uniform shot
at Marines near the city limits and the Marines returned fire, Durrant said.
From the brigade's inception, many members never fully disentangled
themselves from the insurgent movement. Some expressed pride at the role they
had played in fighting the Marines and boasted of their prowess in firing
weapons. Although the Marines provided them with uniforms, most brigade members
eschewed them in favor of the brown or olive green uniforms worn by the Iraqi
armed forces under Hussein.
Although the brigade was never expected to
remain in place indefinitely, there had been talk of having members join either
the Iraqi army or the national guard — either as a unit or as individuals.
Brigade members had said they wished to join the army as a unit, but interim
Iraqi officials believed that to create a professional army, soldiers had to be
loyal first to the country, not to a unit, city or province.
As it
turns out, few brigade members appear likely to be welcomed into the army
— it was not mentioned as an option in the announcement, although Marine
officials said they believed Falloujans were free to sign up.
It also
seems unlikely that Falloujans would choose to join the national guard. Many
Iraqis in the Fallouja area view the guardsmen as U.S. stooges. Fallouja
fighters killed a local national guard commander a few weeks ago and kidnapped
another, leading many guardsmen to abandon their positions.
Several
members said they were angered by the dissolution.
"This was a great
violation to the members of the brigade by the American forces and the Iraqi
interim government," said Maj. Ahmed Abed Abaas. "Dissolving the Fallouja
Brigade, they broke the truce agreed upon last April when the Americans besieged
Fallouja."