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Dealing With The Desertion Disease
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| Contributor | kal |
| Last Edited | kal Apr 16, 2008 06:35am |
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| Category | News |
| News Date | Wednesday, April 16, 2008 12:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | The fighting between government forces and Shia militias continues, with some interesting results. Three weeks of violence have revealed that the Mahdi Army (as many suspected) was not very united, or obedient to leader Muqtada al Sadr. As police and troops captured more and more Mahdi Army members, and facilities were, it became rather obvious that this "army" consists of many independent minded factions, and many of these are basically criminal gangs, trying to pass as secular militiamen. This, and the heavy damage to the Mahdi Army (several thousand members killed, wounded or captured in the last month) caused army leader al Sadr to consider disbanding the organization.
Fighting is heaviest in the main Mahdi Army areas in Baghdad ("Sadr City") and Basra. U.S. troops have assisted by providing aerial reconnaissance and manpower to cordon off the battle areas. Everyone, except the foreign media, has been pleased with the performance of the Iraqi police and troops. But this was viewed differently overseas, where much was made by the foreign media, when the government fired 1,300 soldiers and police for deserting or refusing to fight. Locally, this is seen as tremendous progress. The Iraqi army and police have a long tradition of, well, bugging out when the going gets tough. Remember that the Iraqi army largely melted away in the face of the U.S. and British invaders in 2003. In 1991, about a third of the Iraqi troops occupying Kuwait in 1990-91, deserted by the time coalition troops attacked in January, 1991. During the 1980s war with Iran, desertion was such a pervasive problem that Saddam had to come up with some novel techniques (think "carrot and stick" on steroids) to deal with it. Even before Saddam, Iraqi reluctance to stick around once the fighting begins, was just considered another national characteristic. But five years of troops selection and training have changed that attitude considerably
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