Wednesday, September 22, 2004

Hilla SWAT  

(Image: Kevin Sites.)

Dateline: Jabella, Iraq –9.21.04

We've been up since 3am--waiting for Hilla SWAT. It's now 4:30. Despite their annoyance--the Force Recon squad from the 24^th Marine Expeditionary Unit seems extremely patient--at least around Kuni Takahashi, a photographer for the Chicago Tribune and me. Instead they look at their watches--bullshit each other about their individual depravities--like masturbating in sweat socks. Typical life details at a military FOB or forward operating base in Iraq. These marines at FOB Kalsu still sleep in tents, shit in porta-johns, live in the dirt. This is no Camp Victory green zone paradise with guys chilling in air-conditioned trailers and eating at the Bob Hope Dining Facility--a zeppelin hangar of a building just down the road from Baghdad International Airport. Everyone here has heard the stories--or maybe, been on a convoy through the green zone, briefly glimpsed the way that other half lives. They piss and moan about it--but don't denounce its existence. They are, after all, Americans--it's about aspirations--still believing that hard work and perseverance may someday get you to the Promised Land.

But for now they're waiting for Hilla SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics). The elite Iraqi police force, supposedly better trained, definitely better armed and slightly better paid--about $200 a month as compared to the $120 most get. But despite their elite status--they're late as hell. When they finally show up they're in white pickup trucks with Iraqi SWAT stencil-painted in black on the doors--their logo--a scorpion in the middle--poised to strike.

(Image: Kevin Sites.)

This is their gig today--a sweep through the sleepy burg of Jabella, a supposed haven for criminals and terrorists looking for a little r&r from a 24/7 insurgency in Falluja and Ramadi. The goal is to net some bad guys and weapons caches. Let the locals know the authorities have a least one eye open when it comes to extra-curricular activities in the city. It's not a bad sized operation--about 130 Hilla SWAT members, backed up by about 300 Marines and 100 Polish troops. But the donkeywork today is supposed to be executed by the Iraqis. With the exception of their chocolate brown flak vests--they wear a hodge podge of different uniforms. Some in camouflage pants, some in jeans--knit shirts, ski masks or green bandanas tied around their heads. But what they lack in sartorial splendour they make up in gusto for the job. When we arrive in Jabella--the Force Recon Marines let the Hilla team take the lead. They pile out of their pickups and sweep in big masses of 30 or 40 guys, kicking up dust in the streets, like Texas dirt devils. There may be a plan--but it doesn't seem like it. They sweep into one house on the east side of the street then emerge en masse and pile through a gate into another. They detain a few men here and there--simply taking them by the hand and leading them to one of the white pickups. Their hands are bound with strips of brightly colored cloth--until one of the SWAT team asks a Marine for some of the white, plastic zip strips hanging from his pack. The Iraqi cop seems to love the sound –as he pulls the bindings around the wrists of his captive. They also seems to love my camera--posing like Iraqi Rambos or taking huge giant strides from here to there, as they go about their tasks. The Marine Force Recon captain--briefly admonishes Kuni and I when we follow some of the Iraqi SWAT guys into a house.



(Image: Kevin Sites.)

"I told you not to go in--unless some of my guys are with you," he says, "get out of there."

He then assigns two Marines to follow us as we trail the SWAT teams--clearly not so confident that frenetic energy of Hilla SWAT provides the margin of safety for the two journalist he's been tasked to bring back alive and unscathed.

As the operation comes to a close--the captains and lieutenants of Hilla SWAT drift back to the bed of one of the white pickup trucks where a small wiry man in a black knit shirt is smoking cigarettes as cool and casual as Dean Martin in Vegas. They are deferential to this man who represents the type of magnetic, irrefutable singular authority that has held sway in Iraq for so long. He is the Hilla SWAT team's Lieutenant Colonel. He tells his men to finish mopping up--that it's time to go.

(Image: Kevin Sites.)

And within a half-hour, Hilla SWAT is already headed out of the city. Kuni and I walk back to the Marine humvee we rode in to the raid.

Dean Jones is already sitting in the back of the open vehicle. He's a retired cop with 26 years experience, including being a member of the Denver SWAT team. He's in Iraq for the next year as advisor and liaison to the Iraqi Police. He's employed by the shadowy military contractor--DynaCorp--that provides everything from spray pilots for U.S. State Department's Coca eradication programs in Colombia to MP5 toting bodyguards for pro-American leaders in Iraq and Afghanistan. But Jones seems beholden to no one--and is refreshingly candid in a place where there's so much political spinning going on that the entire world is getting dizzy.

"I wish you could've been here to see some of this," he tells me, shaking his head with disappointment.

"What," I ask?

"Well after the Hilla guys went through one house--the owner came out shortly afterwards and said, ‘all my wife's jewellery is missing.' Then they kind of reacted to him--if you know what I mean."

"Got a little thuggish?"

"That would be a good word," Jones says, "thuggish. We've got a lot of work to do here."

The Iraqi Police have long had a reputation for laziness and corruption. Especially under the regime. They were Saddam's muscle--enforcers and benefactors of his brutal rule. Their small salaries subsidized by whatever they could steal from those they were suppose to protect. Despite U.S. military-run police training here--attitudes, both the cops and the public's, have not changed overnight. The police and Iraqi National Guard have been major victims of the insurgency--with thousands killed so far in attacks on recruiting stations, bases and police headquarters--but they haven't necessarily proved highly effective or motivated in taking on well-trained former regime loyalists or religiously motivated militias like Muktada al Sader's Mahdi Army.

It is the challenge and frustration echoed by the military commanders, administrators and rebuilders across Iraq: the conquered are not fully cooperating in the country's reconstruction.

"In some ways," Jones says of the Iraqi police, "they're hedging their bets--they're still not sure who's going to win this thing."

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Kevin 9:35 PM