Five hooded men hopped out of a car at the checkpoint, heavily armed and clearly eager for blood. Iraqi policeman Maytham Talib figured it was time to quit his job.
"Each one of them had an automatic weapon. The police, we had four rifles, but only two worked. We had seven bullets for each rifle. We ran," said Talib, 25. He had already seen two colleagues gunned down at a checkpoint and two others slain by a grenade. He fled, took a bus home and has not been back to work since.
Established by the U.S. occupation authority and trained by foreign troops, Iraq's police and National Guard have been targets of insurgent attacks for months. With the formal end of U.S. occupation, they have been dying in ever larger numbers -- at least 127 have been killed in the last two months. The danger, coupled with low pay, has caused many to quit.
Defections pose a serious obstacle to the rebuilding of Iraq's security forces but not the only one. Planning has been chaotic, units have staged mutinies, and essential equipment has not been delivered. In recent months, the entire process of recruitment and training has been largely scrapped and begun again, and the interim Iraqi government that was installed on June 28 has dictated more changes.
"It was worse than starting from scratch," complained Sabah Kadhim, a top official in the Interior Ministry, which is in charge of police. "We had to weed out criminals from the policemen who the Americans put there."
After more than a year under the occupation, Kadhim said, "the police lacked efficiency, lacked organization, lacked cars, lacked weapons, lacked communication. Literally, they didn't have clothing."
Now, Iraqi and U.S. officials insist, the security forces are making progress.
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"Each one of them had an automatic weapon. The police, we had four rifles, but only two worked. We had seven bullets for each rifle. We ran," said Talib, 25. He had already seen two colleagues gunned down at a checkpoint and two others slain by a grenade. He fled, took a bus home and has not been back to work since.
Established by the U.S. occupation authority and trained by foreign troops, Iraq's police and National Guard have been targets of insurgent attacks for months. With the formal end of U.S. occupation, they have been dying in ever larger numbers -- at least 127 have been killed in the last two months. The danger, coupled with low pay, has caused many to quit.
Defections pose a serious obstacle to the rebuilding of Iraq's security forces but not the only one. Planning has been chaotic, units have staged mutinies, and essential equipment has not been delivered. In recent months, the entire process of recruitment and training has been largely scrapped and begun again, and the interim Iraqi government that was installed on June 28 has dictated more changes.
"It was worse than starting from scratch," complained Sabah Kadhim, a top official in the Interior Ministry, which is in charge of police. "We had to weed out criminals from the policemen who the Americans put there."
After more than a year under the occupation, Kadhim said, "the police lacked efficiency, lacked organization, lacked cars, lacked weapons, lacked communication. Literally, they didn't have clothing."
Now, Iraqi and U.S. officials insist, the security forces are making progress.
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