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News 4 was granted the interview as long as we did not reveal the Captain's last name, show specific patches on his uniform or show his face. |
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Posted on 11/01/2006 6:07:19 PM PST by SandRat
It's been more than three years since the United States military toppled Saddam Hussein and his government. Since then, the U.S. has been trying to help the Iraqi military get back on its feet.
One of the ways they're doing it is by bringing soldiers to Southern Arizona for training.
After several months of phone calls... News 4 was granted permission to sit down and talk with one of those soldiers.
"They know for sure I will bring something good for them and I am working for them especially for the kids."
On Tuesday, our News 4 crew met Iraqi Captain Haythem.
We were granted the interview as long as we did not reveal the Captain's last name, show specific patches on his uniform or show his face.
Why...? He says terrorists will find out who his family is and hurt them, "They work hard to do a lot of bad things for me, my country and my people."
The Iraqi Captain has been in the United States learning intelligence techniques for almost a year. Prior to that, he was a member of the Iraqi Army serving under Saddam Hussein's regime.
"That was a terrible experience," he says, "because even if you are smart- you are smart and you are qualified, you would never get any advantage unless you have some kind of a connection."
Who can forget the image of Saddam's statue coming down in Baghdad in April 2003?
Captain Haythem says he never will, "I remember that, but I need the people to remember that, also. See how much the people were happy to get rid of this dictator at that time."
News 4 asked the Iraqi Captain what freedom meant to him and he told us there are a number of things.
The most important, he says... is being able to express his opinion without the fear of going to prison.
Now he says, with the help of the United States and allied forces... he's able to do good things for his country.
"We have the best instructors in the world to teach you how you can protect yourself, your family and how you can be an active member of the allied forces and to spread peace all over the world."
We asked him what kind of life he wants for his wife and two young children.
"If you have a positive vision and that's it- that doesn't mean anything. You need to have the positive vision and work hard to make it real for sure in the future."
At no point in our interview did the military from Fort Huachuca intervene... and the Captain answered every question without ever consulting the group in the room.
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News 4 was granted the interview as long as we did not reveal the Captain's last name, show specific patches on his uniform or show his face. |
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Excellent story...which we won't see in the MSM.
One seriously brave [Iraqi] soldier
"Prior to that, he was a member of the Iraqi Army serving under Saddam Hussein's regime."
The worst mistake of the war by far was disbanding the Iraqi Army. The Sunnis have proven themselves to be well adapt officers and soldiers and secular. The Shia in the police and to a lesser extent the Army who have no military history have basically become death squads.
For more than two years after the war, the Shiites did little while various Sunnis massacred tens of thousands. As recently as this spring the Shiite shrine of the Golden Dome was bombed. While we praised the Shiite for their self restraint THEY did the dying. Turning the other cheek is not an islamic position, so it is hardly surprising that they are finally taking their revenge.
I do not have a position on intra-muslim disputes, but the key to peaceful coexistence there is held by the Sunni minority. If they adhere to a non-sectarian social ideal, peace will be possible, if they seek Sunni domination over the 80% non-Sunni arab majority, their future existence in Iraq will be nasty, brutish and short (to quote from Hobbes' state of nature).
You just gave me a giant stawman.
What does what you said have to do with the Shia not making good loyal soldiers for the Iraqi Army?
Also, read Zarqawi's 2003 letter to Bin Laden sometime. It makes clear that he had very little support in the Sunni community outside the Saddamists. But, all he needed to do was get his suicide bombers in place to cause mayhem and provoke the Shia into doing just what they are doing now.
The Shia are acting just like the sheep Zarqawi said they are in his letter and are giving al-Qaeda exactly what it wants a destabilized ungovernable Iraq.
Because if the population percentage of living Sunni Arabs in Iraq approaches the population percentage of Sunni Arabs in Iceland, there will not be many of them,loyal or otherwise, in the Iraqi army. Their survival is entirely dependent on the mercy of the Shiites and the support of the US. If they do not soon realize this, and act like it, they will be one with the people of Urartu.
Again that has nothing at all to do with my point that the US should not have disbanded the Iraqi Army.
And, you need to stop seeing the Shia and the Sunnis as single blocks. Most Sunnis in the Iraqi Army as I said are in my opinion far more loyal to Iraq and far better soldiers then the Shia. You should look at the subgroups instead of focusing on the entire populations.
The Shia community is at war in the south. It is a war not much reported, but it is very violent between the Badr and the Madhi Army. That war could explode at anytime into a full fledged struggle for control of the south of Iraq.
I believe that the US should have given more support to General Arnold's campaign in Canada in 1776. I also think the US should have agreed to annex Cuba in the 1840's. I think the US should have put Grant in command of the Federal armies before it did. I believe the US should have insisted on '54-40 or fight' in the Oregon controversy. I think that Pershing should have been allowed by the US to occupy Mexico in the invasion before WWI. I think the US should have backed the Kaiser in WWI, and gotten Canada as a payoff -- also no Hitler, maybe no USSR. I think that at the Versailles Peace Conference, we should have supported, and insisted on, the reestablishment of the Byzantine Empire at Constantinople. I think the US should have backed Finland in the Winter War in 1939, and the Republic of China in 1948, and France in Indo-China.
I could go on and on, it is fun to argue alternate history. The question on whether or not we should have disbanded the Iraqi Army is also entertaining. During a war though it is more important to discuss what we should do now, rather than indulge in pipe dreams of what might have been.
I agree, but this matters today in that the UIA wants control of the Iraqi Army. Half the officers of the Iraqi Army are Sunnis, the UIA would like to change that big time and put in their own people. We need to make clear if the Iraqi government does that we aren't giving the Army one more red cent.
If that happens, especially if the Dems control the US House (much less the Senate), the Shiites will kick us out, ally with Iran, and massacre the Sunnis, who will become a flood of refugees, living in and hating the US, and ready to join any jihadis that ask them.
If the UIA does an ethnic cleansing of the Army then a civil war is certain.
But, it will be a multisided civil war. If the SCIRI try to fill the Army with their boys it will be the Madhi Army and Sunnis vs the Badr. If the Madhi Army tries to do the same thing it will be Badr and Sunnis vs the Madhi Army.
In that case, it will be Iran really running things!
I don't think that is a fair charge at all. As if it were really some sort of binary choice made in the "grand eternal plan" for invasion of Iraq.
First of all, the Iraqi army as it was constituted, simply dissolved in front of the invading American forces thanks in large part to the "shock and awe" precision aerial bombing campaign that really *did* work.
It's not like we could have marched into town and said "OK... you, you and you, report to the transition army training post... the rest of you, Up against the Wall!"
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