Killing Drives Wedge Between Troops

AD DAWR, Iraq — Like most men from his impoverished Bedouin village, 17-year-old Falah Zaggam joined the Iraqi national guard for a job and steady paycheck.

Federico Merida, 21, was raising a family and working at a furniture business in North Carolina when his U.S. National Guard unit was sent to Iraq earlier this year.

Late one night last spring, the two guardsmen found themselves alone in a lookout tower at a military base here in Ad Dawr, near Tikrit in northern Iraq. They were supposed to be working together to ward off insurgents.

But before the shift ended, Merida shot the Iraqi to death and threw his body off the tower.

One bullet pierced Zaggam's palm, which was burned by the gun blast, indicating that his hand was raised against the muzzle in self-defense, his family members said. A second bullet entered his back and shot through his stomach.

In a court-martial last month, Merida was sentenced to 25 years in prison, believed to be the harshest punishment yet imposed against a U.S. soldier for misconduct in Iraq.

The case is one of about a dozen murder and manslaughter cases filed against U.S. soldiers in Iraq this year. Coming on the heels of the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal, the spurt of cases has alarmed military officials and raised new concerns about the conduct of American soldiers in Iraq and the pressures they endure under prolonged deployments.

The killing has also driven a deep wedge between U.S. and Iraqi troops in the region, just as American officials are hoping to bring the security forces closer together to restore peace in Iraq.

Exactly what happened in the observation tower the night of May 11 may never be known.

"Like most men from his impoverished Bedouin village, 17-year-old Falah Zaggam joined the Iraqi national guard for a job and steady paycheck. "

Just about a paycheck, huh? Better start working to free your country!

Q: Are there evidence of any defections from the Iraqi security forces to the insurgency or to the militias?

General John Abizaid: Well, with regard to defections of the Iraqi security forces, I mean, clearly we know that some of the police did not stay with their post and that in some cases, because we've seen films of policemen with Sadr's militia in particular, that there were some defections. I think that these numbers are not large, but they are troubling to us. And clearly, we've got to work on the Iraqi security forces.

But look, I think we all need to understand that the solution to Iraq's security problems does not lay with the United States armed forces. It's with the Iraqis themselves. And it's just so important to be patient, to be very, very innovative about the way that we build these institutions and to ultimately know that they must be led by Iraqis. There are many Iraqis that have paid the ultimate sacrifice in these fights, and we're extremely proud of the way that many of them have fought.

So we should not discount the Iraqi security services. They will become the bulwark against terrorism and anti-democratic forces of this country, because that's what people want them to be.

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