Against a backdrop of election controversy and volatile ethnic tensions, the attack on security forces in Fallujah last Saturday shows Iraq is just not ready for all eventualities. Ramsey Al-Rikabi, in Baghdad, reports About 350 miles southwest of Baghdad, beyond the town of An-Nukhayb, the vast desert of western Iraq slowly descends towards the Saudi Arabian border. In mid-February, the only sights beyond the occasional flock of sheep or tree sprouting from the numerous brown and green valleys are buses full of Iraqi pilgrims returning from the Hajj. The newly formed Iraqi border officials, alongside a handful of US troops, searched and processed almost 20,000 pilgrims in the last week, without incident, at the border crossing of Ar'ar. The border is quiet and Coalition forces are on good terms with the population. It's not uncommon to see US troops mingling with locals during a convoy stop in town. Lt Col Abdullah Talal, commander of the First Border Patrol Battalion at Ar'ar, is confident the border is secure, and so far, he said, no one has been found trying to cross illegally. US troops trained the border guards at a nearby forward operations base, and Lt Col Abdullah was satisfied with the outcome. He described the working conditions with Americans as "excellent" and is pleased with the cooperation and interaction between his men and US soldiers. For the most part, US soldiers at the border see themselves as providing advice and assistance. Besides the training, it is mostly a hands-off operation with as little interference as possible. Just outside the checkpoint, family members had gathered to welcome returning family members, effectively blocking the road. A border patrolman approached an American soldier, explaining that they needed to move the people aside. "You should do it," the US soldier said, making it clear he would not get involved. The situation, on the whole, is stable. If only the rest of Iraq were this easy. In one of the deadliest, if not most surprising, weeks since the fall of Baghdad, one thing seems clear: the various hastily-formed Iraqi security forces are not up to snuff. And as recent events make clear, efforts to bring about their eventual failure have not abated. For Iraqis already in, or thinking about joining, one of the Iraqi security forces -- such as the Iraqi Civil Defence Corp (ICDC), the border guards or the police -- the dangers were made all too clear last week. Instead of being viewed by insurgents as people protecting their country, or simply needing a job, Iraqi police or corps members are simply labelled "collaborators", aiding and abetting the US occupation. Over 100 people were killed in Iskanderiya and Baghdad in two car bombings over two days, both targeting Iraqis signing up to join security forces. Those already in the Iraqi forces were put to the test on Saturday in one of the most astounding insurgent attacks yet. As one group of militants -- armed with assault rifles and RPGs -- attacked the Iraqi police station in Fallujah and released almost 100 prisoners, another team pinned the ICDC in their base a mile away. Over 20 policemen were killed in the raid, which was carried out by approximately 50 insurgents, according to reports. No one has claimed responsibility for the raid, but rumour points to Shi'ite militants, foreign extremists and, bizarrely, Jewish organisations. Because of the coordination of the attacks, Coalition officials in Baghdad believe former Iraqi intelligence or military personnel are to blame. According to Maj Kimmet, deputy director of operations in Iraq, during the attack, the ICDC did not ask for any assistance from US forces outside the city. The show of Iraqi independence is greatly respected, but the failure to repel the attack and kill or capture the attackers is clearly a bad sign of Iraq's preparedness. As the June 30 deadline for handing over sovereignty to Iraqis draws closer, the effectiveness of Iraqi security forces in keeping the peace, so to speak, is of grave importance as domestic issues in both the US and Iraq will be working against it. At a rate of about one US soldier killed per day in a conflict based on what now looks to be almost indefensibly faulty grounds, the Bush administration's main priority this election year is making sure the war is as bloodless as possible -- at least for Americans. Standard operating procedures for troops stationed in Iraq have changed in such a way as to avoid lethal engagements. US soldiers in Iraq have told Al-Ahram Weekly that, for example, if a patrol comes under fire, the usual response is to leave the area rather than counterattack, unless absolutely necessary. As the US makes plans to pull troops out of cities to bases on the edges of urban centres, Iraqi security forces are being trained and deployed at a break-neck pace, often without proper vehicles or communications and security equipment. The goal is to hand over all security positions to the Iraqis, and damn the consequences. Existing resistance activities, like the prison raid in Fallujah, could be an example of the chaos that may erupt this summer. Take the already volatile tensions between the Sunni, Shi'ites and Kurds, and the fact that some of these groups have their own militias -- like the Kurdish peshmergas or the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq's Badr Brigade and Muqtada Al-Sadr's Mahdi Army -- then add some foreign fighters intent on inflaming those tensions and an elections showdown sure to make either Shi'ites or Sunnis very upset: we have the perfect ingredients for a civil war. If that happens, the US seems to be the only force in the country with the capability to keep the peace, but ironically they have not accomplished that even without widespread sectarian violence. As the United Nations finishes their mission to assess the feasibility of direct elections prior to the June 30 handover, UN envoy Lakhdar Labrahimi had some words for the various Iraqi groups' leaders, urging them to put aside ethnic and religious differences for the sake of the nation. Civil wars, he said, start "because people are reckless, because people are selfish". Thinking you can stop it without strength -- as the Iraqis tried to do last Saturday in Fallujah -- or knowing you can stop it but without will, as the Americans might do, is reckless indeed.
