Is the U.S. Training Iraqi Death Squads to Fight the Insurgency?

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/12/01/1526201

Is the U.S. Training Iraqi Death Squads to Fight the Insurgency?
Democracy Now!

Photo: The body of Abu Akeel, a Sunni Arab, lies in a Baghdad morgue in this
undated photo. His relatives, who provided the photograph, said he was
kidnapped, tortured and killed by Shi'ite militiamen linked to the
government.
December 1, 2005

In what the White House billed as a major policy address, President Bush
outlined the administration's Iraq war strategy. Bush again linked a
withdrawal of U.S. troops to improvements in the capability of Iraqi
security forces. We speak with independent journalist Arun Gupta about the
presence Iraqi death squads and the U.S. training of Iraqi security forces.

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President Bush sought to overcome mounting criticism of the Iraq war
Wednesday in what the White House billed as a major address outlining the
administration's strategy.
In a 45-minute speech before the US Naval Academy, Bush again rejected a
timetable for the withdrawal of US troops and recounted improvements made by
Iraqi security forces. The speech was the first of a series of four Bush
plans to give before the December 15th parliamentary elections. The
president yesterday reiterated that Iraqi troops will eventually take over
from US forces in fighting the insurgency.


President Bush, November 30
"Our goals are to train enough Iraqi forces so they can carry the fight and
this will take time and patience and it is worth the time and it is worth
the effort because Iraqis and Americans share a common enemy and when that
enemy is defeated in Iraq, Americans will be safer here at home. And as
Iraqi security forces stand up then coalition forces can stand down and when
our mission of defeating the terrorist is complete our troops can come home
to a proud nation."

Bush has repeatedly linked a U.S. withdrawal to improvements in the
capability of Iraqi forces. But the mainstream media has recently detailed
the existence of death squads within the largely Shiite police and special
commandos.
Operating through or with the Iraqi security forces, these militias have
abducted, tortured and executed hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Sunnis. The
New York Times reported Tuesday "Some Sunni males have been found dead in
ditches and fields, with bullet holes in their temples, acid burns on their
skin, and holes in their bodies apparently made by electric drills. Many
have simply vanished."

At a Pentagon press conference on Tuesday, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
was questioned about the death squads.


Pentagon press conference, November 29
Q: Mr. Secretary, are you concerned over -- and in fact, is the United
States looking into growing reports of uniformed death squads in Iraq
perhaps assassinating and torturing hundreds of Sunnis? And if that's true,
what would that say about stability in Iraq?
SEC. RUMSFELD: I'm not going to comment on hypothetical questions. I've not
seen reports that hundreds are being killed by roving death squads at all.
We know for a fact that it's a violent country. We know for a fact that
there have been various militias. We know that there have been some militias
that have been Iran-oriented. We also know there's been some militias in the
north that have been very helpful. The Peshmerga have been very constructive
in what they've done. But I'm not going to get into speculation like that.
Q: But, sir, that's not a hypothetical, I don't believe. The Sunnis
themselves are charging that hundreds have been assassinated, people shot in
the head, found in alleys.
SEC. RUMSFELD: What you're talking about are unverified -- to my knowledge,
at least -- unverified comments. I just don't have any data from the field
that I could comment on in a specific way.

While the story only recently made front-page news, it actually first
appeared in the press over six months ago. Investigative journalist Arun
Gupta was one of the first to report on the presence of death squads in Iraq
back in April of this year. We interviewed him at the time, he joins us
again in our firehouse studios. Arun is an editor with New York City
Independent Media Center's newspaper, The Indypendent.

Arun Gupta, investigative journalist who writes frequently for Z Magazine,
Left Turn and the Indypendent newspaper in New York. He is an editor at the
Indypendent and a former editor at the Guardian weekly in New York.
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