United States To Establish Iraqi CIA

The U.S. is getting down to conducting its new strategy called “Making the Best of Iraqis.” This means controlling anti-U.S. Iraqis with the assistance of pro-U.S. Iraqis.

There will be two facets to this strategy, establishing an Iraqi-only intelligence agency and setting up regular military forces and police organs.

The U.S. is to hand over intelligence collection work and maintaining the public peace to the locals. The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is busy preparing to establish a new Iraqi intelligence agency by February 2004 by gathering up former Iraqi agents who had worked for Saddam’s regime, the Washington Post reported on Thursday.

The present interior minister of the Iraqi interim government, Nuri Badran will take the position of chief executive agent. He and Ayad Futayyih Khalifa al-Rawi, who sought political asylum in the U.S. in the past, are currently working at the headquarters of the CIA to prepare the concrete shape for this new Iraqi intelligence agency. These two individuals were also the organizers of the Iraq National Accord (INA), an organization that struggled with Saddam’s regime for 20 years from Jordan, and also coordinated with the CIA to bring about a counter-Saddam coup d’etat in Iraq.

Since August, the CIA has employed many former Iraqi intelligence agents in order to utilize them as collaborators and to expand its branches all over Iraq.

The first goal of the CIA and the new Iraq Central Intelligence Agency is to track and crack down on troublesome Iraqi insurgents. The CIA recently organized an intelligence analyzing and assessing team in Iraq with newly dispatched CIA intelligence analysts from the U.S., doubling the team’s size.

The newly established police body composed of only of Iraqi officers has also been expanded on a large scale. Ronald Rumsfeld, the U.S. Defense Secretary, disclosed at a press conference held on Tuesday that, “The newly appointed Iraqi police has 160,000 members.” He added that, “Especially in Kirkuk, about 2,200 local police have been educated by the coalition forces. They are handling almost every type of crime case currently. This will enable the Iraqi police to carry out maintaining the public peace by itself.”

Can the goal of the U.S. plan be achieved – even as it has been faced with diverse obstacles?

In one of the Iraqi battalions, which was organized with 750 of the newly trained regular Iraqi soldiers in October, approximately 250, or a third of the troop members, have recently quit military service. It seems that they were anxious about possible conflicts with insurgents and the small salary of $60 per month.

For these reasons, it is hard to be optimistic about the U.S.’ plan to establish Iraqi troops consisting of 40,000 light infantry soldiers by the end of October 2004.

As for the establishment of a new Iraqi intelligence agency, the U.S. defense department and Ahmed Chalabi, the chief of Iraq National Congress (INC) are opposing it, saying, “It might include suspicious figures.”

But, the Washington Post said in a prediction, “Because, the new Iraqi intelligence body is critical to completing the new Iraqi government, the project will not be halted or delayed.”

Ki-Tae Kwon kkt@donga.com