Neff Zone Column

Print Edition: April 25, 2006

PREPARE TO GET ANGRY

No one enjoys being angry, frustrated and just plain flummoxed. Sometimes, however, you run across something that makes your blood boil and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. Well, buckle your chin strap because I’m going to tell you something that will make you angry.

Before I get to that, though, let’s engage in a couple of warm-up exercises. Exercise 1: Suppose that your son or daughter joins the military and after completing boot camp and some specialized training is sent to, let’s say, a base in Texas. It’s pretty hot in Texas during the summer, dusty too. So your soldier decides that perhaps Hawaii might be a more desirable station, so your soldier marches into the commanding officer’s headquarters and asks for a transfer. The commander denies the request, whereupon your soldier tosses their rifle to the commander, quits the service on the spot, and comes back home.

Exercise 2: Suppose your soldier gets sent to Iraq and gets stationed near Baghdad. It’s pretty dangerous there. On their first mission your soldier’s field commander instructs your soldier to enter a building and search for enemy insurgents. Your soldier thinks about this request for a minute or two, decides it’s a bit too risky, and retreats back to the base, turns in their gear and gets on a plane back to the U.S.

Now, what do you think would happen to your soldier if he or she behaved like the examples in exercises one and two? I can almost guess what you’re thinking right now – that what you’ve read so far is a moot point because it’s too ridiculous to happen (even in a theoretical sense). There’s something called "absent without leave." Court-martials, stockade time, and dishonorable discharges would undoubtedly come into play. No military could possibly function if it allowed its soldiers to leave willy-nilly with no questions asked at any time for any reason. You would be correct in that line of thought -- unless you are considering the Iraqi army.

According to reports by the Associated Press, USA Today and the Washington Press, among others: "U.S. and Iraqi commanders are increasingly critical of a policy that lets Iraqi soldiers leave their units virtually at will - essentially deserting with no punishment. They blame the lax rule for draining the Iraqi ranks to confront the insurgency - in some cases by 30 percent or even half."

The report continues: "The Iraqi army does not require its soldiers to sign contracts. That means they can quit anytime and casually treat enlistments as temporary jobs. Soldiers can even pick up their belongings and leave during missions - and often do without facing punishment…According to Col. Alaa Kata al-Kafage, (after) soldiers get paid and save a little bit of money, they leave."

Another Iraqi colonel noted that forcing Iraqi soldiers to stick to a rigid schedule would lead to a decline in enthusiasm. However, Colonel al-Karfage observes: "If someone punishes them, they can throw down their uniform and say, 'Have a nice day.'"

Need I point out the obvious? While the United State is bankrupting itself fighting to "liberate" Iraq, and while your sons and daughters are sacrificing life and limb in the effort, Iraqi soldiers can (and do) leave their posts at will.

Need I also point out that it would behoove an insurgent to join the Iraqi army, obtain training (at U.S. taxpayer expense), and then just up and leave to go back to their terrorist cell – with a few dollars in their burka and a set of new skills to use against the people who provided the training.

Even if an Iraqi soldier does stick with their unit, they get ten days off per month, and if they are a bit late retuning from leave U.S. trainers said some units have resorted to temporarily jailing soldiers. But even these punishments have been manipulated by wayward but savvy soldiers. "They'd rather go to jail then sit out at a hot checkpoint, said Maj. Kenneth Wilson of Chicago, a trainer."

Right, those nasty jobs are left for your sons and daughters. They get to do something many Iraqi soldiers are unwilling to do – lay life and limb on the line on behalf of Iraq.

I don’t know about you, but this situation just makes me disheartened, indignant, and just plain angry.

Jim Neff is a local columnist. Comments to neffzone@gmail.com. Read Neff Zone columns online at www.neffzone.com/cadillacnews.