Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)

Reuters - US forces have detained around 200 Iraqi paramilitary soldiers who refused to take part in a US offensive against the Sunni Muslim city of Fallujah, their former comrades said on Saturday.

The US military declined to confirm whether the men were being held.

Senior officers play down the significance of such incidents but, asked about reports of mutiny among Iraqi troops, have acknowledged a "command failure" took place during the Fallujah offensive.

Soldiers from the Baghdad-based 36th Security Brigade, part of the Iraqi Civil Defence Corps (ICDC), said that last week US commanders took them at night to Fallujah, west of the capital, where US forces were massing to crush a growing insurgency.

"They told us to attack the city and we were astonished. How could an Iraqi fight an Iraqi like this? This meant that nothing had changed from the Saddam Hussein days. We refused en masse," said Ali al-Shamari.

Fallujah has been a flashpoint for attacks on US forces since Saddam was toppled last year. The city is inhabited by minority Arab Sunnis, many of whom complain they are worse off under the occupation than under Saddam, a fellow Sunni.

US Marines began a major assault on Fallujah on April 5 after the killing and mutilation of four US private security guards in the city the previous week. Doctors say more than 600 Iraqis have died in fighting in Fallujah since then.

Shamari said the brigade members did not know they were heading to Fallujah until they arrived there.

After the brigade refused to fight, he said, soldiers were stripped of their badges and confined to tents in a US base on the outskirts of Fallujah. Their rations were restricted to one meal per day.

"I escaped, but around 200 of our comrades remain there. We demand their release," Shamari said.

The 36th brigade, according to four of its members, comprises 340 soldiers from the former Iraqi army and the Peshmerga, the Kurdish militia that once fought Saddam's forces.

Ali Hussein, a Shi'ite private, said the brigade's mission since its formation had been security tasks such as conducting searches and guarding buildings.

"Suddenly, we were asked to take part in a huge offensive," Hussein said, adding that he felt sympathy for Fallujah residents although they were from the Sunni minority who had dominated the Shi'ites for decades.

Bukhtiar Saleh, a Kurdish soldier, said US heavy-handedness had discouraged him from fighting.

"They were bombing the city with warplanes and using cluster bombs. I could not be a part of this," he said.

Human rights groups and several leading Iraqi politicians have denounced US action in Fallujah, calling it collective punishment of a whole town for the violent actions of a minority.

The US army says it has not targeted civilians. The Sunni insurgency and a separate Shi'ite revolt is testing the resolve of thousands of Iraqi security forces hastily formed after Saddam's government fell last year.

Article #2

Iraqi forces fighting beside Marines angry at being outgunned and having to kill fellow Iraqis

Boston Herald

FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) Iraqi security forces fighting alongside Marines in Fallujah are angry, saying they're outgunned by Sunni insurgents and resent being sent to fight fellow Iraqis.

''Eighty percent of us want to leave and go to Baghdad'' because they don't want to fight civilians in Fallujah, said Amar Hussein, a medic in the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps.

The 36th ICDC Battalion was supposed to be the elite of the U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces, with members drawn from the militias run by various members of the Governing Council in order to fight insurgents who have been attacking U.S. forces and their Iraqi allies for months.

Now it finds itself involved in the bloody battle of Fallujah, where Marine forces have been fighting insurgents in the city, but where many civilians are also believed to have been killed. Mosques have been targeted by both sides, buildings in residential areas destroyed, soccer fields turned into makeshift graveyards.

The Fallujah siege has become a rallying point for anti-U.S. sentiment among Iraqis and their countrymen in the 36th Battalion are feeling conflicted.

''I feel there are very few terrorists in Fallujah, but because of the way the Americans are treating the civilians, we are creating more and more terrorists every day,'' Firaz Munshed, a Shiite in the force, said Friday.

''If they did this in Sadr City, I would fight the Americans too,'' he said, referring to the mostly Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad where U.S. forces have been trying to put down the militia of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

The unprecedented fighting across Iraq this month has highlighted deep problems in the Iraqi forces that the Americans want eventually to take the front line against insurgents after the handover of sovereignty to an Iraqi government on June 30.

In the south, police and some ICDC abandoned their stations when faced with attacks by Shiite militiamen, some out of fear, some out of mixed loyalties.

A battalion of the U.S.-trained Iraqi army refused outright to fight in Fallujah, west of Baghdad. The force came under fire as it left the capital and turned around, saying it did not sign up to fight fellow Iraqis.

The ICDC forces stationed in Fallujah before the fighting have abandoned their posts and U.S. commanders acknowledged that some may be joining the insurgents.

''We have heard reports of that but we certainly can't confirm it. But we have heard reports as such,'' Major-General Joseph Weber, Chief of Staff, Task Force 7, said.

Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said Saturday that the 36th Battalion, made up of 240 members helping enforce the Marine cordon on the south side of the city, have been ''acquitting themselves admirably.''

But asked about the army unit, he suggested for the first time that there could be repercussions for their refusal to fight.

''Are we disappointed with performance of some of those units? Yes. Are we going to take action in the future? ... Yes,'' he said.

''We never said the units will be fully ready by this time,'' he said. ''If we had a force inside of Iraq that was capable of completely conducting public security and external security requirements there will be no need for coalition forces here.''

The ICDC paramilitaries said they were severely lacking in the weapons needed for the Fallujah fight and that they are getting battered by insurgents.

''We are just targets for the terrorists we never see,'' Munshed said. ''Just show us the houses and we'll assault the terrorists, but we can't hit at mosques.''

Numan Jabar, a Kurdish fighter brought into the ICDC from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, said the Iraqi security forces were woefully outgunned.

''We are not a force. We are just guys with AK-47s (assault rifles),'' he said. ''We must have better weapons, more pay, more training.''

Marines have turned up dramatic weapons caches inside the city suggesting the extent of the arsenal held by the estimated 2,000 Sunni fighters. The finds have included anti-tank mine, rockets and anti-aircraft guns.

While Marines fighting inside the city have heavily armored vehicles, members of the ICDC battalion on the outside have only unarmored Land Rovers and two Humvees.

Iyad Hussein said he was wounded when a mortar landed next to his convoy south of Fallujah. A fellow ICDC member was killed.

Hussein said he was now having doubts about his mission.

''We are supposed to be here against the terrorists, not against the people of Fallujah. Ninety-five percent of Fallujah's people are good,'' he said.