At Iraq's front line, U.S. puts ex-foes on payroll (Reuters)

[katty]

more: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18233.htm

At Iraq's front line, U.S. puts ex-foes on payroll

By Peter Graff

08/22/07 --- -JURF AS-SAKHR, Iraq (Reuters) - Under a tree by a battlefield road in Iraq's "Triangle of Death," Lieutenant- Colonel Robert Balcavage meets his new recruits.

The men are Iraqi Sunni Arabs who are about to join the U.S. military's payroll as a local militia. They want guns.

"I am not giving out guns and ammo," the U.S. commander says. The men listen carefully as the interpreter translates.

"I've been shot at up here enough times to know that there's plenty of guns and ammo. Me personally. Some of you guys have probably taken some pretty good shots at me."

Slowly but deliberately, U.S. forces are enlisting groups of armed men -- many probably former insurgents -- and paying cash, a strategy they say has dramatically reduced violence in some of Iraq's most dangerous areas in just weeks.

[HeraldSquare212]

1. This is the strategy that Clinton endorsed

and it is a dangerous if not reckless tactic. We're paying off the guys who used to shoot at us, so they'll shoot at al Queda instead. Eventually, they'll shoot at us again, and at the Shiites.

It's funny though because in one sense it's like undoing the order to disband the Iraqi army, sort of a, whoops, my bad.

[katty]

2. yup-a tad late for this kind of 'recruiting'