Perspective: Training Iraq's Death Squads

Above: Iraqi police officers practice patrolling this month at a U.S. training program

Tucked into the corner of Major Ali's mirror is a postcard displaying the handsome, airbrushed visage of Imam Hussein, the venerated Shiite martyr. Ali probably needs no reminder of sacrifice when he sees his tired reflection. His office on the second floor of the Khadimiya Police Station has become his second home. Yellowing papers erupt from their folders, which in turn burst out onto every available inch of space, from the overstuffed filing cabinets to the small cot nearby. Ali handles logistics, finance and personnel for this police station in a famous Shiite neighborhood just west of the Tigris River, centered around one of Iraq's most important Shiite shrines. But despite his own Shiite faith, it's often not safe for him to return home.

One of the reminders of Ali's sacrifice is a framed photograph on his cluttered desk. In it, his young son wears the oversized camouflage helmet of Lieut. Jonathan Sherrill, a 24-year-old from Charlotte, North Carolina, who leads a platoon of the 57th Military Police Company, which oversees fifteen police stations like Khadimiya here in western Baghdad...

"He's one of the hardest-working IPs I've ever met," Sherrill tells me, using the ubiquitous military acronym for Iraqi Police. "He's doing good, and making sure the station gets what it needs." But what the station--and Iraq--needs is not solely measured in items on an acquisition order. Roving the hallways are men only nominally controlled by the police chain of command. "I'm happy with the loyalty of many of the men," Ali tells me after he finishes briefing Sherrill on the day's progress. "But we're suffering with the newer IPs, because I don't know exactly if they come from a militia or some political party." It's a fear echoed by practically every IP commander the 57th becomes partners with. Several told me that many of their police are little more than militiamen in uniform.

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