Law and disorder
Too many robbers and too few cops create lawless conditions in Baghdad
BAGHDAD--Hanan Hassan is a woman who has lost everything. Before the war, she sold her house and bought more than 2 pounds of gold jewelry--it was her entire life's savings. For this 32-year-old widow, the gold was the future for her and her two children. But a customer at a jewelry shop overheard her two weeks ago making an appointment to sell the gold to buy a house. When she arranged for a taxi to take her to the shop, the driver stopped along the way and picked up the eavesdropping customer. He put a gun to her head and demanded the jewelry. Then he threw her out of the moving car. Now, she has nothing--even her parents are dead. Sympathetic U.S. troops took her report but have not done more. The skeleton crew at the local police station says it has no weapons and cannot help her. "I have no money and two kids," she sobs. "I don't know what to do anymore."
More than a month after U.S. troops seized Baghdad, this city of 5 million people remains dangerously on edge. The initial orgy of looting has mostly run its course, with ministry buildings, palaces, and many factories stripped bare in the early days. "It's not so much looting now as all-out robbery," says Capt. Chris Carter of the 3rd Infantry Division, leading his platoon on a routine patrol through Baghdad.
The worst comes at night, when gunfire regularly echoes off Baghdad's gray concrete buildings. Looters and unidentified bands of armed men roam the streets, robbing, carjacking, and even abducting women. Drunks harass girls on their way to and from school. Reports of revenge killings have started to race through the rumor mill. "I was optimistic a few weeks ago, but the security situation is getting worse," says Sahar Kharuffa, an Iraqi architect who spent some of his childhood in Utah. "More people than I expected are voicing opinions sympathetic to the old regime."
Several forces came together to turn a bad situation into an even worse one. Few government workers have been paid, telephone lines are down, and more guns than ever are available for sale. Thousands of criminals hit the streets when Saddam Hussein emptied the prisons in October. Many in Baghdad fear that Kurds from the north and Kuwaitis have come to take revenge. "The Americans took Saddam out but put many Saddams in the street," says Abu Khis al-Jami, an office manager for a doctor. Moreover, many of the Kurdish and exile opposition groups are armed, including Ahmed Chalabi's controversial Iraqi National Congress. Some have occupied offices, clubs, or even private homes to house their party headquarters, with the apparent consent of U.S. forces. "Most of the opposition are carrying guns," says one prominent Iraqi businessman. "You don't know who is opposition or a criminal."
Ultimately, U.S. officials acknowledge, there are simply too few U.S. troops to enforce real security in the city. While there are 49,000 combat troops in the Baghdad region, at the beginning of last week Americans soldiers were a surprisingly rare sight in many of the city's sprawling neighborhoods. Fewer than 2,000 trained military police were on duty. And the Iraqi police were barely functioning, with 60 of their 61 stations completely looted and destroyed.
advertisement
