Word: sheikh
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...walks briskly down these dusty streets checking on his men distributed across 30 checkpoints, he is joined by Colonel Abdel-Rida Shwaya of the Iraqi police's 7th Brigade. The young sheikh cuts a striking figure, clad in a crisp, white dishdasha and matching headdress. His weather-beaten face, his thick, black mustache and the tan bandolier draped across his chest give him the look of an Arabic Pancho Villa. Neither man knows if any of Dora's SOIs will be part of the 20% absorbed by the security forces. There are 300 more Sunni patrolmen than there are Iraqi...
...want to reduce the number of checkpoints," he says. "Do you want the Iraqi security forces and the Sahwa (SOIs) to remain on the streets 24 hours a day?" he asks Sheikh al-A'ghayde, who has stopped at an unusually sturdy-looking SOI checkpoint. Most are little more than flimsy wooden shacks reinforced with a few sheets of corrugated iron and propped up with several sandbags...
...saying that instead of incorporating 20%, incorporate 60%, 70%," the sheikh responds as his men, several of whom are barely teenagers, mill about. Bereft of uniforms, their bright yellow vests and AK-47s are the only markings that distinguish them as citizen patrolmen...
...perception is often more important than reality, and the perception along these once mean streets is that the U.S. has sold out some of its allies. "The Americans considered us like a piece of paper that was useful for a while but now is no longer needed," says the sheikh. He sternly watches a U.S. patrol of several armored Humvees pass the checkpoint. "The Americans made this decision. Believe me, any promises they make, nobody will believe them. They don't keep their word...
...fully understand that the proof will be in the execution," Brigadier General Perkins says. "We, along with the Iraqi government, know that this is strategically important that it is done properly." But the measure of whether it has succeeded will be in the response of Sheikh Saleh al-A'ghayde and his men, and others like them. And right now, the signs are not promising...