Hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee - Report on the Findings of the Iraqi Security Force Independent Assessment Commission

Statement

Hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee - Report on the Findings of the Iraqi Security Force Independent Assessment Commission

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

SEN. SUSAN M. COLLINS (R-ME): Thank you. I see Senator Akaka is there as well. For one brief shining moment, I thought that I was chairman of the Armed Services Committee. But alas, that's not to be.

General Jones, I want to talk to you about two different issues. The first is the recommendation in the report having to do with the national police -- and I would welcome Chief Ramsey's comments on that as well.

When I first read your assessment of the national police as essentially being ineffective, and the subsequent recommendation that it be disbanded, it brought to mind what I think was a disastrous policy decision to disband the Iraqi army in the early days of the war, thus creating a large number of trained, armed, alienated and unemployed men who subsequently joined the insurgents or the militias. And in talking to you before the hearing, I learned that that is not really an appropriate parallel.

For the record, so that everyone has the benefit of the discussion that you and I had, could you or Chief Ramsey describe exactly what percentage of the police force you're talking about, and the fact that the national police is a smaller group among the security forces.

Chief Ramsey?

MR. RAMSEY: Yes, Senator, thanks for raising that issue, because there is a lot of confusion around that particular recommendation.

The national police consists of about 25,000 members. The Iraqi police service has 230,000 roughly. So it is not the entire police force that we are talking about. We are talking about a separate department that is significantly smaller than the Iraqi police services.

We also are not talking about total disbandment to the point where people are just going back out into provinces and become armed insurgents and all that sort of thing. We are talking about redefining their mission. We believe there are many functions within policing that are highly specialized, that require a great deal of skill and training, that the provincial police may not be able to sustain long term, such as explosive ordnance disposal or bomb squad, SWAT teams, or emergency response teams, urban search and rescue which in the United States is largely fire-centric, but obviously police would perform that particular function, river patrols, air support, all those kinds of functions could be performed by a group national in scope. And that's what we're recommending, small groups in the provinces but being controlled centrally.

The people that were -- that would take about 6,000 people roughly, maybe perhaps a few more of the 25,000. The remaining people could go in either the army or to the Iraqi police service where there's still help needed.

Counterinsurgency is obviously very important in Iraq. For now, the national police -- that is probably one of their principal functions as they are currently organized, which has led to a lot of issues quite frankly. Last October, they disbanded an entire brigade because of 26 Sunnis allegedly kidnapped, seven of which were later murdered, and the national police, or at least a brigade within the national police, believed to be responsible for that.

Those are very serious allegations. And it's highly sectarian. And our sense was that if they were given a real police mission -- and right now their mission is unclear, whether it be a military unit or a police unit -- that that would solve a lot, or at least lessen a lot of the issues and problems surrounding the national police.

SEN. COLLINS: Thank you.

General Jones, the second issue I want to bring up with you concerns the transition to a new mission that you described in your report. Your report suggests that coalition forces could begin to be adjusted, realigned, retasked as the Iraqi army becomes more and more capable. And you look ahead to the first quarter of 2008, when this might be able to be accomplished.

This is very similar in many ways to the new mission proposed by the Iraq Study Group, and also proposed by Senator Nelson and I in a proposal that we have where we've suggested that our troops focus on border security, counterterrorism operations, training and equipping of Iraqi troops and protecting Americans and American infrastructure.

My question for you is, how soon do you think we could begin that transition to a new mission for our troops? I'm not talking about setting a timetable or deadlines for withdrawal, but transitioning the mission I believe is important. And I think we need to do that as soon as possible.

Could you give us more guidance on when you believe the kind of realignments that you recommend could begin to take place?

GEN. JONES: Senator, thank you for that question. I would just simply say that such a transition is probably going to be incremental. It will not be a certain date when the mission changes dramatically, but accomplished over time, depending on the situation and the capabilities of the units, the progress that we hope will continue to be made by the Iraqi security forces.

But we saw some evidence in some areas that it has actually already started. General Abrams mentioned Nasiriyah Province with the Australian brigade down there and their relationship with the Iraqi police and the Iraqi army has already begun to show signs of instituting that kind of overwatch transition.

So I think it will be sequential. But based on -- our report suggested early 2008. But really the commanders on the ground can determine that, the transition of the mission.

SEN. COLLINS: Mr. Hamry, did you have something you wanted to say?

MR. HAMRY: Well, think -- I'd defer to my colleagues who studied the military mission more directly, but we recommended that there actually -- we stand up a transition command that would help facilitate this very thing. And I don't know if my colleagues would care to comment on it, but it's one of our recommendations that we institutionally lead this with structure at the top and a command center.

GEN. JONES: Well, just to -- I'm glad Secretary Hamry raised that issue. Because we feel very strongly as a commission that what is lacking in the briefing sets that one gets when you go to Baghdad is a sense of the center of mass of transition. You can get answers to a transitional question if you ask the military, or if you ask the Justice Department, or if you ask other aspects of the government. But you don't get a sense of transition being discussed in the broad sense in any one place.

So we recommend it as one of our suggestions that such a place be established. It sends a good clear intent of what we're there to do, and it also is a place where you can measure the progress that we're making with regard to transition. And it goes beyond simply the police and the military. It would include legal reform, economic reform, unemployment, the services -- political reforms that governments must go through, and how the ministries are working, and capturing all that in a center so that people can see where we were a year ago, to where we are today, and what the plan is for the future, we think is an important message to send forward, and that's why we made that recommendation.

So built into that would be the military aspect of it.

SEN. COLLINS: General?

GEN. JOULWAN: Senator, if I could just add that, what I think, at least in my view, what is needed for this transition is a political surge to match the military surge. And that is beyond the scope of -- our soldiers and the Iraqi soldiers have provided an opportunity here for that to take place.

How we do that is going to be very critical in the next four to six months. And I think it's very important that, at least from my view, that you understand that.

SEN. COLLINS: Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you for your great work.

SEN. LEVIN: Thank you, Senator Collins.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source