From: "Rich Gauszka" 

The Kurds that haven't deserted anyway and those that remain don't sound
too enthusiastic.


http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0701210442jan21,1,7692940.st
ory?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

 As the Iraqi government attempts to secure a capital city ravaged by
conflict between Sunni and Shiite Muslim Arabs, its decision to bring a
third party into the mix may cause more problems than peace.

Kurdish soldiers from northern Iraq, who are mostly Sunnis but not Arabs,
are deserting the army to avoid the civil war in Baghdad, a conflict they
consider someone else's problem.

he Iraqi army brigades being sent to the capital are filled with former
members of a Kurdish militia, the pesh merga. Most remain loyal to that
militia.

Much as Shiite militias have infiltrated the Iraqi security forces across
Arab Iraq, the pesh merga fill the ranks of the Iraqi army in the Kurdish
region in the north, poised to secure a semi-independent Kurdistan and
seize oil-rich Kirkuk and parts of Mosul if Iraq falls apart. One thing
they didn't bank on, they said, was being sent into the "fire" of
Baghdad.

"The soldiers don't know the Arabic language, the Arab tradition, and
they don't have any experience fighting terror," said Anwar Dolani, a
former pesh merga commander who leads the brigade that's being transferred
to Baghdad from the Kurdish city of Sulaymaniyah.

Dolani called the desertions a "phenomenon" but refused to say
how many soldiers have left the army.

 In interviews, however, soldiers in Sulaymaniyah expressed loyalty to their
Kurdish brethren, not to Iraq. Many said they'd already deserted, and those
who are going to Baghdad said they'd flee if the situation there became too
difficult.

"I joined the army to be a soldier in my homeland, among my people.
Not to fight for others who I have nothing to do with," said Ameen
Kareem, 38, who took a week's leave with other soldiers from his brigade in
Irbil and never returned. "I used to fight in the mountains and
valleys, not in the streets."

Those who are planning to go to Baghdad said they didn't want to be
considered cowards.

Mohammed Abdoul, 41, reluctantly prepared to leave for the Iraqi capital
last week. Fear clouded his mind.

"I don't know why we should interfere in this Sunni-Shiite war,"
he said. "If I am going to face a difficult task in Baghdad and feel
sectarian tension, I will leave the army forever, come back to Sulaymaniyah
and work in the market."

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-5