America's North Shore Journal

Today's Blog­gers' Round­table was with Lieu­tenant Colonel Jeff Kul­mayer, Chief of Rec­on­cil­i­a­tion and Engage­ment, Multi-National Corps – Iraq, OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM. He dis­cussed the on-going trans­fer of the Sons of Iraq [SoI] to the Iraqi government.

The Sons of Iraq is a pro­gram devel­oped by Coali­tion forces based upon the suc­cess seen in al Anbar Province with the Anbar Awak­en­ing. The Awak­en­ing was a largely vol­un­teer effort that pre­dated the SoI progam by nearly a year.

The SoI were locals who were recruited for infra­struc­ture secu­rity duties within their com­mu­nity. They use their per­sonal weapons and guard build­ings, oper­ate secu­rity check­points and patrol highways.

At its height, the SoI pro­gram employed 94,000 men in 9 provinces. Some 800 con­tracts were in place allow­ing these SoI to be paid by the Coali­tion. Over­all hir­ing ended in June 2008.

Kul­mayer told us that on Octo­ber 1, 2008, the SoI in Bagh­dad were trans­ferred to Iraqi author­ity. This was about 51,000 men hired under 385 con­tracts. Diyala Province trans­ferred next, mov­ing another 9,000 men onto the Iraqi payroll.

The Colonel stated that all the Sons of Iraq would be on the Iraqi pay­roll after March 1 of 2009, bar­ring any com­pli­ca­tions. The Min­istry of Defense has con­trol over these units but the pay­roll come from the National Rec­on­cil­i­a­tion bud­get. As of today's inter­view, about 75% of the total num­ber of SoI are being paid by the Iraqis.

The SoI are about 85% Sunni and the remain­der are Shia. Kul­mayer has seen lit­tle eth­nic ten­sion, either in the exist­ing pro­gram or after the trans­fers to Iraqi authority.

The goal is to inte­grate about 20% of the SoI into the Iraqi Secu­rity Forces, and to find the remain­der employ­ment with the gov­ern­ment or in the pri­vate sec­tor. Train­ing pro­grams are being devel­oped or under­way. Until an alter­nate job is found, the SoI will con­tinue their duties and be paid by the Iraqi government.

About 3,000 for­mer SoI have been hired by the Iraqi Police, and another 1,600 have been found employ­ment else­where. The process is slow but new pro­grams will be com­ing on line as time passes.

The SoI have been in bat­tle and have suf­fered because of it. In 2008, LTC Kul­mayer reports about 500 were killed and about 750 wounded. Pay varies for the SoI, with those in Bagh­dad being paid $300 a month and those in al Anbar $130 monthly.

There are about 800 Iraqi women in the Daugh­ters of Iraq pro­gram, 400 in Bagh­dad and the remain­der through­out the coun­try. The women are not part of the SoI inte­gra­tion plan. Those in Bagh­dad are under Iraqi author­ity and paid by them. The 400 women out­side Bagh­dad remain con­trolled by and paid by the Coalition.

The Colonel made it quite clear that the Iraqi gov­ern­ment sees the SoI as impor­tant and as a crit­i­cal part of the nation­wide rec­on­cil­i­a­tion process. The Diyala Provin­cial Gov­er­nor recently stated that the SoI 'saved Diyala".

Unem­ploy­ment remains high in Iraq and com­pli­cates the place­ment of SoI. Secu­rity forces are at or near bud­geted man­power lev­els which slows the inte­gra­tion of the 20% of SoI into the forces, as do edu­ca­tional require­ments for many of the positions.

LTC Kul­mayer was upbeat with his report. He con­tin­u­ally remarked on the "amaz­ing progress" made by the Iraqi gov­ern­ment and sounded very encour­aged by the antic­i­pated future progress in inte­grat­ing the SoI with the government.

For addi­tional infor­ma­tion:
Daugh­ters of Iraq / Lioness program

SoI and Iraqi Police