First off, hat tip to greywar for this, as he was the one who saw this man on Fox News speaking of this experience, and pointed it out to me.
Link details how Scott Taylor was taken hostage by insurgents in Iraq, traded from group to group, beaten and tortured and finally released (no spoiler there; how else could he write that article?).
What had really taken me aback here (aside from the atrocities that had been delivered upon him, of course):
The sight of U.S. paid Iraqi police forces monitoring traffic had seemed like a good sign that things were still under control, despite the recent fighting. As I did not have an exact address for my previous contact, I approached a police checkpoint to ask for assistance. When I asked them to be taken “to Dr. Yashar”, they recognized his name as a prominent local Turkmen official and eagerly nodded in the affirmative. A senior policeman was summoned and he instructed me and Zeynep Tugrul, a Turkish journalist who was serving as my translator, and filing her own reports for Sabah, a daily national newspaper, to climb into a nearby car containing four masked gunman. As we clambered into the backseat, one of the gunmen said in excellent English, “We will take you to Doctor Yashar – please do not be afraid”.
I had presumed that these men were some sort of special police force – our own Canadian counter – terrorists teams often wear ski-masks – so I had no immediate cause for concern. However, as soon as we entered Tal Afar, I saw that the streets were full of similarly masked resistance fighters armed with Kalashnikov rifles and RPGs (rocket-propelled grenades). I suddenly realized we were in the hands of the resistance. Still believing that they were taking me to my friend’s house, instead we were ushered into a small courtyard outside a walled two – story building. There were about a half dozen armed men inside – none of them smiling.
As soon as the metal door clanged shut behind us, the English – speaking leader said, “You are spies… and now you are prisoners”.
That he had been betrayed by the very people that we had been trusting to keep good order and security… and then, this:
When we actually entered the Mosul checkpoint, the Iraqi police appeared to take no notice of the dusty column of cars packed with bearded men armed with Kalashnikov’s and RPG’s.
Now, I’ve calmed down a lot since I heard grey talk about it, and since I read it this past weekend. And I’ve come to realize: what else can I expect these people to do? While it is idealistically pleasing to have these certain Iraqis make a stand as officers of the law, how many times do they get to do that before they are dead? Less than twice, I think.
The news is full of detailed incidents of Iraqi security forces being blown up, maimed, kidnapped, branded, having their families threatened and kidnapped, their commanders kidnapped, tortured and killed. Link Link While idealism drives some (or, hopefully, most) of the security force members (and I hear the pay is good, too), there is an increasing “fear factor” in everything they do.
I find it hard to balance trusting them enough to watch our soldiers back with suspecting them enough to intensely scrutinize their activities. I guess it just goes back to DTA, and who watches the watchmen…