U.S. forces carefully evaluate motives for amnesty candidates

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As another soldier looks on, 1st Lt. Derek Sparks, 25, of Scottsdale, Ariz., searches the trunk of a car after sticks of TNT explosives were found inside during a raid in Sharqat in northern Iraq. Soldiers from Crazyhorse Troop, 1st Squadron, 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment raided the house looking for a suspected insurgent financier who was reportedly planning an attack on U.S. forces. Soldiers say that a reconciliation program has convinced some insurgents to lay down their arms while providing valuable intelligence on others who refuse to stop fighting.


U.S. forces carefully evaluate motives for amnesty candidates
By Drew Brown, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Friday, February 15, 2008

SHARQAT, Iraq — A man who came in to talk to U.S. forces under a flag of truce here on the night of Feb. 9 is a known financier for a Sunni nationalist group that has carried out numerous attacks against U.S. military targets.

U.S. commanders had solid intelligence that he had helped orchestrate attacks that had killed U.S. troops in the past, and they suspected that he had even cooperated with al-Qaida in Iraq on some operations. But they were willing to offer him amnesty if he had come clean about his past and offer up information about ongoing insurgent activities.

The meeting was part of a new U.S. strategy in northern Iraq that seeks to persuade insurgents to lay down their arms and stop fighting in exchange for amnesty.

Dubbed “reconciliation,” the strategy aims to get former insurgents to cooperate with U.S. and Iraqi security forces and involved in local political dialogue.

Lt. Col. Thomas Dorame, commander of 1st Squadron, 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, said the reconciliation effort is partly an acknowledgement that the insurgency in Iraq will not be defeated by arresting every low-level militant who plants a bomb.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=52495