What is it like in Iraq?

[kandrathe]

Esquire: Hired Guns by Tucker Carlson

The gist of the article is that the US military is very focused on military objectives, with turnover of many of the transitional tasks to contract firms (e.g. training the Iraqi police on non-torture interrogation techiniques). I guess once an acceptable provisional government is established and the new nation is able to defend itself, we can get the heck out of there. Egads, though, I found the end of that article to be chilling.

Edit: Now that I've had some time to let the article sink in, I'm finding myself a little appalled by the obviously "wild, wild, west" environment in Baghdad.

But the CID has no authority over civilians off base. "I don't even know that if you engage someone there's even an investigative authority to follow up," Kelly said. "With no parameters, how do I know if I've done something wrong? It's like the Wild West, but nobody's the sheriff."

And, here is another observation from the war hardended merc Bill,

Bill had spent months in Somalia around the time of the Black Hawk disaster in 1993, commanding a surveillance team in downtown Mogadishu. Feuding warlords, khat-addled lunatics driving pickups with .50-caliber machine guns mounted on the back—it sounded like a hairy place. Bill said Baghdad was more dangerous.