U.S. commander in Iraq wants troops in disputed land

BAGHDAD (AP) — America’s top commander in Iraq said Monday he wants to deploy U.S. soldiers alongside Iraqi and Kurdish troops in a disputed swath of northern territory in the wake of a series of horrific bombings by insurgents hoping to stoke an Arab-Kurdish conflict.

The move would be a departure from the security pact that called for Americans to pull back from populated areas June 30. But Gen. Ray Odierno warned that al-Qaida in Iraq was exploiting tensions between the Iraqi army and the Kurdish militia, the peshmerga, to carry out attacks on villages not guarded by either side. The bombings have killed scores of people since Aug. 7.

The U.S. soldiers would act in an oversight role to help the troops work together to secure areas along a fault line of land claimed by both Arabs and Kurds, Odierno said, stressing no final decision had been made.

“It won’t be for long if we do it. It’ll be just to build confidence in the forces so they’re comfortable working together, then we’ll slowly pull ourselves out,” Odierno told reporters during a briefing at the U.S. military headquarters on the outskirts of Baghdad. “I think they just all feel more comfortable if we’re there initially.”

Odierno said he had met with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki earlier Monday and found him receptive to the idea.

Several top defense officials have identified the split between Iraq’s majority Arabs and the Kurdish minority as a greater long-term threat to Iraq’s stability than the Sunni-Shiite conflict. Defense Secretary Robert Gates went to the Kurdish self-rule area in the north late last month to tell both sides they need to resolve their differences before U.S. troops leave.

At the heart of the dispute is the oil-rich city of Kirkuk as well as villages in Ninevah province that the Kurds want to incorporate into their semiautonomous area despite opposition from Arabs and the minority Turkomen ethnic group.

“We have al-Qaida exploiting this fissure that you’re seeing between Arabs and Kurds,” Odierno said. “What we’re trying to do is close that fissure.”

He said al-Qaida was targeting minorities, small towns that don’t have a police force and other so-called soft targets to avoid heavy security concentrated in more central areas.

The Kurdish peshmerga have set up checkpoints on the outskirts of such villages and small towns to provide at least some security. The overstretched Iraqi security forces stay out of these areas altogether, partly to avoid antagonizing the Kurds.

Odierno said the deployment of the U.S.-Iraqi-Kurdish protection forces would start in Ninevah province, which includes the volatile city of Mosul, and then extend to Kirkuk and to Diyala province north of the capital.

He did not say how many U.S. troops would be sent to the disputed territories but pointed out that the Americans still have a lot of forces that have been pulled back to large bases near Mosul and other cities.

“I’m still very confident in the overall security here,” Odierno said. “Unfortunately, they’re killing a lot of innocent civilians.”

Nevertheless, U.S. forces have never had a heavy presence in the villages outside Mosul, and the move to establish a presence signals a more pessimistic outlook about security in the region.

Neither al-Maliki nor his spokesman could be reached to comment because they were traveling to Syria to discuss the infiltration of foreign fighters into Iraq.

The general, however, said he has discussed the idea with al-Maliki and other senior Iraqi and Kurdish officials and planned another high-level meeting in early September.

“Having met with all these leaders, I think there is room to work this out,” he said.