Reading these e-mails makes my blood boil - at our betrayal of our Iraqi friends and allies. (You can read excerpts of several of the e-mails at my blog: www.philly.com/worldview.) If you feel as I do, I have suggestions at the end of the column about how you can help.
One e-mailer, A.M. (I use his initials for safety's sake), is a 26-year-old interpreter who has worked with a U.S. combat unit and with a U.S. contracting unit that checks on Iraqi subcontractors.
"My job was to coordinate with the government of Iraq to prevent waste, fraud and abuse," he e-mailed me. "We made these companies to pay hundreds of thousands of U.S. dollars they didn't pay in previous years." A.M. got recommendations from the brigadier general heading his unit and several other senior officers in the command.
But, in doing his job well, A.M.'s face became known to Iraqi contractors and ministry officials. He began receiving death threats. "In 2010 my car windows were broken in front of my house and a red X was taped on my driver's side window," he told me in a phone interview. For safety, he moved onto the U.S. base.
Now he must move off the base when it closes next month. But he was told in June that his special visa is on hold for eight to 12 months because of new security procedures. This leaves him open to assassination.
He certainly can't expect Iraqi authorities to protect him. "In Iraqi culture, if you worked for the Americans you are a 'spy' and a 'bad guy,' " A.M. said, glumly. "Our police don't work in a proper manner. Every single police or army unit has its own loyalties, and if they knew I worked as an interpreter they would hate me."
