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U.S. General to Review Pay After Iraq Army Walkout

Sat December 13, 2003 01:14 PM ET

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By Michael Georgy

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The top U.S. general in Iraq said on Saturday he would rethink the Iraqi army pay structure after a wave of recruits quit the new force over low salaries.

His remarks came after a bomb killed a U.S. soldier west of Baghdad, the latest in a series of deadly attacks that have increased domestic pressure on the U.S. administration over Iraq and led it to accelerate plans to hand power over to Iraqis.

Lieutenant-General Ricardo Sanchez acknowledged soldiers who quit over salaries of $150 monthly for senior officers may have a legitimate grievance.

"We're in the process of reviewing the pay scales to determine what needs to be done there to ensure that they have a decent standard of living," he told reporters in Baghdad.

Plans for a 40,000-strong new Iraqi army to help replace U.S. forces on Iraq's streets hit a snag this week when officials of the U.S.-led civil administration said almost half of the 700-man first unit had quit over pay.

Those troops, along with larger police and security forces, are central to U.S. plans to turn responsibility for security and formal sovereignty over to Iraqis by mid-2004, ahead of U.S. presidential elections where the U.S. occupation of Iraq looms.

Sanchez said he hoped to have a solution on the pay issue in the weeks to come, adding: "I believe our targets for building the new Iraqi army are still valid."

Washington's Iraq troubles extended to Europe, where the defense minister of Germany -- which opposed the U.S.-led war to oust Saddam Hussein -- said U.S. troops were ill-prepared for their mission of preparing Iraq for democracy.

The remarks reflect the depth of transatlantic bitterness over Iraq following a Pentagon decision to limit $18.6 billion in Iraq reconstruction contracts to countries that backed the United States, freezing out the likes of Germany, France and China.

European Commission officials are studying whether the restrictions violate World Trade Organization rules.

CONTRACTS ROW CONTINUES

The heat over Iraq also reached the U.S. administration at home, as President Bush acknowledged that a company once linked to his deputy Dick Cheney may have overcharged for deliveries of fuel to Baghdad.

Bush administration critics say Halliburton, of which Cheney was once chief executive, unduly benefited from government connections. The fuel deliveries were made under a contract awarded to Halliburton in March without competition.

Underlining security troubles that have plagued Iraq since April, Iraqi police and U.S. soldiers cordoned off an area near a Baghdad hotel where Western contractors stay, fearing a bomb had been planted there.

In the southern port city of Basra, hundreds of former Iraqi army officers demanding back pay blocked streets around the headquarters of the civil administration, burning tires and throwing stones.

In Tikrit, the center of the hunt for the ousted Iraqi leader, the U.S. Army said it had disciplined a senior officer who admitted firing a pistol near an Iraqi's head and letting his troops beat the man during an interrogation.

In a statement, the U.S. military said that Lieutenant-Colonel Allen West had been fined $5,000 and submitted a request to retire, but would avoid a court martial. It cited "mitigating factors."

West had told a military tribunal his actions were wrong but that he was protecting the lives of his men while interrogating the Iraqi man, who he believed had information about plots to attack U.S. troops.