Law and Order in Iraq:

That's the goal of Pitt Meadows resident Jim Speros

Tom Barnes, Pitt Meadows TIMES and OP Contributor

The following e-mail arrived from Jim Speros, a Pitt Meadows resident
who had been working in Iraq.

“Thanks Tom, you're right, it is very busy. A close friend of mine here was
shot and killed yesterday in a drive-by shooting near the Baghdad airport.
He was a retired cop from Denver, CO. But I hope to hear about when I
can send the info to you soon.

All the best, Jim.”

Since this email, communications between the Pitt Meadows TIMES and
Speros have been brief but polite. Speros said he wanted to reply to the
queries for information about his experiences as an international police
advisor. Before he could answer his community newspaper back home,
clearance from the US State Department was needed.

Finally, after the TIMES sent a sample of the questions to a public
affairs worker at the US Embassy in Baghdad, the green light was given for
Speros to discuss a country whose citizens are taking their first steps
towards freedom since Saddam Hussein was thrown from power.

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Speros, 53, retired from the San Francisco police department after 28
years on the force. He settled in Pitt Meadows with his wife, who grew up
here.

In Baghdad, he is under contract with the US State Department and
works as the advisor for police, media, and community relations working to
draft policy that will aid the Iraqi people in establishing their own police
force.

In describing Iraq and its people, Speros paints a much different picture
than what is commonly seen through large-market media beamed from the
States—where images show little else but sand and clay and hordes of cry-
ing women with their faces covered.

“This is an amazing nation,” says Speros. “You go from the azure blue
Persian Gulf in the south, through the deep desert, into the lush green area
between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers (the cradle of civilization), by the
major metropolitan Baghdad area, and to the alpine region of northern
Iraq. There are deep and thought-provoking contrasts between what the
media feeds us and the reality of Iraq.”

The same, according to Speros, can be said for the country’s people,
who are just getting used to the idea that their country is now, in fact, theirs.

In an article Speros recently wrote and had published in the US, he
writes about a people full of deep and sacred love for their country, a peo-
ple who are now exhaling after years of living under the oppression and
tyranny of Saddam.

“During Saddam Hussein’s regime there was no freedom of anything,
except to pay him homage, flee, or exist to not be executed or tortured. The
people now have the right to protest, and that they do very well,” Speros
writes. “Much is pent-up response to 30 years of brutality and a 5,000-year
history of absolutist governments. There are those few who would use this
natural response to their own evil ends—tyranny and terror.”

And that’s where the challenge in setting up an Iraqi-administered police
force lies, Speros says, by not forcing Western influence and ideas on the
Iraqis and letting them dole out justice in their own way.

He says the new police system will not be an “American system,” and it’s
a constant balancing act to ensure he and his team don’t push too hard, or
appear to influence the newly liberated society with American-style polic-
ing.

“We must remain aware that Iraq is the home of the first-written law
and the Iraqi people are very proud of their land. While they enjoy freedom
for the first time, there is some sense of injured pride that outsiders
removed their oppressor. This is what is being capitalized on by outside ter-
rorists and radical idealists in the land. This is another price of freedom and
part of the fine line we must walk,” he says.

Speros calls the everyday Iraqi people “generous and outgoing,” and
people who really are not much different than Canadians.

“We both share a deep love for our nations, families and God,” he says.
“These are recurring themes that can give us common ground when dis-
cussing issues.”

As amazing as it must be to play a role in reshaping a nation enjoying
freedom for the first time, ultimately, Speros says, the less impact he leaves
behind the better. What is important to realize is that they will develop their
own society as Iraqis.

DGNEPPPeSS | 8