Naval postgraduate school monterey, california thesis approved for public release; distribution is unlimited

 
Some others also changed 
their minds in recognition of the positive effects of engagement with local militias.
124
3. 
The Semantics of Security 
Clashes between the U.S. military and the Mahdi Militia in 2004 and rise of 
sectarian extremism in 2006 gave a negative connotation of the term ‘militia.’ The 
inroads made by U.S. forces in engaging and working with local militias groups since late 
2006 has thus been accompanied by a semantic evolution. The estimated 70,000 local 
citizens who have joined formed local security groups that work alongside U.S. and Iraqi 
state security forces have not been referred to as militias. Instead, they are called 
Concerned Local Citizens, Critical Infrastructure Guard Force, Iraqi Citizen-Volunteers, 
and the Anbar Awakening.
125
The only difference between these groups and the militias 
122
John Burns and Alissa Rubin, “U.S. Arming some Sunni Groups to Fight Al Qaeda,” International 
Herald Tribune, http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/11/frontpage/strat.php (accessed November 14, 
2007). 
123
Smith and Rasheed, 
Sects Unite to Battle Al Qaeda in Iraq
, 3. 
124
Burns and Rubin, 
U.S. Arming some Sunni Groups to Fight Al Qaeda
, 2-3. 
125
Mays, 
Concerned Iraqi Citizen Movement Saves American Lives
, 1; Kukis, 
Turning Iraq’s Tribes 
Against Al Qaeda
, 4; Pittman, 
Sunni Sheiks Join Fight Vs. Insurgency
, 3; Mike Pryor, 
From the Ashes: 
Soldiedrs Help Adhamiyah Residents Set their Neighborhood on the Road to Recovery
(Camp Liberty, 
Baghdad, Iraq: Multi-National Division-Baghdad,[2007]) (accessed August 2006).; Smith and Rasheed, 
Sects Unite to Battle Al Qaeda in Iraq
, 1. 

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prior to 2007 is that they are now recognized as legitimate by U.S. military forces.
Approximately half of the 70,000 who have signed up are paid by with U.S. funds. The 
rest are serving as volunteers.
126
Developing and employing ‘Concerned Local Citizens’ 
has been an option since 2003, when many of the same neighborhoods were protected by 
local militias staffed by these same people. Instead, CPA Order 91 implemented a U.S. 
strategy of demobilizing the militias in favor of a national police force that is untrained, 
unfamiliar with the local terrains in which it was deployed, and unprepared to perform 
local security responsibilities. This led to dangerous power vacuum that could have been 
avoided if U.S. decision-makers had considered a strategy to engage, co-opt, and support 
local militias to perform local security functions and allow the Iraqi political and security 
apparatus to focus on regional and national security. The next section shows how the 
ongoing strategy of demobilization or defeat in the Shia-dominated areas of Iraq since 
2004 has prevented U.S. forces from engaging and influencing moderate militias, as they 
did in Anbar, which in turn drove Shia militias to seek financial and material support 
from external actors on the one hand, and facilitated the explosion of criminal violence in 
these areas on the other. Comparison with the Anbar experience suggests that the U.S. 
could gain the support of popular Shia militias, which could serve as local security 
providers in these areas, reducing both violence and the need for larger numbers of U.S. 
forces.