A Legitimate Prison Break

Did you hear about the great escape?

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Britain on Wednesday defended its decision to use force to free two British soldiers being held by Iraqi police, saying the men were first stopped by plainclothes gunmen, then moved by militiamen from a jail to a private home while British officials tried to negotiate their release with Iraqi officials.

Britain's position also appeared to be strengthened by Iraq's national security adviser, Mouwafak al-Rubaie, who acknowledged that one problem coalition forces face in such situations is that insurgents have joined the ranks of Iraq's security forces.

"Iraqi security forces in general, police in particular, in many parts of Iraq, I have to admit, have been penetrated by some of the insurgents, some of the terrorists as well," he said in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corp. on Tuesday night.

But Iraqi Interior Minister Baqir Solagh Jabr disputed the British military's account of how it freed the captured soldiers in the southern city of Basra on Monday.

He told the BBC that the two British soldiers never left police custody or the jail in Basra, were not handed to militants, and that the British army acted on a "rumor" when it stormed the jail looking for them.

In Basra, about 500 Iraqi civilians and policemen held an anti-Britain protest outside the city's police headquarters on Wednesday.

These British soldiers shouldn't have been arrested in the first place, period. They shouldn't have been moved by militiamen, period. If they were, then the Brits absolutely had justification to storm the jail. This is precisely the kind of situation that leads to a couple of decapitated soldiers and a video on al Jazeera.

If the Iraqi police forces are in this kind of state, then this is precisely why we can't withdraw our troops from Iraq yet. In fact, I foresee an American military presence, even if it's in a slow decline, for several years into the future. When Iraq's police forces have a handle on things, to the point that two British soldiers can't get arrested by a couple of plainclothes officers, transported by militiamen, and moved to a private residence for no apparent reason, then they're ready to take over; not before.