And DoD counterproposes: If State can't find warm bodies to fill all those jobs in Iraq, why not give them first crack at all "American Idol" rejects?

"Last year, 35 local employees resigned, 'nearly all due to security issues,' [a senior official in the U.S. embassy in Baghdad] said. The State Department is authorized to hire 136 local people for jobs in the embassy, but right now only 47 are filled by Iraqis. Thirteen more are filled by Jordanians brought over in a program specifically set up to fill the chronic gap."
--from an item in Al Kamen's Washington Post "In the Loop" column today

Apparently neither U.S. foreign-service officers nor Iraqis who might be suitable for embassy employment have heard the news of the enormous triumphs we've been racking up in Iraq, since the State Dept. has been having increasing difficulty filling existing positions in the country, let alone the 300 new ones called for by the administration's new plans. In what seems like desperation, the department has apparently been trying to get the Defense Dept. to pony up some of the manpower for the new hires--and casting a slightly wider net for "local" hires.

Wanted: A Few Good Iraqis. Or Jordanians. Or . . . Anybody?

By Al Kamen

The Pentagon and the State Department have been squabbling quite publicly over State's request to have the already-stretched military fill about 40 percent of the 300 new State jobs in Iraq created by the administration's latest rebuilding plan.

Seems the military isn't the only one balking at working there. The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad [above] is finding it increasingly difficult to get local Iraqis to work there because of what one senior official at the embassy called the "precarious security situation" in the country.

Last year, 35 local employees resigned, "nearly all due to security issues," the official said. The State Department is authorized to hire 136 local people for jobs in the embassy, but right now only 47 are filled by Iraqis. Thirteen more are filled by Jordanians brought over in a program specifically set up to fill the chronic gap.

Even with the Jordanians, the "ever-growing" shortage of local Iraqis "seriously impacts on our ability to carry out the normal, day-to-day operations of the embassy," the official said. They can't find Iraqis to fill the solid-paying jobs even in a country where the unemployment rate is estimated to be 25 to 40 percent.

Two years ago, the department sent out pleas for volunteers to go to Iraq, but the responses were mostly from folks who could fill only low-level jobs. There are now a number of important mid-level jobs the embassy needs to fill with people from the region.

So the plan now is to provide additional benefits -- housing and meals, more vacation, more health benefits and other inducements -- to entice local people hired at embassies in the region and even elsewhere in the world who might be willing to work in Iraq on six-month rotations. There is talk of figuring out ways to hire retired embassy employees from the region to come back in and work in Baghdad as contractors.

The long-term hope is to hire Iraqis for these jobs, but given the chaos and insecurity in Baghdad these days, nobody's counting on that option.