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Florence Chief turns into instructor for
Kurds
16.10.2007 |
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October
16, 2007
In 2005, Florence Police Chief Lynn Lamm retired
after six-plus years in the position. Sort of. After
stepping down, he left for Iraq to serve as an
instructor to the country’s new police personnel.
NOW: Lamm, 63, is back after 14 months, retired in
Cottage Grove and glad he took the wildest side trip
of his life.
“No regrets, absolutely none,” says Lamm, “other
than losing some students along the way. They’d go
back to their homes on weekends and some would get
killed in roadside bombings or be kidnapped in
marketplaces.”
He spent seven months in Baghdad and seven months in
Erbil, a city of 1.2 million in the Kurdistan region
that’s believed to be the oldest continuously
inhabited city in the world.
“The Kurds are the most wonderful people in the
world,” he says. “They’ve been persecuted throughout
history and idolize Americans. They really believe
in democracy and freedom of religion and women’s
rights.”
He mainly taught management to everyone from
low-level managers to police chiefs.
“We spent a lot of time on ethics, on integrity
issues,” he says. “Iraqis have no idea what the term
‘democracy’ means and how it works.
“They didn’t understand the whole issue of freedom,
voting and picking leaders because they’ve always
had someone telling them what to do.
“Sometimes as Americans we think if people don’t see
it our way, it’s the wrong way. I learned that’s not
true.”
Occasionally, he felt in danger; once, the compound
took some mortar rounds. And travel, done by teams
of vehicles with machine gunners in front and back,
could be scary. Still, he thought of staying.
“But I’ve got a wife and family and grandchildren,”
he says. “I didn’t want to be in Iraq while they
were growing old at home.”
registerguard com
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