Are Iraqi security forces ready to take over?

[stormthebeaches]

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22/20100812/tt ... 02f96.html

U.S. military leaders, engaged in a massive troop withdrawal that will see American forces reduced to 50,000 by month's end from about 150,000 at their peak, say Iraq's army and police are up to the challenge of militant attacks.

Under the security pact between Baghdad and Washington, all U.S. troops are scheduled to leave by the end of next year.

But Lieutenant General Babakir Zebari, Iraq's senior military officer, told Agence France Presse at a defence conference in Baghdad on Wednesday the Iraqi army would not be ready to ensure security until 2020.

"At this point, the withdrawal is going well, because they are still here," Zebari was quoted as saying.

"But the problem will start after 2011 -- the politicians must find other ways to fill the void after 2011.

"If I were asked about the withdrawal, I would say to politicians: the U.S. army must stay until the Iraqi army is fully ready in 2020."

Washington plans to leave 50,000 troops in Iraq to support and train Iraqi forces, which now number about 440,000 police and 220,000 soldiers. But Iraq has only a bare-bones air force and navy, and U.S. officials concede that strengthening its ability to defend its borders is a work in progress.

"WORK TO BE DONE"

"The Iraqi Security Forces are in the lead for internal security and fully capable of providing internal security," U.S. General Steve Lanza said in response to Zebari's comments.

"Iraq is rapidly building conventional capabilities to defend against external threats every day and there is much work to be done before the end of the current mission of U.S. Forces in December 2011," he said.

Violence has fallen sharply since the height of sectarian violence in 2006-07 but Iraq still sees an average of 15 militant attacks a day, according to U.S. figures. American soldiers will train and support the Iraqis, provide air support and logistics help, and work as "partners" in counter-terrorism operations, Lieutenant General Robert Cone, a top U.S. commander, said this week.

"It is very unlikely that the Iraqi security forces will ask for assistance in the form of combat soldiers ... because there's 660,000 Iraqis in uniform today defending this country," Cone said, adding that the Iraqis are doing "exactly the right things" against militant attacks.

But Iraqi military analyst Adil al-Azawi estimated the army's readiness for internal threats at about 60 to 70 percent and said it was not close to being prepared to defend borders.

"The statement of Lieutenant General Babakir Zebari is professional and has a high degree of credibility," said Azawi, a former army colonel. "The Iraqi army does not have even 20 percent of the arms of the armies of neighbouring countries."

Top military officials have said full modernisation of a force rebuilt from the ground up following the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein will take another ten years.

For example, Iraq has ordered 140 Abrams tanks but got its first shipment of 11 just recently.

Iraqi government spokesman Ali a-Dabbagh told al-Arabiya TV that Zebari's comments were a personal view and said government policy dictated no U.S. soldier would remain after 2011.

"Politicians respect the point of view of military personnel but in the end, the decision is made by politicians," he said.

He called the decision on a complete U.S. withdrawal by the end of next year "final." But Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, in an interview with Reuters last week, appeared to leave the door open to a renegotiation of the security pact when he said he hoped the next premier would not have to propose an extension.

(Additional reporting by Waleed Ibrahim and Muhanad Mohammed; editing by Andrew Roche)

So what does the board think of this?

[Big Phil]

It's about time we get the fuck out of Iraq, and they don't really have any external threats other than Iran... and Iran isn't likely to try invading knowing that America is just itching for an excuse to bomb the shit out of them.

[Kanastrous]

They don't need to invade; they'll infiltrate continue infiltrating and achieve their goals (or some proportion of them) that way.

[Stark]

Imagine how much cheaper it would have been if the US did it that way?

[Kanastrous]

Alas while subtlety has long been a Persian virtue, I don't think it's ever been a big American one.

[Stark]

America has virtues?

I'm curious why these 'Iraqi ready' articles are so focused on 'wah we want to leave wah wah poor us in this mess we made wah wah wah' instead of looking at the reasons for the situation. The Iraq 'security forces' (lol at that) did just fine keeping the population under control beforehand.

[Sea Skimmer]

They don't need to invade; they'll infiltrate continue infiltrating and achieve their goals (or some proportion of them) that way.

Unlikely, the Iranian backed candidates did poorly in the last election. So did quite a few of the religious parties. Unfortunately they still have not formed a government after 5 months, but that isn’t exactly a sign Iran is dominating anything. The whole Iranian domination thing was never very likely, and if Iraq doesn't break up into pieces it wont happen. These are not two nations that on average like each other one bit, and they've been fighting over shit along the same basic boarder lines for nearly as long as recorded history exists. People just love to forget that.

Imagine how much cheaper it would have been if the US did it that way?

Except the US did try, and a lot more then once to topple Saddam internally or just get him killed. Saddam as a tough guy, and he has pretty ridiculously elaborate decoy and security operations going on, besides the huge secret police apparatus that kept up a regular quota of murdered dissidents . What the US should have done was just told the Saudis and other Arab states to fuck off and crushed Saddam in 1991 with a half million men.

[Stark]

'Infiltrate' doesn't mean 'kill the guy at the top to bring on chaos for no reason'. If the threat of Iran exertign its sinister influence in Iraq isn't just American paranoid stupidty, then surely America could have exerted it's own sinister influence rather than spending a pile of money and dead kids.

[Kanastrous]

Yeah, back to the whole subtlety thing again...

[Sea Skimmer]

Yeah, back to the whole subtlety thing again...

You fucking retarded if you think some subtle infiltrators would have done fucking anything against Saddam or that this wasn’t tried in the first fucking place. Are you just incapable of understanding that the only reason Iran is a threat at all is because the US turned the place into a fucking democracy? That means the Irnaians can gain a little influence if 1% of the voters will at all support them. Its all or fucking nothing against a Ba'ath Party dictatorship. Do you pay any attention to reality at all?

[Kanastrous]

Actually I meant America's subtlety, or lack of it as referenced in Stark's post. Your point regarding Iranian infiltration was well taken.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, Iranian infiltration is also a threat because we turned Iraq into a state which is both democratic and plagued with warlords. That increases Iranian options when it comes to subversion and infiltration; they're not just supporting dissident political movements. They can also provide weapons and training to Shi'ite militia or guerilla forces- not necessarily to attack Americans, even, just to give pro-Iranian factions more security when it comes to dealing with anti-Iranian rivals.

[dragon]

They should be ready after all the training we gave them. After all our alot of our soliders with less than a 6 months of training were sent there doing patrols, storming houses in short kicking ass. It's not like they need the years of training some speciality soliders, such as sat com tech, get as they won't be using alot of high tech stuff.

[Kanastrous]

But what about the quality of Iraqi soldiers? I expect that there are brave take-charge kick-ass individual Iraqis but the reports I read based upon US soldiers' experience working with Iraqi troops makes it seem that they tend to lack initiative, organization, dedication and the kind of gung-ho attitude that the US military works to instill in their troops.

Maybe it's cultural, or maybe it's just illusory but it seems that in a lot of places the US has tried to raise and train friendly local forces, we always get a preponderance of dregs, lazies and hangers-back and our local opponents get the go-for-the-throat dedicated killers...

[irishmick79]

Unlikely, the Iranian backed candidates did poorly in the last election. So did quite a few of the religious parties. Unfortunately they still have not formed a government after 5 months, but that isn’t exactly a sign Iran is dominating anything. The whole Iranian domination thing was never very likely, and if Iraq doesn't break up into pieces it wont happen. These are not two nations that on average like each other one bit, and they've been fighting over shit along the same basic boarder lines for nearly as long as recorded history exists. People just love to forget that.

Didn't some of them do fairly well in the south? I think the big difference now is that for the first time in a long time, at least in the south, the dominant forces in Iraq have more in common culturally with Iran than before. Iraq has never been led by predominantly Shi'ia governments, and that could change the dynamic of Iranian-Iraqi relations a lot.

[Knife]

But what about the quality of Iraqi soldiers? I expect that there are brave take-charge kick-ass individual Iraqis but the reports I read based upon US soldiers' experience working with Iraqi troops makes it seem that they tend to lack initiative, organization, dedication and the kind of gung-ho attitude that the US military works to instill in their troops.

Maybe it's cultural, or maybe it's just illusory but it seems that in a lot of places the US has tried to raise and train friendly local forces, we always get a preponderance of dregs, lazies and hangers-back and our local opponents get the go-for-the-throat dedicated killers...

Don't be silly. Our guys fight with our interests in mind, while their guys fight for their own interests. When the two don't align, our perception of them changes. Maybe we think they are being lazy, in truth they don't want to attack that house, their uncle lives there, or some shit. Same problem with upper echelons, they are used to a very dangerous, very strict power hierarchy. To gather power is to increase your lot in life but also usually deadly at some point, very tribal. We don't really have a frame of reference for such things and so interpret them in what we do know, incompetence, lazy, lack of initiative, etc...

[Kanastrous]

Well, that's why I made an allowance for the possibility that it may be

cultural, or maybe it's just illusory

[Sephirius]

This link illustrates many of the problems facing the Iraqi Army after the US leaves, as the problem according to this author is largely cultural.

[Medic]

Well, that's why I made an allowance for the possibility that it may be

cultural, or maybe it's just illusory

There are very real cultural road blocks and there's been a lot of media and professional literature bemoaning this fact. Even before we ground their Army beneath our boot heels (twice) theirs was never any better or worse on average than other Middle Eastern military's -- which isn't very good.

For example though a common refrain from military advisors was that when you give an Iraqi officer a bunch of technical manuals and professional material they just horde it -- they were holding onto it all for themselves because the possession of that knowledge was a tool to be bartered or traded; leveraged when appropriate.

I've read a lot of this stuff over the years due to various duty positions and this is a good primer on the base I'm touching (PDF, sorry, can't remember where I first saw this but it was likely originally in a magazine or Military Review): http://ausastg.portalsolutions.net/publ ... d_1209.pdf


At the end of the day, "are they ready?" Time will tell just how good they are, but ready or not, it's time to go. They are not the American Army leaving the country but they have 2 great advantages: barring catastrophic performance in the field / a spate of desertions, they will be larger than any American presence ever could have been AND, they are comprised of Iraqi's of course. Citizens will far more readily assist the Iraqi Army in pointing out insurgents than they ever would have Americans, if for no other reason than they can speak the same language and come from the same culture. These are great advantages and IMPO will be the difference that allows them to succeed. If not, oh well, you won't see very many Americans shed very many tears, the economy's in bad shape and a trillion dollars went into that country - billions more will be doled out to disabled veterans for decades to come.

edit: typo edit2: pointing out the obvious at the end of my 1st paragraph...

[Medic]

On reflection, I remember this very idea was brought up... SOMEWHERE (the thread is fucking huge) in the recent Salvation War Thread about the idea of the Satanic Army evolving. In this, the board consensus arrived at a conclusion about Satanic culture that very readily describes the difficulties in American advisors trying to impart a professional ethic upon Arab culture.

The long and the short in that thread read: a military's professional culture invariably is a product of the greater societal culture, it is colored by it. Satan's Army's could no longer evolve tactically than could the society invent greater technology, due to their attitudes about the unknown towards authority. This analogy applied to 20th century warfare: Arab armies lose wars. When you get 1000 TM's for humvee's you fucking give it out to the soldiers and grunts that need that information, you don't sit on it. And yet it's happened.

[Ritterin Sophia]

Are you just incapable of understanding that the only reason Iran is a threat at all is because the US turned the place into a fucking democracy?

I actually think the reason Iran is a threat is because in the 2002 State of the Union Address someone decided it was an awesome idea to include Iran in the 'Axis of Evil'. Prior to that Iran was providing us with much needed intelligence data on Afghanistan, the Taliban, and AQ (including 300 passports of identified AQ operatives); I say much needed because prior to that all of our good info was from before the Taliban took power. Let's not forget the candlelight vigils that broke out in the middle of Tehran in reaction to the events of 9-11.


Their moderate president Khatami was seeking re-election and then that came and legitimized anti-West Ahmadinejad's platform.

The War on Terror was a momentous chance to further warm relations between Iran and America, we may have even counted Iran as part of the 'Coalition of the Willing', but then Neoconservatism happened.

TL,DR: We have only ourselves to blame for Iran being an enemy now.

[Kanastrous]

*shrug* you can probably go much further back than that, to when we re-installed Reza Palahvi after helping push out Moussadegh in the 1950s.

[Ritterin Sophia]

*shrug* you can probably go much further back than that, to when we re-installed Reza Palahvi after helping push out Moussadegh in the 1950s.

Except that's not when the recent problems with Iran started, remember that it was us and the UN Security Council that talked them down from invading A-Stan in '98. Which is where that intel they gave us came from. Until Bush opened his mouth the whole Shah and Cold War harsh feelings were water under the bridge.

[Kanastrous]

The relationship had improved from its lowest ebb but 'water under the bridge' seems like a bit of an overstatement.

[Gil Hamilton]

Is not another problem that Iraq is alot like the original United States in that not a whole lot of people where really, truly have any dedication to the whole nation but rather the small subunit they are apart of? I've heard that one issue is that Iraqis are perfectly willing to fight and die for their neighborhood or town, but really don't consider it worth fighting and dying for some other part of Iraq (particularly if they had a really poor opinion of that part of Iraq and the people who lived there to begin with). They reason "Why should we sacrifice ourselves for folks who aren't our people, plus may be apostate Shi'ite/Sunni/Kurdish scum who've we've hated forever anyway?"

That strikes me as a big problem. It seems the whole concept of Iraq is just continuing the mistake the British originally made their by stuffing a whole bunch of people with centuries of bad blood together, calling it a nation, and expecting them to get along. Iraqis may just not see themselves or others as Iraqis and all on the same team.