After the US-trained and armed Iraqi military collapsed in the face of ISIS offensives in 2014, the US embarked on a broad effort to retrain and reorganize the military. 17 months into this effort, US officials are increasingly admitting the effort is another failure.
Retired Lt. Gen. Mick Bednarek, who commanded the US training mission until last year, said the Iraqi Army has not improved much, saying the big problem is a lack of recruitment and retention in the Iraqi forces, saying the US officers are ready to train who shows up, but are never sure who that’s going to be.
Other US officials complained that the Iraqi military’s commanders are too cozy with the Shi’ite militias they so heavily depend on in the war, and that many of the US arms being transferred to the Iraqi military “either because of corrupt commanders or outright robbery,” end up in the hands of the militias.
Iraqi Defense Ministry officials defended this, saying the militias are an “official body” connected to the armed forces, though indeed the fact that the Iraqis are still so heavily dependent on the militias for serious combat underscores just how weak the proper military remains.
The militias have been heavily criticized by human rights groups, with many cases of “liberated” Sunni towns being left under the control of Shi’ite militias who engage in looting and violent retaliation against suspected “ISIS supporters.”
Hard to imagine that this didn’t work. After all, they had so much success training the South Vietnamese.
50 years of wasting billions of dollars in hopeless efforts to get soldiers to die bravely for a distant empire.
You nailed it GMV! Add to that that they have no interest in killing their own people and it’s a wrap.
Before the US has a chance to go back in this period of time could be an opportunity for Russia to initiate the basis for a future peace as they have done through Obama’s cooperation in Syria and Iran. It could take years for all those countries but hopefully the process can be started in iraq.
What’s the taxpayer bill? Just add another $100 billion to the bill?
one has to assume they are not really trying.
since a well train iraqi army, would one day soon meet their allies the syrian army on sykes picote.
Well said but Sykes-Picot may be a little too sophisticated for the audience we want to entertain here.
Maybe, but then there’s always the internet search engine of choice. Wait, even that seems too sophisticated for many commenters I’ve encountered.
You get it Barsoomian! keep up the good work. With a few more people helping we may turn this site into a real antiwar site and away from partisan domestic politics.
“President Obama, pardon Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning”
How absolutely fu–ing stupid and naive does it get. Does anybody really think the people of the US would put up with anything such as doing that?
A big problem that lurks in the minds of antiwar people is in thinking that they are representative of the norm in their country. Is it rocket science to understand that they’re not?
You’re replying to the wrong article, Don G. I see your posts and don’t mind them at all. Just please place them where they’re relevant. It’s less confusing that way.
Can’t because it’s not going to be posted here at antiwar.com, so I’ll continue to do it as long as I don’t get an official warning to stop.
The presidential pardon does not require the American people to “put up with” anything. That said, Obama is a weakling white-man-wannabe. If he didn’t have the courage or good sense to clear the Neocons out of his administration, he surely won’t have the courage to pardon Manning or Snowden.
US arms being transferred to the Iraqi military “either because of corrupt commanders or outright robbery,” end up in the hands of the militias.
Maybe that was the plan from the get go, in which case I say keep up the good work..
Lord knows we’ve given enough arms and equipment to ISIS.
America has decided it’s best bet is training, and arming, the Kurds.