Elite Iraqi Unit Seeks Footing as It Fills U.S. Boots

[LiberalAndProud]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/20/international/middleeast/20training.html?ex=1298091600&en=665f0ad7ec6a9ca3&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss


The Bush administration has anchored its plans for troop withdrawals from Iraq on the promise of increasingly capable indigenous security units: the army, the police, border patrols and a facilities-protection service, currently totaling 227,000, although they are trained to vastly different levels of proficiency.

Now, as part of that program, American Special Operations forces commanders say they have shifted their own efforts from carrying out raids and attacks to training elite Iraqi teams to take over the most challenging missions.

Like their American counterparts, the new Iraqi special operations forces, now about 1,800, will be only a tiny percentage of the country's overall security forces, but they will take on some of the most dangerous missions, including capturing or killing insurgent and terrorist commanders, guarding Iraqi government leaders and rescuing hostages.

The Iraqi special operations forces are rapidly moving toward full self-sufficiency in carrying out the combat part of their missions, American officers say, and there is general agreement these Iraqis are the best in the new military here. Even so, it is clear that some American troops will have to stay in Iraq for some time to come. American officers say that is because they share the burden of supplying food, fuel, weapons, ammunition, spare parts, maintenance and, perhaps most of all, intelligence on individual targets and a disciplined planning process

[tatertop]

1. We are training and arming our adversary.

Excellent way to keep the fight on.

[Spinzonner]

2. Wonder if it's been infiltrated

[gratuitous]

3. 1,800 special operations folks?

Uh huh. Yeah, I believe that. Just like I believe the 227,000 figure in the first paragraph. I wondered what fevered corner of the diseased mind of Rumsfeld those numbers came out of?

[Massacure]

4. 90% of those figure are probably cannon fodder.

Iraq may have 227,000 security forces, but how many of those are actually decently trained and equiped would be interesting to see.

[0007]

5. When are gonna give 'em planes and tanks and a few nukes?