Jeff Goldstein has a great post on the difficulties of rebuilding the Iraqi military that features this exceptionally astute comment on the situation:
Not to pick nits, Jeff, but the problem in fact is developing leaders at all ranks, but especially at the company (captain and below) levels. General and field grade (major to colonel) ranks are somewhat simpler (in concept, anyway, because fewer are needed). But of even more importance is producing a reliable NCO cadre. Officers lead the way, but sergeants make sh*t happen, and enlisted soldiers do the work.
The sheer quantities involved make this difficult; a typical infantry company needs 4-5 officers, the battlion HQ some 5-8 more, for some 35 or so per battalion (5 companies per battalion).
NCOs, however, are much more plentiful. As a rule, an NCO (equivalent to staff sergeant in the Army) is needed for every 10 troops or so (squad). In a battalion of 500 soldiers, that’s 50 or so SSGs. And so on, up to a single senior NCO (in the US Army, a command sergeant major). That could easily reach 100 NCOs in one battalion.
That’s a lot of leadership development. It’s amazing that we’ve come so far, so fast. That’s quite heartening, given the tasks ahead.
I say that because I read an article a couple years ago, Why Arabs Lose Wars, which discusses, in part, the lack of NCOs and reliable company grade leadership, and pointing out that this is, in part, a cultural problem in the Arab world. One telling quote from that article is:
“U.S. trainers often experience frustration obtaining a decision from a counterpart, not realizing that the Arab officer lacks the authority to make the decision—a frustration amplified by the Arab’s understandable reluctance to admit that he lacks that authority. This author has several times seen decisions that could have been made at the battalion level concerning such matters as class meeting times and locations requiring approval from the ministry of defense. All of which has led American trainers to develop a rule of thumb: a sergeant first class in the U.S. Army has as much authority as a colonel in an Arab army.“
Emphasis is mine. I can’t say (lacking direct information) that standing up the new Iraqi army has had to overcome this specific obstabcle, but I do know that getting reliable junior leaders who can perform in combat has been an issue. And I have to think that the Iraqi culture has to contribute some problems in developing a western style military.
To make things harder, you produce graduates, not leaders; leaders are in fact developed, or grown into their ranks. This is part science, part art, and takes time. Any buffoon can put on a uniform and be an officer, but can that person inspire their soldiers to follow him/her into combat? Not hardly!
This is not obvious to many people, because the US military has been developing leaders for several generations, so it has been in the background. And it is something not easily produced for export. McCain knows this for the same reasons I do—we’ve been there, and done that.
But you’re right, the administration needs to push this issue, as a measure of success. Because it is.
Indeed, that’s exactly the reason why all those people, such as Senator Kerry, who berate the Iraqis for not being able to stand up faster don’t get it. It takes a significant amount of time to develop a coherent military force with the requisite leadership at all levels. Saddam was not exactly known for fostering innovation or initiative among his officer corps – in fact, officers who did express those traits tended to be shot as potential challengers to Saddam’s singular authority. It’s far more than just a matter of giving a bunch of Iraqis guns and putting them through basic – it’s a matter of training Iraqis to be leaders – and as any member of the military will tell you, that can’t be done overnight.
The progress that has happened already is amazing, and already many Iraqi leaders are stepping up to the challenge of safeguarding their country. However, the expectations that an army can be built from the ground up in a matter of a few short years isn’t realistic – nor would it have been realistic to keep Saddam’s thoroughly corrupt and dysfunctional army around and attempt to reform it into a coherent fighting force. What will happen is that over time more and more Iraqi units will become more and more independent and more and more lethal. However, that won’t happen overnight.
We may well be able to draw down forces by next year, putting some of the pressure off of us and transferring more and more responsibility and control to the Iraqis. However, that can’t be done on an arbitrary timetable. One of the advantages of the situation is that while Iraq is supposedly a training ground for terrorists, it’s an even more effective training ground for Iraqi anti-terrorist forces who can blend into terrorist groups in a way that a Westerner never could. Having an indigenous Arab force dedicated to infiltrating and disrupting groups like al-Qaeda could not be more crucial towards an effective defense against terrorism.
The operative word here is “patience”. The armchair quarterbacks in Washington have no right to criticize the bravery of the Iraqi soldiers in Fallujah, Basra, or Mosul, who are on the front lines of this war every day in the line of fire and risk losing their lives as well as the lives of their families. Those who argue that the Iraqis aren’t pulling their own weight simply because they can’t do in two years what it took us decades to achieve is not only arrogant, but tinged with racism. The reality is that the Iraqis have come quite far in a limited amount of time and are taking more and more responsibility for their own defense every day. However, we still have a moral obligation to leave Iraq with the capability to defend itself against terrorism, and if we shirk that duty we will not only do a disservice to the people of Iraq, but endanger our own safety as well.
UPDATE: W. Thomas Smith, Jr. has an interesting piece in National Review Online on the training of new Iraqi soldiers.
Racism? Get real! How many other countries in world history have gotten the luxury of a foreign Army holding its hands during a three-years-and-counting training period? It’s mind-blowing how the same crowd who looks down their noses at poor Americans for “not pulling themselves up by bootstraps and taking charge of their own destiny” are now criticizing those who don’t want the Iraqi Security Force to become indefinitely dependent upon America’s “welfare army”. If time limits for welfare benefits are okay for single mothers with three kids living in Cabrini Green, they why shouldn’t a time limit for Iraqi Security Forces to become a self-sufficient military also be acceptable?
Germany, Japan, South Korea, hell, pretty much all the member states of NATO…
Because those two things aren’t remotely similar?
“Germany, Japan, South Korea, hell, pretty much all the member states of NATO…”
Ah, yes….all stunning examples of never-quite-ready-for-self-sufficiency militaries that make the knees of world dictators quiver. While it’s certain an American military presence will endure indefinitely in Iraq, the magnitude of that presence will be determined by whether we’ll foolish enough to create the military welfare state of Japan into a permanent fixture of Iraq.
“Because those two things aren’t remotely similar?”
If domestic conservative dogma is to be taken seriously, they should be considered similar. Rewarding non-productive behavior is unlikely to yield different results in Iraq than it is in Cabrini Green.
Non-productive?!
You tell some Iraqi GI whose sitting in a foxhole fighting a bunch of terrorists who would gladly murder him and his family that he isn’t being sufficiently “productive” because he can’t do what it took our military (living in safety) decades to do in a matter of months. Our troops don’t worry about being blown up while waiting to get into the Army – the Iraqis do. Yet thousands of Iraqis keep standing in those lines to join in the defense of their country.
You honestly want to argue that you can rebuild an entire military from virtually nothing in two years? Build an entire officer corps? Train leaders? Build the kind of espirit de corps necessary for a capable military force? Because that’s an argument so incomprehensibly dumb that it defies belief…
What’s funny is that you criticized me for arguing that the Iraqis should take responsibility for their own defense two years ago – and now you’re arguing that it’s shameful that they don’t.
Of course, who needs logic or consistency when you’re a member of the far left?
“What’s funny is that you criticized me for arguing that the Iraqis should take responsibility for their own defense two years ago – and now you’re arguing that it’s shameful that they don’t.”
Damn, I didn’t realize you hung on my every word to this extent. It’s kind of flattering.
Seriously though, that quote was a pretty good find….although both my statement and Will’s were made 28 months ago. Will was making that statement when the Iraqi Security Forces were in their infancy. Two and a half years later, with mind-blowingly little progress in training Iraqis and an American-killing insurgency growing more organized by the day, the equation is slightly different.
While I stand by my original comment that Iraqi self-sufficiency is asking alot considering we invaded their country, Iraq being a permanent American colony is not in anybody’s best interest. The mother of all mistakes was invading Iraq in the first place. There are no stellar exit strategy options and there is plenty of risk for long-term instability with the withdrawal timeline I propose. On the other hand, self-sufficiency will NEVER be realized without motivation and “staying there until the mission is done” will perpetually fail to motivate.
It is curious, though, that you and Will who wanted to crack the whip and get Iraqis to take responsibility for their own defense TWO AND A HALF YEARS AGO are now, in December 2005, suggesting that those of us who believe such responsibility should be established A YEAR FROM NOW are out of line.
Such is the power of a really good search engine…
I think a lot of the problem stemmed from the fact that we didn’t get everything together until about a year ago. Partially because the CPA never could get its act fully together, and partially because the situation in Iraq was much worse than we thought. In the short term, getting rid of the Iraqi Army was not a good idea, but it saved us a lot of trouble over the long term. Larry Diamond’s book does a good job of covering that.
It’s only been since the Iraqis have had more political responsibility that things have gotten better. The reason why things are turning around in Iraq is precisely because the Iraqis now have a newfound sense of identity.
However, I’ve said for a long time that the process of democratization will take a long time. In fact this guy has nicely catalogued some of my statements on the matter, although he doesn’t realize that he’s implying a contradiction that doesn’t exist. Even after we’re gone, Iraq will have a long road towards democratization, but that doesn’t mean that it’s impossible.
The only timeline should be the one the Iraqis create for themselves. Anyone who thinks that the process of securing Iraq and creating the stability necessary for further democratization on an artificial timeline is a fool. Our sole objective in Iraq is a stable and free society, and we must devote whatever resources and time are necessary to finish the job. Fortunately I think that by next year we will be able to withdraw significant numbers of troops, but only as the situation dictates.