Only 1 of 90 Iraqi Battalions is Combat Capable Now-Pentagon Bill

[RamboLiberal]

Iraq's hollow military
by kos
Tue Feb 15th, 2005 at 09:50:15 PST

Remember Bush running around talking about the batallions of Iraqi troops defending their country from terrorists? That hack Wolf Blitzer took the administration at face value when Rumsfeld announced that Iraqi security forces numbered in the 200,000.
That was on March 14, 2004.

Sen. Biden (D) has been running around telling anyone who'll listen that this was all lies. Having visited Iraq at least once, he has been on the Sunday morning talk shows and elsewhere claiming that the number was far, far less. And he is apparently right.

But the Pentagon's supplemental budget bill , released yesterday, shows just how hollow those words were. In fact, the Defense Department now admits in a $5.7 billion request to train local troops, there are hardly any Iraqi forces that are able to put up a fight.

The Iraqi Interim and Transitional Governments, with Coalition assistance, have fielded over 90 battalions in order to provide security within Iraq during a period of an intense counterinsurgency campaign that was designed to suppress the development of democracy. All but one of these 90 battalions, however, are lightly equipped and armed, and have very limited mobility and sustainment capabilities. These limitations, coupled with a more resilient insurgency than anticipated when the Iraqi Security Forces were initially designed, have led the Prime Minister of Iraq to request forces that can participate in the "hard end" of the counterinsurgency, and to do so quickly. (Emphasis mine. And yeah, I caught the little Bushism, too.)
In other words, only one of the 90 batallions fielded by the Iraqi armed forces is combat capable. The others have no vehicles, no ammunition, no fuel, and very little in the way of weapons.

http://www.dailykos.com/

http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/amendments/supplemental_2_14_05.pdf

[indepat]

1. One in ninety ain't all bad: just almost 99% bad

[Cocoa]

2. at this rate

we'll be there for 150 years. :toast:

[MichiganVote]

3. Let's see. Two years and 300bil. for 1 batallion out of 90

I think that means 180 years at 27 trillion or so for 90 battalions?

Yeah, that sounds about right for a George Bush plan.

[Riding this Donkey]

4. I've mentioned this before

When Cond-a-liar was having her hearings and she testified that big fat lie about 120,000 troops already trained, etc. Then I heard
Biden's comments and said *Yeah* we've trained 120,000 Iraqi Troops with SPIT BALLS!

It makes me angry, that these American taliban liars, can't even own up to the fact, that they have failed to train many Iraqis at all. No they instead lead us (by their silence) to believe that the Iraqis are just chicken-shit and run at every chance.

We need to train Iraqi Troops (THE RIGHT WAY) and bring home our troops ASAP!

The Iraqis do not need us occupying them one moment longer than necessary to clean up the HELL we waged on them.

[MichiganVote]

5. We don't need to train them at all. These people know how to fight plenty