As Iraqis stand up, we will stand down,

[Pryderi]

What happened to that strategy? How many Iraqis have been trained? Are there negative numbers being trained, and that's why we're "surging"?

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/11/20051119-5.html

[dkofos]

1. You know it's tuff work training the Iraqi's, but those 10,000

trainers are crankin out 10 or 20 a week now.

Really tuff work!!

[MissWaverly]

2. are you referring to Bush's promise from June of 2005?

which was made 1 year after the government rule was handed over to the Iraqis?

As Iraqis Stand Up, We Will Stand Down,' Bush Tells Nation
By John D. Banusiewicz
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, June 28, 2005 – On the one-year anniversary of the transfer of sovereignty in Iraq to a transitional Iraqi government, President Bush tonight promised that U.S. forces would remain in Iraq until the job is complete, "but not one day longer."

"The principal task of our military is to find and defeat the terrorists," he said. "And that is why we are on the offense. And as we pursue the terrorists, our military is helping to train Iraqi security forces so that they can defend their people and fight the enemy on their own. Our strategy can be summed up this way: As the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down."
More than 160,000 Iraqi security forces are now trained and equipped, Bush said. Some, he said, are capable of operating independently, and others now are experienced enough to plan and execute anti-terrorist operations with coalition support. Some units still are forming, the president said, and the task of training them continues with three new approaches.

http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=16277

[Pryderi]

3. Yes. That is the promise. How many units have been trained?

[MissWaverly]

4. here a snip from the whitehouse.gov site

In The Past Year, Iraqi Security Forces Have Made Real Progress. This time last year, there were only a handful of combat-ready Iraqi battalions. Now, there are over 120 Iraqi Army and Police combat battalions in the fight - typically comprised of between 350 to 800 Iraqi forces. Of these, about 80 battalions are fighting alongside Coalition forces. About 40 other battalions are taking the lead, and most are controlling their own battle space and conducting their own operations with some Coalition support

so using the White House own figures and using the lower estimate, 350 x 120 = 42,000
about 1/3 of these are capable of independent actions according to the above report
which equals 14,000.

[Pryderi]

5. 120 Battalions was as of November 2005, today there are reportedly

129 battalions. So it took 16 months to train 9 battalions? How many soldiers are in a battalion? Can't we just get a raw, number of trained Iraqi soldiers, and not battalions?

http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/11235802/detail.html
SAN DIEGO -- Republican presidential candidate Duncan Hunter returned from a fact-finding trip to Iraq Monday with a plan for what he calls a successful handoff of battlefield duties.

Hunter's plan builds upon the already-existing "Baghdad Stabilization Plan." He wants to see all 129 trained and equipped Iraqi Army battalions undertake a three-month combat rotation through a combat zone.


Link to 2005 numbers:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/11/20051130.html

[MissWaverly]

6. well, using the lower estimate that less than 3,000 since Nov.

[mmonk]

7. Which ones?

[MissWaverly]

8. here's some interesting numbers

courtesy of Newsweek, March 5, 2007

page 34: During a speech last year, the then secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld noted
that Iraqi security forces take casualties at "roughly twice the rate of all Coalition
forces." That is approximately 40,000 wounded and more than 6,000 dead, grim numbers by
any measure. Both the Iraqi Ministry of Defense and the US military refuse to divulge data
on Iraqi wounded for "security reasons."