Sunday, December 04, 2005
THE WARFIGHTER'S VIEW FROM IRAQ
Bill Roggio, formerly of The Fourth Rail and now Threatswatch is now deployed in Iraq and has interviewed Lieutenant Colonel Dale Alford, commander of the Marine 3/6 " Devil Dogs" Battalion:
"He has a unique, outside of the box idea to get the Iraqi Army trained up to the proper standards to fight the insurgency on its own. Instead of using the MITT model, where small teams are embedded into Iraqi battalions to provide assistance, he would transplant the staff of a Marine battalion and graft it onto an Iraqi battalion. The staffs would team up, man for man, and act as advisers down to the company level, in the areas where the Iraqi military needs it most: logistics, heavy weapons support and air support. When finished, the embedded staff would leave the equipment behind for the Iraqi Army to carry on the fight.
He believes this would increase the proficiency of the Iraqi Army and reduce the deployment time of large amounts of American troops. This would place the burden of deployment on the professional elements of the Marine Corps, the officers with the rank of Captain and above and the Staff Sergeants and above in the enlisted ranks. A small detachment of officers and NCOs would need to remain home to train the Marines left home, but this would have the effect of accelerating the leadership development of lieutenants, sergeants and corporals. With the combat experience throughout the Corps, this would not be a problem in the short term."
This is of course, not what the United States has been doing in Iraq in terms of policy as the recent article in The Atlantic made clear. ¶ 8:42 AM
Bill Roggio, formerly of The Fourth Rail and now Threatswatch is now deployed in Iraq and has interviewed Lieutenant Colonel Dale Alford, commander of the Marine 3/6 " Devil Dogs" Battalion:
"He has a unique, outside of the box idea to get the Iraqi Army trained up to the proper standards to fight the insurgency on its own. Instead of using the MITT model, where small teams are embedded into Iraqi battalions to provide assistance, he would transplant the staff of a Marine battalion and graft it onto an Iraqi battalion. The staffs would team up, man for man, and act as advisers down to the company level, in the areas where the Iraqi military needs it most: logistics, heavy weapons support and air support. When finished, the embedded staff would leave the equipment behind for the Iraqi Army to carry on the fight.
He believes this would increase the proficiency of the Iraqi Army and reduce the deployment time of large amounts of American troops. This would place the burden of deployment on the professional elements of the Marine Corps, the officers with the rank of Captain and above and the Staff Sergeants and above in the enlisted ranks. A small detachment of officers and NCOs would need to remain home to train the Marines left home, but this would have the effect of accelerating the leadership development of lieutenants, sergeants and corporals. With the combat experience throughout the Corps, this would not be a problem in the short term."
This is of course, not what the United States has been doing in Iraq in terms of policy as the recent article in The Atlantic made clear. ¶ 8:42 AM
