Chicago Tribune:
As Iraqi army Capt. Saddam Ismail Abid commanded a vehicle checkpoint in this northeastern city one recent day, he was more like the sheriff of Mayberry than a member of Iraq's most hunted fraternity.Drivers shook his hand, acquaintances peeked out of their cars to offer him kisses on the cheek, and a few neighbors even pulled over to chat with him about his recent wedding. Abid was so relaxed he said he didn't believe it was necessary to wear his body armor.
"There is nothing to be afraid of," Abid explained. "Muqdadiyah's people love the Tiger Battalion."
The Tiger Battalion, which is the 2nd Battalion of the 2nd Brigade of the 5th Infantry Division, is perhaps the most heralded unit of the struggling Iraqi army. Lauded for its competence and professionalism by U.S. commanders, the battalion has proved to be the antithesis of a struggling Iraqi security force that has been slow to take responsibility for security through much of the country.
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Over the summer, the U.S. 3rd Infantry Division pulled its soldiers out of the joint communications center in Muqdadiyah, where they had helped the Iraqis respond to criminal and insurgent activity in the area.
These days, the U.S. officers provide much of their assistance to the Iraqis by sending them tips and observations about their shared battle space through an Internet chat room, said Lt. Col. Roger Cloutier, the American commander of the 3rd Infantry Division battalion that shares a base with the Tiger Battalion on the edge of Muqdadiyah.
"We've gotten to the point where we just don't do independent missions anymore," Cloutier said.
Cloutier said his troops have assumed more of a logistical and advisory role in Muqdadiyah and the surrounding villages. But the Iraqi army still relies on the Americans for operations that require air support. And like much of the Iraqi army, the Tiger Battalion lacks basic fighting tools such as armored vehicles and a mortar delivery system.
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The 35-year-old commander said his unit has a strong core of mostly younger officers who remained open-minded as their U.S. trainers pushed the idea of delegating responsibility to the men under their command. U.S. trainers have faced a great deal of resistance to that philosophy from Iraqi soldiers elsewhere in the country. Under the former regime, officers controlled all the decision-making, and low-ranking soldiers were treated poorly.
Unlike other army units elsewhere in the country, the members of the Tiger Battalion are almost exclusively from Muqdadiyah and the surrounding area, which arms them with an intuitive sense of their area of operation.
In addition, Abid, who was an intelligence officer in the Iraqi army's old regime, said he was able to quickly establish an intelligence-gathering operation that has proved more effective than that of his American counterparts from the 3rd Infantry Division. Abid said soldiers from his battalion have posed as sympathizers to the insurgency and have been able to infiltrate terror and criminal cells.
"We are able to get human intelligence that the Americans could never get," Abid said. "We are doing the kind of intel work that no one (in the Iraqi army) in Baghdad has even started to do."
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Some Washington lawmakers have argued the Bush administration's resistance to setting a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops leaves Iraqis without a sense of urgency to stand up a proper security force.
However, Abid said the difficulties in training the army have more to do with the attitude of Iraq's enlisted men and officers.
"In Iraq, we still have an old regime way of thinking," he said. "This will take a generation to be removed. When I started with my soldiers, they could do nothing. I had to teach them to be officers and delegate responsibility to their soldiers and make decisions for themselves."
Despite their success, some members of the Tiger Battalion said they would like to see U.S. troops stay in Iraq for four years or more, the amount of time they believe it will take to properly stabilize the country and fortify it from external threats.
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