Iraqi soldiers giving uneven performance in Sadr City battle

Michael Gordon, NY Times:

A company of Iraqi soldiers abandoned their positions on Tuesday night in Sadr City, defying American soldiers who implored them to hold the line against Shiite militias.

The retreat left a crucial stretch of road on the front lines undefended for hours and led to a tense series of exchanges between American soldiers and about 50 Iraqi troops who were fleeing.

Capt. Logan Veath, a company commander in the 25th Infantry Division, pleaded with the Iraqi major who was leading his troops away from the Sadr City fight, urging him to return to the front.

“If you turn around and go back up the street those soldiers will follow you,” Captain Veath said. “If you tuck tail and cowardly run away they will follow up that way, too.”

Captain Veath’s pleas failed, and senior American and Iraqi commanders mounted an urgent effort to regain the lost ground. An elite Iraqi unit was rushed in and with the support of the Americans began to fight its way north. (Emphasis added.)

This episode was a blow to the American effort to push the Iraqis into the lead in the struggle to wrest control of parts of Sadr City from the Mahdi Army militia and what Americans and Iraqis say are Iranian-backed groups.

...

Company B moved into Sadr City at the end of March as part of a broader effort to secure the southernmost portion of the densely populated Sadr City.

That area has been used by militias to fire 107-millimeter rockets toward the Green Zone. The Americans’ mission is to stop the rocket firings and help the Iraqi government establish a modicum of control.

Some Iraqi soldiers have fought hard. American soldiers have been regularly coaching them on how to protect their patrol bases, conserve ammunition and evacuate their wounded.

One big problem is that the Iraqi troops have responded to militia gunfire with such intense fusillades that the soldiers have endangered civilians, American soldiers and even their own forces. The barrage of Iraqi Army fire has become such a regular occurrence that some American soldiers are worried that militia fighters have tried to insert themselves between nearby Iraqi units to induce the Iraqi soldiers to fire on one another.

...

The problem on Tuesday, however, was more serious: an Iraqi retreat that left a gaping hole in the most forward position on a critical thoroughfare in the Tharwa section of Sadr City.

The episode began when Major Sattar, the leader of an Iraqi company that had taken up positions 700 yards in front of the Americans, suddenly appeared at Company B’s field headquarters in the southern part of Sadr City.

The major’s company had replaced a more battle-hardened Iraqi unit just two days earlier, and he had been unhappy to find that he would be occupying a position to the front of the better trained and equipped Americans.

...

Gordon is a good reporter, but I think he buried the lead in order to get a story about retreating Iraqi troops. The real story is that an Iraqi unit stepped into the breach to replace it. The commander of the retreating unit should surely lose his command and his troops should be disciplined and given a chance to redeem themselves with better leadership. If they cannot then good riddance.

The Iraqi army is still a work in progress and needs this battle testing to figure out who they can count on. That is why the Democrats plan for retreat will leave them in the lurch before they are ready to assume full responsibility. For what should have been the lead see the bold italics above. Unfortunately American units in other wars have performed like this Iraq unit. Think about some of the army units in North Korea for example. Thank goodness we did not give up on the US army after such performances.