From: "Rich Gauszka" 

back to plan Z?

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070422/NEWS07/704220606/1009

U.S. plan backs off training of Iraqis Policy shift entrusts security to
American troop buildup WASHINGTON -- Military planners have abandoned the
idea that training Iraqi troops will enable U.S. troops to start coming
home and now say American forces will have to defeat the insurgents and
secure control of troubled provinces.
Training Iraqi troops, which had been the cornerstone of the Bush
administration's Iraq policy since 2005, has dropped in priority, officials
in Baghdad and Washington said.

 No change has been announced, and a Pentagon spokesman, Col. Gary Keck,
said training Iraqis remains important.

"We are just adding another leg to our mission," Keck said,
referring to the greater U.S. role in establishing security that new troops
arriving in Iraq are to undertake.

Although President George W. Bush said in a speech Friday in East Grand
Rapids that Iraqi forces are leading the attacks on insurgents, evidence
has been building for months that training those troops is no longer the
focus of U.S. policy and that the troops have been ineffective.

Pentagon officials said they know of no new training resources in U.S.
plans to dispatch 28,000 more troops to Iraq.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they aren't allowed
to publicly discuss the policy. Defense Secretary Robert Gates made no
public mention of training Iraqis when he visited Iraq on Thursday.

In a reflection of the need for more U.S. troops, the Pentagon decided
earlier this month to increase the length of Army tours in Iraq from 12
months to 15 months. The extension came amid speculation that the U.S.
commander there, Army Gen. David Petraeus, will ask that the troop increase
be maintained well into next year.

Iraqi forces viewed as ineffective

Throughout 2006, Casey and top Bush administration leaders touted the
training as a success, asserting that eight of Iraq's 10 divisions had
taken the lead in fighting insurgents.

But U.S. forces complained that the Iraqi forces weren't getting support
from their government and that Iraqi military commanders weren't always
willing to embrace U.S. tactics. Some everyday Iraqis said they didn't
trust the country's forces, saying they were sectarian and easily
susceptible to corruption.

Most troubling: Insurgents and militiamen had infiltrated the forces, using
their power to carry out sectarian attacks.

In nearly every area where Iraqi forces were given control, the security
situation rapidly deteriorated. The exceptions were areas dominated largely
by one sect and policed by that sect.

In Tal Afar, which Bush celebrated last year as an example of success,
suspected Sunni Muslim insurgents set off a bomb last month that killed as
many as 150 people, the largest single bombing attack of the war. U.S.
troops were sent to restore order.

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