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$19bn later...
28/06/2007 09:20 - (SA)
Stephen Collinson
Washington - The United States has sunk more than $19bn into training Iraqi forces, but new army and police units still cannot enforce security, a congressional report warned on Wednesday.
Four years after the US invasion, 346 500 Iraqi military and police have been trained, but readiness is not evenly spread and there is strong evidence some newly trained troops are committing sectarian violence, the report said.
The study, by a subcommittee of the House of Representatives Armed Services panel, was the latest unflattering assessment of US operations in Iraq, and came as support ebbs for current Iraq policy among Senate Republicans.
The hugely expensive and complicated US mission to train Iraqi forces has had "mixed results", the report said, with Iraqi police forces particularly problematic.
Though some units are operational, "the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) have not yet developed as fast as the coalition planned and ... are not yet ready to take full responsibility for their country's security," the bipartisan report said.
It is also unclear how many of the 346 500 forces trained are still operational, the committee said, warning the US Defence Department "must focus on personnel and equipment accountability systems".
"This bipartisan report shows clearly that the president's plan to stand down our troops as the Iraqis stand up has been a failure to this point," said Oversight and Investigations committee chairperson Martin Meehan.
'We want to make sure we don't train the enemy'
Building Iraqi military and security forces is seen as a critical mission which will help determine if and when US forces can leave the country and avoid leaving a deadly power vacuum.
Republican Representative Phil Gingrey expressed concern that some new security force members trained by US soldiers could end up on the opposite side of the sectarian war or in bloodthirsty militia.
"It is obviously a very difficult thing to do and we want to make sure we don't train the enemy, there is always that potential risk," he said.
The report also warned that Iraq's military and political infrastructure was sorely lacking.
"The Iraqi Ministries of Defence and Interior are not capable of accounting for, supporting or fully controlling their forces in the field.
"In addition, these ministries lack the capacity to execute their budgets."
Democratic Senator John Kerry seized on the report to launch a fresh Iraq-based attack on President George W Bush, who beat him in the 2004 election.
Massive waste and lack of progress
"Four years and $19bn later, there's pathetically little of the overhyped and overspun 'standing up' of Iraqi security forces to show for our investment," Kerry said in a statement.
"The massive waste and lack of progress is yet another example of how the administration's mistakes and misjudgments have created a disaster in Iraq."
The report on the progress in Iraqi troop training came as Washington was still mulling the fallout of calls by two Republican senators for a change of course in Iraq.
Senator Richard Lugar, a foreign policy expert and reluctant rebel, warned late on Monday that the US "surge" of nearly 30 000 troops into the country would not work and called for an immediate change of tack.
Fellow Republican George Voinovich, who like Lugar has resisted Democratic attempts to curtail Bush's war powers, on Tuesday recommended a disengagement from Iraq as the White House warned of a "very difficult summer" for US troops.
Many members of Congress are now awaiting a report by the US commander in Iraq David Petraeus, in September on progress of the surge strategy, with expectations, even among loyal Republicans that a policy change may be imminent.
Roy Blunt, Republican minority whip in the House of Representatives, told reporters on Wednesday he did not expect to see Lugar's intervention spark a flood of defections from the president.
"I believe our members will likely reserve their decision about what needs to happen next in Iraq until the September report," he said.
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