Summary
Our present attempts to pressure the Iraqi government to take more responsibility for security will not succeed. The Iraqis are years from having the combat-ready armed forces they need to control their country. Any professional military officer will tell you the key to a combat unit's effectiveness is the quality of its noncommissioned officers, or "NCOs" -- the corporals, sergeants and senior staff. Iraq does not have a large enough or qualified NCO component to anchor an effective military.
When the British, Americans and Germans mobilized armies and navies in the world wars, they found the best units were those with talented NCOs. Napoleon actually trained armies while marching them to the front simply by putting new inductees with cadres of experienced sergeants and corporals. The Iraqis cannot do that since they don't have experienced sergeants and corporals.See the full content of this document
Extract
Iraqis in Need of Good-Quality Ncos
In the United States we spend about four years developing a good sergeant. It takes nearly twice as long to develop a staff NCO. And we have great ...
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