A view from the front

I've learned a new term from my Army brethren: BLUF. It stands for Bottom Line Up Front. Here's mine:

The presidents plan has a chance to work.
We are, in fact, engaged in the ideological struggle of our generation.
We CANNOT afford to lose this fight and let Iraq slip into chaos.

First, some background. In the military we talk about the "tooth to tail" ratio. That is, the number of trigger pullers compared to the number of people to support them. The average is a 3 to 10 ratio. For every trigger puller there are 3.3 people supporting him. That includes the pilots and admin staff and, in this case, advisers like me. So, of the approximately 140,00 people we have in Iraq, a little over 40,000 of them are shooters.

Perhaps some perspective would be helpful. Any one care to venture a guess on how many cops there are in New York City? Anyone, Bueller, Anyone??* Would you believe over 37,000? That's right kids, NYPD has almost as many cops as we have combat troops in Iraq. Adding 20,000 more combat troops to central Iraq will substantially increase the number of shooters on the street. Of that 20k, there will still be some dilution of course, but the impact will be significant.

I know for a fact, because I've talked to Iraqis who live in Baghdad, that when the Americans arrive they breath a little easier. When some of the guys who work here call home and their wives tell them that the military is in the neighborhood, they ask "which military?" If it's us, the say "don't worry, you'll be OK".

The New Iraqi Army (IA) is a work in process. It is a force that is less than three years old. And while not as bad as the police force, it's had it's fair share of corruption and abuse. When we disbanded the old Iraqi Army, we lost the structure and process and the institutional knowledge. When we began recruiting for the New IA, the Americans here at the time had little knowledge of who was who and who was telling the truth about their experience or past rank. It was, as you might imagine, a bit chaotic.

Sidebar: Col Abbas, the Iraqi I work with and mentor, was the very first officer in the new Iraqi Army and he's very proud of that. Do a Google search of "Col Abbas" and you can learn more about him. I'll share my thoughts about him in a later post.

Another axiom of military thought is: amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics. The most brilliant tactical plan will come to a grinding halt if you run out of fuel, bullets or food. One of great but perhaps unrecognized strengths of our force is logistics. Our logisticians are among the best in the world. We have fleets of cargo aircraft and ships and trucks and helicopters. The IA has none of that. Almost all of their combat support is provided by us. It is unrealistic and naive in the first order to think that after only three years they can sustain themselves. It would have been a difficult job to build this army had there been no insurgency. With the insurgency, it is doubly so.

Progress is being made. The main part of the force has been created. The service support element of the Iraqi Army is coming together now. The folks I work with at CMATT are working very hard to get new soldiers trained and to establish and transition the schools and support infrastructure required to run an army. Here at Besmaya, my Iraqis are now able to get their radios and vehicles repaired using Iraqi repair facilities. Sounds simple enough, but even the simple is difficult here.

I'll expand on my BLUF in the next few days.

* "Anyone, Bueller, Anyone". Another of my arcane pop culture references. This from the mid 80's classic "Ferris Buellers Day Off".