Embedded milbloggers are providing invaluable first-hand reports of the military’s successes and setbacks in helping stand up the Iraqi Army.

Bill Roggio reports on successes:

In November and December of 2005, I embedded in the Qaim region with the 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines, which partnered with the 1st Battalion, 1st Brigade, 1st Division of the Iraqi Army, as well as the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines in the Haditha Triad, which partnered with the 7th Division, the youngest formation in the Iraqi Army. The Marines and Iraqi soldiers partnered with a platoon of each and lived in Battle Positions, forward bases inside the cities and towns in western Anbar province.

In December of 2006, I embedded with the 3st Battalion, 2rd Brigade, 1st Division of the Iraqi Army and its Marine Military Transition Team in Fallujah (as well as the Iraqi Police in Fallujah). This past week, I’ve embedded with the 3rd Battalion, 3rd Brigade, 1st Division its joint Army and Marine Military Transition Team in the Habbaniyah region. The Military Transition Teams are small groups of Marines (teams of about 15 Marines and soldiers) that embed in at the battalion level to advise, mentor and train the Iraqi Army as it works to achieve operational independence.

A Jundi in the turret of an Iraqi Humvee. Click image to view.

The shift from partnering with Iraqi battalions to the implementation of the transition teams in one year is dramatic, and there are both surprising developments and disappointing setbacks. Developing an Army from scratch is a difficult and time consuming process (building an Army from scratch a process and not an event, as Glenn Reynolds would say). The Army must first learn to crawl, then walk, then run. After viewing the Iraqi Army in Anbar over the past few months, I estimate they are somewhere between the crawling and walking phases, perhaps holding on to the coffee table while taking those first steps…

Read the whole assessment.

Bill Ardolino adds new information and insight to mainstream reports of “ghost soldiers” in the IA:

Something quite strange even for Fallujah happened here Saturday when the occupants of three civilian vehicles stopped at the home of Iraqi General Khalid Juad Khadim, then marched into the residence and stole weapons, money and gold. What made the theft especially odd is the fact Khalid’s personal security detail of 15 armed soldiers stood by and watched, doing nothing.

The identity of the burglars is as yet a mystery, but the raid may have been linked to controversy swirling around Khalid after a British newspaper claimed he is the corrupt beneficiary of large-scale thefts of supplies intended for the Iraqi Army, including fuel and weapons, as well as the pay intended for “ghost soldiers,” imaginary Iraqi soldiers listed on a military unit’s roster.

The Times of London article claimed corruption throughout the Iraqi Army chain of command and accused Khalid, who was also described as having been “ousted” of having “suspected ties to Shia militias.” The latter allegation has circulated before the Times article appeared and was voiced to this writer by an Iraqi civilian and a Marine officer with no prompting other than mentioning the general’s name. Other marines caution that such allegations are common yet difficult to verify, often based on thin speculation.

Contrary to the Times account, Khalid was not removed and is still in command of the Iraqi Army’s Second Brigade, currently stationed in the Iraqi Training Camp adjacent to Camp Fallujah. Khalid has vigorously denied the allegations, but American military officials contend that overall theft of supplies and ghost soldiers in the Iraqi Army are both real and in part responsible for the deaths of American and Iraqi soldiers.

Many American personnel, including former Military Transition Team (MiTT) members advising the Iraqi Army in Fallujah, vehemently complained about fuel, supplies, weapons and pay stolen by higher echelons of the Iraqi Second Brigade of the First Iraqi Army (IA) Division, as well as IA officials up the chain of command. Current members of the MiTT, however, declined to comment.

As I mentioned last week, we heard similar stories and complaints from the officers we were embedded with at FOB Justice. Bryan Preston adds over in the comments at HA:

As a couple of the officers at FOB Justice explained it to us, officers in the old Iraqi army used their positions to enrich themselves rather than manage a professional force and look after their troops the way our officers are trained to do. As a result, in the Iraqi military there’s no culture of management, no history of honesty and rampant corruption now as there was then. The quality of a given unit of the IA depends almost entirely on the quality of its top officer and his leadership and ability to promote competence among his subordinates. So all around the IA, there are units that just don’t function well because those units are led by corrupt or compromised officers. We could replace those bad officers, but with whom?

It’s one more layer of complexity and difficulty our troops are facing over there every single day, and one more reason that Iraq won’t be fixed quickly.

Here is where bipartisan, united American political pressure needs to be applied on the Maliki government: a surge will be useless without a purge of Defense and Interior Ministry corruptocrats standing in the way of standing up independent, effective Iraqi security forces.

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Update: Bryan reflects on getting “Over There.”

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