The Vietnamization of Iraq: Inside the Military Training Program

By Col. Daniel Smith
Created Dec 10 2006 - 8:20am

It didn't require oracles or entrails after the U.S. public signaled its
rejection of the Bush administration's Iraq policy on November 7, 2006.
Something had to change.

A week later, when General John Abizaid, Combatant Commander of the U.S.
Central Command, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee, he
signaled that the White House was on the verge of abandoning the status quo.
The president finally had decided that the only course forward in Iraq was
to accelerate the fitful training program, started two years earlier. The
training program was supposed to create a professional Iraqi military
establishment that would be loyal to the national Iraqi government, be
effective enough to defeat the insurgency and the foreign extremists, and
allow the withdrawal of U.S. ground combat forces from Iraq.