Small Wars Journal

A Primer For Fixing Iraq’s Battered Army

Mon, 07/07/2014 - 12:32am

A Primer For Fixing Iraq’s Battered Army

James “Jamie” E. Hayes III

The Iraqi Army’s recent humiliation at the hands of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has indeed sent shock waves through the national security community.  Policy-makers and pundits alike are scrambling for potential solutions to this new crisis.  Drone strikes?  Massive influx of U.S. aid?  Do nothing at all? The Iraqi Army commander is no doubt feeling the crushing weight of this frenzy.  Between fielding angry phone calls from Prime Minister Maliki and attempting to rally his dispirited troops, this poor guy is probably wondering just what the hell he can do to get out of his current predicament. 

With that in mind, I have a suggestion for the proper U.S. response.  It isn’t Apache gunships, or Predators, or even the advisors that President Obama most recently ordered back into theater.  Rather, I would send the Iraqi commander a history book.  Specifically, Field Marshal William Slim’s Defeat into Victory, the classic account of the British 14th Army’s reversal of fortunes in Burma (now Myanmar) during World War II.  In 1942, Field Marshal Slim faced many of the same challenges now confronting his 21st Century Iraqi colleague.  The Japanese had soundly defeated Slim’s larger yet tactically deficient army, leaving him with some stark choices.  Reorganize and reform his army or be utterly destroyed.  Change the paradigm or die. 

Indeed, Defeat into Victory is a veritable primer for how to turn a defeated, rag-tag army into a first-class fighting force---all while maintaining contact with the enemy.  Here are but a few of the pearls that the Iraqi commander could glean from this treasure of military writing:

  • Leadership:  Field Marshall Slim knew that competent and confident leadership was the key to winning.  After the 14th Army’s initial defeats, Slim cleaned house by firing his division and brigade commanders who looked good on the parade field but then wilted under the rigors of actual warfare.  The Iraqi Army commander should do the same.  Regardless of top-cover from Prime Minister Maliki, the Iraqi Army commander should dismiss his politically-connected yet incompetent subordinate commanders and replace them with the first-rate officers---many of them Sunni and Kurd--- purged after the U.S. departure in 2011.
  • Training: Field Marshal Slim realized that his early defeats were due to the British Army’s complete unpreparedness for jungle warfare.  In his book, Slim provides extensive detail about re-training his forces and transforming them into a hardened, battle-ready organization.  Slim believed that training was more than just mastering tactical and technical skills; in his eyes, realistic exercises forged unit cohesion and confidence.  U.S. forces attempted to instill a similar ‘continuous-training’ mindset in the Iraqis before their 2011 departure to no avail.  The world saw the fruits of this reluctance to train when unprepared Iraqi units melted before the numerically inferior ISIS forces in Mosul and Tikrit.  Perhaps that bitter experience, reinforced by Slim’s book, could finally drive the message home to the Iraqi commander.
  • Regaining the Initiative: Field Marshal Slim’s Defeat into Victory describes how the British 14th Army eventually knocked the Japanese back on their heels, gaining time and space to prepare for a general offensive to retake Burma.  While Slim was no fan of special operations forces, he nonetheless employed the Chindits, a long range penetration unit made of specially trained British, Gurkha and Indian volunteers, to wreck havoc on Japanese supply lines and rear areas.  The Iraqi army commander also has such a tool at his disposal---the Iraqi Special Operations Forces (ISOF) Brigade.  As one of the few Iraqi units still in fighting shape after the ISIS onslaught, the U.S. Special Forces-trained ISOF Brigade would be the force of choice to conduct direct action raids against the terrorists’ vulnerable lines of communication along Iraq’s Highway 1.  Doing so would force ISIS into a defensive posture, thereby permitting both the Iraqi government and Army to adequately prepare for a counterattack against the Islamic extremists.
  • Relationships: Field Marshal Slim knew the value of partners.  In his book, Slim describes the great efforts to maintain working relations with the Nationalist Chinese armies fighting their common enemy.  He valued this relationship with the Chinese so much that he assigned one of his most talented generals to serve as his liaison with them rather than command one of the 14th Army’s fighting units.  The Iraqi army commander faces a similar opportunity with the Kurds, in particular the commander of the Kurdish peshmerga militia.  Undoubtedly, the Kurds and their formidable peshmerga fighters will play a key role in either subduing ISIS or keeping them fixed in place near the Sunni Triangle.   Therefore, the Iraqi commander, in spite of the political sensitivities, would be well served to reach out to the Kurdish commander with the purpose of building a solid military-to-military relationship.  Given the current state of play, a similar liaison mission with the recently-mobilized Shia militias would also be helpful in coordinating and synchronizing future operations.   The Iraqi commander needs to put his best men on it, and quickly. 

Obviously, the suggestions presented here are a bit tongue-in-cheek.  I am under no illusion that the mere introduction of a military classic such as Defeat into Victory, however pertinent to the situation, will turn the tide against ISIS.  Larger decisions, such as Maliki’s political reconciliation with the Sunnis and Kurds, need to come into play in order for Iraq to survive.  However, from a military standpoint, the Iraqis’ appreciation of Field Marshal Slim’s seminal work would reinforce the most universal aspects of armies at war.  That is, defeated military organizations can turn things around if their leadership focuses on the troops and their fighting capabilities rather than the politics.  I volunteer my copy.

Comments

RantCorp

Mon, 07/07/2014 - 2:42pm

In the context of how to rectify the effects of toxic leaders in the political and military arm of a nation state I would suggest Field Marshal Alan Brookes 'War Dairy' to be a better source for a possible solution. His observations into the nature of battlefield reversals prior to the Dunkirk evacuation and the causal characteristics ingrained within French and British general class is an insight that could help the US military as much as the Iraqi Army.

He sacked many generals who he correctly judged to be incompetent. Those he thought to be unlucky rather than toxic he demoted. These generals were assigned to less critical commands wherein they were discreetly monitored to see if they managed to redeem themselves. If they excelled (rather than resigned in a vain-glorious fit of pique) they would eventually be brought back into the fold of active service.

Brooke's mastery of grand strategy enabled him to shout down Churchill's hare-brained pomposity and military incompetence. Having the measure of Churchill he had the British political class in his pocket. In 'exalted' company he often remarked(much to Churchill's amusement) upon the lack of basic human quality in Allied generals. He bemoaned the good stock from wherein good leaders should have emerged was 'buried in Flanders' in 1914-18.

Written as a private diary Brooke's book is a warts and all account. As recent events suggests Slim appears to have been a less than candid in his personal reflections and behavior.

RC

RC

Outlaw 09

Mon, 07/07/2014 - 4:06pm

In reply to by Robert C. Jones

RJ----
While we watch the activities of the IS in Iraq do not forget their activities in Syria--this is interesting oil article as it ties into a NYT article on the IS Syrian/Iraqi strategic strategy.

Currently the IS through the declaration of the Caliphate has created effectively a new Sunni State complete with oil reserves and revenue streams so the argument that the Sunni's in Iraq can not sustain themselves is actually false from the IS perspective---they are in fact right now in this time and space a viable state.

Then if you take the statement by al Hamdun that the Sunni's are ready to declared themselves independent of Baghdad if Malaki does not increase the number of Kurds and Sunni's in the government and allow a Sunni federated region.

http://www.arabnews.com/news/596796

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...ers.html?&_r=0

http://www.spiegel.de/politik/auslan...-a-979714.html

Outlaw 09

Mon, 07/07/2014 - 3:42pm

In reply to by Robert C. Jones

RJ---no truer words are being written currently that apply to say Iraq, AFG, and Syria or for that matter any current hotspot say in Africa or even the Ukraine.

One can substitute any country in the place of the word "Iraq" and the comment still makes sense.

"We need to realize that there is no military cure for what ails Iraq. Systems of governance will come and go and evolve; lines on maps will shift; alliances will form and fray as interests align or diverge. This is natural. The people caught in the middle will often suffer, but in the end, to have any hope of getting to a relatively durable and natural form of stability, this is a journey that every people must make for themselves.

Perhaps we can help mitigate the high end of suffering and chaos to some degree as this plays out, but we must resist the urge to employ excessive power to control the outcome."

We must actually compliment Putin for starting this spiral into redoing national boundaries using ethnicity and language as the key factors---although I do not think Putin was thinking through his ideas to the end which oldline Communists seem to not be able to do.

In some aspects what we are seeing in the ME is both religious and political---religious in the sense the Sunni/Shia divide must be addressed by themselves and that is now occurring because al Baghdadi has forced it with his Caliphate declaration and political in that the borders of the ME are really colonial borders and no longer fit the environment of 2014 as seen by the populations currently residing within those colonial borders.

Again we must thank al Baghdadi and the Sunni Coalition because they are in the process of politically changing the Iraqi/Syrian borders---in some aspects this is not about the IS as it about a Sunni uprising due to poor governance and misuse of the rule of law by the current Iraqi government as you often point out.

This link on an article from al Sisi's stating his concerns about an independent Kurdish region in fact reflects the deep seated fear that now all ME borders will be redrawn around ethnicity and religion.

http://www.ibtimes.com/al-sisi-says-independent-kurdish-state-would-be-…

Robert C. Jones

Mon, 07/07/2014 - 1:53pm

I can only hope that the unfolding events in Iraq and Afghanistan serve to put a fork once and for all in the misguided notion of "building partner capacity" as an end in of itself in our current military doctrine and strategy. Building partner capacity is primarily a vehicle for access that can lead to the development of our own understanding of some place and the people who live there; develop influence with key individuals and institutions; and for creating and nurturing the relationships that influence is exercised through.

Understanding, Influence, and Relationships.

But we have deluded ourselves into believing that at the policy level we can decide to create or prop up some fundamentally flawed system of governance; and then create a military capacity formed in our image that can somehow sustain the unsustainable. This is a fascinating fusion of the ignorance and hubris of great nations.

We need to realize that there is no military cure for what ails Iraq. Systems of governance will come and go and evolve; lines on maps will shift; alliances will form and fray as interests align or diverge. This is natural. The people caught in the middle will often suffer, but in the end, to have any hope of getting to a relatively durable and natural form of stability, this is a journey that every people must make for themselves.

Perhaps we can help mitigate the high end of suffering and chaos to some degree as this plays out, but we must resist the urge to employ excessive power to control the outcome. Where truly vital interests are in play, we will need to have the capacity and influence to control those things; but we will not have what we need, when and where we need it, if we squander if foolishly on every little dust up we don't approve of.

Hopefully our soon to be released National Security Strategy is more cognizant of this reality; and is more circumspect in the breadth of the interests we deem as vital. A bit more pragmatism in approach and a good deal less ideological in context would serve us well, IMO.

Sparapet

Mon, 07/07/2014 - 10:52am

In reply to by Mark Pyruz

While context does matter to the ultimate conditions/results of a campaign, not every aspect of the campaign depends on external variables. So while your point is taken as a matter of campaign success to eradicate the IS and reunify the State of Iraq, COL Hayes' makes a major point on the internal challenge for the Iraqi Army.

What Slim faced and the IA face right now is a crisis of leadership, not high-level politics, equipment, or organization. ISIL (IS) has shown quite admirably what motivated Arabs can accomplish with homemade equipment (there is a great liveleak of their "parade" through Fallujah a few months ago if you want a sense of what they started this campaign with). If they only weren't our ideological enemies, we might admire their successes. The most successful Iraqi response so far has been through Shia militias...also highly motivated and decently well led Arab irregular formations. And the Peshmerga are....highly motivated and decently well led. Leadership and motivation are the threads here. Slim found a way to recover both, and that is what the IA needs to do now if it intends to be relevant. Then again, depending on how this whole thing plays out we might see the Shia militias forming the backbone of a future "Iraqi Army".

Regardless, Slim's campaign success was never certain. However, his defeat if he didn't reign in control of the British force was certain. Accomplishing that was step one, and all his other efforts would have been irrelevant had his formations not been reformed.

Mark Pyruz

Mon, 07/07/2014 - 6:06am

Begging the colonel's pardon but this primer completely disregards the context of the 2014 Northern Iraq Offensive.

Hayes brings our attention to a conflict involving two first-rate, colonial powers fighting a foreign war.

Iraq's current crisis involves three elements and a myriad of associated elements, in a conflict that further involves a cold war dynamic between two regional powers, as well as the recent, past invasion and military occupation by a superpower.

With all this going on--and more--how could we possibly expect the Iraqis (Baghdad government) to pursue the relative cut-and-dry approach of a British, colonial army led by a field marshal?

To more accurately render such an analogy to the current situation, Slim would be facing not an allied Chinese army but an indigenous Chinese force that has taken the opportunity of seizing Koshanpye and with it signal independence (think Kurds), the Japanese would somehow fuse a cultural, military solidarity with Burma's non-Bamar peoples (think Sunnis), a somehow independent India would be assisting British forces in a domineering, advisory role (think Iran) and the USSR would have 600 special forces on the ground (think USA). How would Slim have navigated through that highly complex situation?

To take this far-fetched and convoluted analogy still further, into the political sphere, it would be as if the British somehow held a wartime national election, with Churchill winning another term, but with the United States expecting him to step down in favor of a unity government comprised of British, British-allied Bamars, non-Bamar allies of Japan, and Chinese. That'd surely be the backbreaker of a Field Marshal Slim.

The Iraqi Army was defeated tactically, nothing more at this point, but the trend line isn't positive. It appears they were defeated by internal politics instead of superior tactics by ISIS, but hard to ascertain from reading press accounts. If the Iraqi government can fix the government piece, then I'm confident the Iraqi Army can turn things around if they put their war fighting officers in charge of the force. Although the recommendations were given tongue in cheek, they are still relevant, and as Jamie stated in his last paragraph, armies that were defeated tactically in the past used that experience to transform and make a come back. There is no need to continue to wallow in the shadow of defeat, learn from it, and move on.