NATO to Start Training Soldiers in Iraq
NATO to Start Training Soldiers in Iraq by Julian E. Barnes, Wall Street Journal
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization will begin its training effort in Iraq on Sunday, as the alliance looks to step up its efforts to assist in the fight against Islamic State, according to NATO’s secretary-general.
The effort to train Iraqi soldiers in how to better counter the threat of improvised explosive devices inside Iraq will be small at first, but NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said it is an effort that could expand.
“The training inside Iraq is modest, but it is scalable, and I believe NATO both can and should do more,” Mr. Stoltenberg said in an interview. “This is a start, and then we will assess, work with allies and look at what more we can do.”
Still, while stepping up NATO’s efforts to counter terrorism is a priority for the Trump administration, it is being treated more skeptically in other parts of the alliance. Some countries, including France and Germany, have been skeptical of having NATO take too large or public a role in the coalition to fight Islamic State in Iraq and Syria…