Iraq forces ready internally but face external gaps

Iraqi forces can handle internal security, but the focus on quelling domestic violence has left major gaps in their ability to defend against external threats, US and Iraqi officers and officials say.

Being prepared for internal security does not, however, mean Iraqi forces are able to prevent all attacks, as evidenced by the near-daily bombings and shootings in the country.

But ready or not, Iraqi forces will be on their own handling both internal and external security, as all American troops except for a small number of trainers are to depart Iraq by the end of December.

"The Iraqi security forces have built capacity to deal with internal threats for the last eight years," Lieutenant General Robert Caslen, the chief of the Office of Security Cooperation-Iraq (OSC-I), said in an interview with AFP.

But they "have not yet built the capacity to deal with the external threats," said Caslen.

He oversees the 157 American service members and up to 763 civilian contractors who are providing training to Iraqi forces, under the authority of the US embassy in Baghdad.

"A lot of my work is in the external threat business, to really build (Iraqi) security forces, only because they haven't built that capacity yet because they've been focused primarily on the internal threats for the last eight years," he said.

Iraq's security forces currently number around 930,000 -- 650,000 police and 280,000 military, though the air force and navy combined are fewer than 10,000-strong, according to government figures.

Iraq's military chief of staff, Lieutenant General Babaker Zebari, has said it will be years before Iraqi forces are fully ready for external defence.

According to a late-October report by a US watchdog, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR), "Zebari suggested that the (Ministry of Defence) will be unable to execute the full spectrum of external-defence missions until sometime between 2020 and 2024."

And "Iraq will not be able to defend its own airspace until 2020, at the earliest," Zebari told SIGIR, adding that "an army without an air force is exposed."

Iraq has ordered 18 F-16 warplanes from the United States, but it will be years before that force is fully operational.

Baghdad and Washington discussed a post-2011 American military training mission, but the talks stalled over the issue of immunity from Iraqi prosecution, with the US saying its troops must have it, while Iraq disagreed.

Caslen said that the training mission that fell through over the immunity dispute was to provide the large-scale training needed to prepare Iraqi forces for external defence.

"Now that the residual force is not going to be here," the question is how that training can be accomplished, he said.

"We're doing the work and the thinking right now on what those options are and then we'll discuss them with the Iraqi military," he said, adding that options include training for Iraqi forces elsewhere in the region, or via military exercises, or for senior leaders in the US or other NATO countries.

General Lloyd Austin, the commander of US forces in Iraq, told reporters last month that while Iraqi security forces have generally proven competent in internal security, they still have a long way to go on external defence.

"They're approaching having the ability to control the internal security environment," Austin said. But "I don't think they have very much of a capability at all to address an external threat."

Like Caslen, he pointed to the focus on internal Iraqi security as having adversely affected preparations for external defence.

"Because of the fact that we've been focused on internal security, we really haven't had the ability to focus in earnest on developing a foundational capability to defend against an external threat, and that's really what they need to begin to focus on in the future," Austin said.

He pointed to militant groups including Al-Qaeda and Iran-backed Shiite militias as posing a continuing threat to Iraqi stability.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said in remarks at a ceremony at a military base near Baghdad on December 1 that "we are fully confident that the security forces are ready and fully prepared to fulfill their national duties in providing security and protecting the country."

But he also acknowledged the need for training for Iraqi forces.

"There is a need for the presence of (military) trainers for... specific purposes," Maliki said.

The United States officially ended combat operations in Iraq from August 31, 2010, shifting its focus to training and giving Iraqi forces primary responsibility for security.

Now the ultimate test will be how they perform post-2011.