U.S. officer: Iraqi soldiers are loose cannons

[ECH1969]

Iraqi soldiers being trained by American military advisers go on rampages, flee from dangerous situations and waste ammunition in undisciplined bursts of fire at any provocation, according to an account in a U.S. Army journal.

In contrast to the iron discipline imposed during Saddam Hussein's regime, "the new army serves the cause of freedom, and officers and soldiers alike are a bit confused about what this means," Lt. Col. Carl D. Grunow wrote in the July-August issue of Military Review.

Iraqi soldiers frequently use excessive force, going on retaliatory rampages after colleagues are killed by insurgents, Grunow wrote in the journal, a publication of the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.

Another problem, Grunow wrote, is the Iraqi "death blossom," in which an attack by even a single sniper "provokes the average Iraqi soldier to empty his 30-round magazine and fire whatever belt of ammunition happens to be in his machine gun."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15519286/

[MadMaddie]

1. Well that's going well isn't it....

We need to get our soldiers out....

[TheCowsCameHome]

2. Great. 300,000 armed crazies with nothing to lose. How very comforting.

Thanks,Don. Thanks,Dick. Thanks,*W*

You've done a fine job of screwing up the world.

[TomInTib]

3. This switches on the WayBack Machine for me...

They gave us these idiot Viets to train and to take with us on extraction missions.

We spent about a week with those nutcases - they were poor farmers who were just looking for pay - and told 2nd Marine that if we had to go into the bush with them that they would be the first to die and we would make damn sure of it.

So they took them away from us and probably saved our lives.