By Maj. Wayne Marotto
Army, July 2004
TALLAFAR, Iraq-Amid mortar fire, firefights at the front gate, drive-by shootings and the ever-present danger of improvised explosive devices (IEDs), the first of four 75th Division (Training Support) advisory support teams is training hundreds of soldiers of the Iraqi armed forces as part of the Coalition Military Assistance Training Team (CMATT).
These U.S. Army personnel are training and advising the soldiers of the Iraqi army so that Iraqis can defend their own country as soon as possible. It is an enormous responsibility for the 75th Division, an active and reserve component training support division headquartered in Houston, Texas.
The 75th Division has been mobilized since January 2003, and its normal wartime mission is to provide observer/controllers to train and mobilize Reserve and National Guard soldiers in the United States. The Army also tasked the division to deploy hundreds of its soldiers to train the Iraqi army. The majority of those deployed in Iraq volunteered-the memory of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, still fresh on their minds.
The first team of Reserve soldiers, led by Maj. Robert Chandler, CMATT battalion advisory support team chief, and MSgt. Richard Howard, noncommissioned officer in charge, is in Tallafar, Iraq, performing a mission that would normally be done by Special Forces soldiers. Because they are needed for other missions in Iraq and in Afghanistan, however, the mission went to the Reserve training support divisions. The Reservists are all infantry or combat arms soldiers; the majority have served on active duty, and several have combat experience in Operation Desert Storm. They will spend the next year training Iraqi soldiers on basic infantry tactics and squad- to battalion-level operations.
Tallafar is located in the northern part of Iraq near the Syrian border. The closest major city is Mosul, which is approximately 70 miles to the south.
The city of Mosul has more than 1.6 million people and had the second highest death rate (behind Baghdad) of any Iraqi city for U.S. soldiers. The U.S. Army camp at Mosul is routinely hit with mortars, and U.S. patrols are fired upon on a daily basis.
The hostility of the local residents was apparent by the intimidating stares they gave the 75th Division’s soldiers as they sped in and out of traffic hoping to avert an IED or ambush on the way to the camp in their SUVs. Their awareness was heightened because of a previous IED explosion that had narrowly missed their convoy.
When the soldiers first arrived at Fort Tallafar, they found it in extreme disrepair. The fort had been used as a prisoner-of-war compound for Iranian and Kuwaiti soldiers. Its most recent use was as a base for the Iraqi army.
The challenge to improve the fort from Spartan to adequate living conditions was huge. With typical undaunted American ingenuity, however, the U.S. soldiers quickly repaired the plumbing, infrastructure and physical security.
The soldiers are embedded with more than 600 Iraqi soldiers in the fort, many of whom were in the old Iraqi army, while others are new to the military.
The U.S. soldiers live, train and eat with the Iraqi soldiers. Much to the chagrin of the U.S. soldiers, they are subsisting on an Iraqi diet because the Iraqi battalion commander ordered that no American food would be served at the fort.
Chandler said the breakfast was a mashed up hardboiled egg, a white soup-like substance, bread and cream. For lunch and dinner the soldiers were given the choice of chicken with rice or rice with chicken. The soldiers do like the hot sweet tea the Iraqis serve with every meal.
The importance of the mission was not lost on the soldiers. SSgt. James Mitchell of the 3rd Battalion, 381st Regiment, 2nd Brigade served two years on active duty with an infantry unit.
This is the first time he has been in a combat zone, however. He said he volunteered to be part of the CMATT mission because it would help the Iraqis gain the capability to defend themselves, allowing them to then work on rebuilding their economy.
In the first month of operations, they have put the Iraqi soldiers through military operations in urban terrain training, close-quarter combat training, patrolling techniques and formations, tactical checkpoints and individual movement techniques.
All of this training was to be put to use when the Iraqi soldiers and 75th Division trainers went on combat patrols with the 2nd Infantry Division Stryker Brigade Combat Team soldiers.
Going on combat patrols with the Iraqi army is a new part of the mission for the 75th’s soldiers. This is not a mission they execute when training Reserve and National Guard soldiers in the United States. Here, they accompany the Iraqi soldiers on day and night patrols in the local villages and the terrain around the fort.
Capt. Barry Starr of the 3rd Battalion, 289th Regiment, 2nd Brigade is the team’s S-1 (Personnel) and S-4 (Logistics) expert. He coaches, teaches and mentors his counterparts on how to keep track of personnel and equipment. One of his first goals was to have the Iraqis sign for equipment (especially the weapons) and to have accountability formations. These are things the U.S. Army has inculcated into its soldiers, but are new concepts for the Iraqi army, according to Starr.
Starr emphasized that he does not dictate any type of training to the Iraqis, but makes suggestions to them. He explained that he was not there to run the Iraqi army, but to assist them. He said that he wanted the Iraqi officers and noncommissioned officers to stand on their own. The Iraqi officers, for their part, were eager to ask Starr questions and get his advice.
SFC Malcolm Stone of the 3rd Battalion, 381st Regiment, 2nd Brigade, is a veteran of Operation Desert Storm, where he served with the 643rd Air Defense Artillery (Patriot). He said he volunteered to return to a combat zone “to help out the Iraqi nation and the troops, and to get our soldiers home faster to their loved ones.”
The CMATT soldiers said the training and mission are going well. SSgt. Russell Cotton of the 3rd Battalion, 289th Regiment, 2nd Brigade, served with the 3rd Armored Division in Desert Storm. “All of the Iraqi soldiers want to train and defend their country. They are motivated,” he said.
Although the mission is inherently dangerous, all of the soldiers agreed that this mission was a good one for the 75th Division and the Army Reserve.
“I believe this is the exact mission that we should be doing. We are a training support division,” said Chandler.
Maj. Wayne Marotto is the public affairs officer for the 75th Division (Training Support).
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Citation: Maj. Wayne Marotto. “Under Fire: Training the Iraqi Armed Forces,” Army, July 2004.
Original URL: http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3723/is_200407/ai_n9413231
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