From 2004 through 2010, the Pentagon oversaw all security training in
Iraq. Officials said the Pentagon's aim had been to avoid duplication, turf
battles and interoperability issues amid the U.S. war against Al Qaida in
Iraq, Middle East Newsline reported.
The administration of President Barack Obama has approved $650 million
to shift the Iraqi police training program from the Pentagon to the State
Department. At the same time, Obama has ordered the police training program
in Afghanistan to move from State to the Pentagon.
Officials said the State Department would use the funds in the fiscal
2010 supplemental spending bill to procure 20 helicopters for the transport
of advisers and trainers for the Iraqi police. They said the department
would employ private contractors for the Iraqi training program as well as
security for police bases.
"The training under State will be different from that of the Pentagon
and will include lots of specialized skills," the official said.
In all, the Iraqi police training would include up to 2,000 government
employees and contractors. They said the State Department would officially
take over for the Pentagon in October 2011, during the last days of U.S.
military deployment in Iraq.
In all, the State Department training program was expected to cost $1.2
billion per year. Officials expected the program to last through 2016.
"Our commitment will not be on the scale of numbers and money that the
military has," Carmen Munter, the No. 2 diplomat in the U.S. embassy in
Iraq, said. "But it will be extraordinarily substantial."
Officials said the State Department would work with Iraq's Interior
Ministry to determine requirements for weapons and instruction. They said
many of the training programs would come under Iraqi auspicies.
"There's no right and wrong on how to do this stuff," a senior American
military official told the Washington Post. "It's a difference of training
and resources. What we're going to have to do is recognize that State can't
do it the way we've been doing it."
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