Trainers predict shaky times for Iraqi navy

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A British Marine, center, trains two Iraqi Marines aboard an Iraqi patrol boat near the Khawr al-Amaya oil terminal in the Persian Gulf. Iraq's navy now has five Chinese-made patrol boats and 26 fast-attack aluminum vessels -- fewer than half of which are operational. Its personnel number about 1,350.


Trainers predict shaky times for Iraqi navy
By Barbara Surk - The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Apr 17, 2008 6:01:29 EDT

ABOARD AN IRAQI PATROL BOAT — The unidentified speedboat fails to respond to warnings as it races toward Iraq’s vital oil terminal in the Persian Gulf. A young Iraqi Marine radios to the vessel, warning it to turn away: “I will be required to use deadly force.”

This confrontation is just a drill — an effort by American, British and Australian officers to prepare Iraq’s tiny navy to defend its waters and the country’s major oil exporting facilities.

But the day when Iraq alone can defend its shores — and protect its critical offshore oil installations — seems remote.

Iraq’s navy now has five Chinese-made patrol boats and 26 fast-attack aluminum vessels — fewer than half of which are operational. Its personnel number about 1,350, including 350 Marines.

“They think they are an elite unit, but they are not,” said Capt. Jock Alexander of the British Royal Marines, who is in charge of training Iraqi Marines to guard the 1.8-mile exclusion zone around each of the country’s two oil platforms.


Rest of article at: http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2008/04/ap_iraqinavy_041608/