Cdn troops to train Iraqis

[loyalcana]

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2005/02/18/935275.html

Cdn troops to train Iraqis

OTTAWA (CP) â ” Canada will contribute up to 30 soldiers to a NATO-led force that will help train the new Iraqi army, senior federal officials confirmed Friday.

The formal announcement will be made when Prime Minister Paul Martin gathers with other leaders of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization meeting Tuesday in Brussels.

Ottawa also plans to contribute $1 million towards a NATO-managed trust fund that will help pay the expenses of Iraqi officers who take part in the program.

The troops will likely not conduct the training in Iraq itself, but in neighbouring Jordan, said the officials, who asked not to be named.

Even though free elections have been held in Iraq, â Å“most NATO members are still reluctant to send troops directly into the countryâ ? given the level of violence, said one official.

NATO leaders agreed in June to establish a training program, the size and scope of which has yet to be determined.

Media reports earlier this month suggested that the United States had directly asked Canada to send training troops directly to Baghdad.

The officials, who spoke Friday, denied that Washington issued a direct bilateral request and emphasized the plan has always been to base the training operation in Jordan, where RCMP members are already educating Iraqi police officers.

Details, such as when the instructors will be deployed and how long they'll be away, have to be finalized.

Martin will also discuss with other NATO leaders the alliance plan to expand its peacekeeping mission in Afghanistan.

Troops, including a Canadian provincial reconstruction team of up to 250 members, will be sent to the southern part of the war-torn country.

Agreement on the Afghan mission came this week after Italy, Spain and Lithuania committed hundreds of troops to support U.S. forces that will switch to NATO command.

Canada already has 700 troops in Kabul as part of the international force meant to bring stability to the country.

During the NATO summit, Martin will also meet Victor Yushchenko, the newly elected president of Ukraine.

 

[jc5778]

maybe my battalion will participate???? please please please.  I don't wanna wait until 2008  :threat:

 

[Big Foot]

What, you want to go to Iraq and train their army? Or go to 'Stan? I'd rather go to 'Stan but I can't go until at LEAST 2008. lol.

 

[big bad john]

Officers in Iraq 'training the trainers'
Handful of Canadian personnel have participated in mentoring program
 
Mike Blanchfield
The Ottawa Citizen

Saturday, February 19, 2005


A handful of senior Canadian military officers have ventured to Baghdad on NATO training missions since the alliance began its "mentoring" program of Iraqi security forces last August.

"We are training the trainers. We are helping the Iraqis help themselves," said Lt.-Gen. Michel Maisonneuve, the Canadian chief of staff of NATO's allied command transformation headquarters in Norfolk, Virginia.

Two Canadian officers, including a colonel, served on a NATO training mission in Iraq late last year, Lt.-Gen. Maisonneuve said in an interview. The colonel, he said, served as a chief of staff to the training mission based in Baghdad, but did not do any of the "right-seat mentoring" that pairs NATO trainers with Iraqi security officials, a program that began in August.

The Canadians were among the approximately 100 NATO officers serving in Baghdad in an attempt to get a training program running with Iraqi security forces.

NATO made a commitment to train Iraqi forces last summer, but that has proved controversial because many member countries, including Canada, opposed the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq two years ago, and have vowed not to send troops to Iraq.

The Liberal government has repeatedly said Canada would not contribute combat troops to Iraq, but has been vague about the fact Canadian military personnel -- under the banner of NATO -- have been actively engaged in Iraqi training.

"We've had a varying number of Canadians on exchange duties with other nations, and with NATO in and out of Iraq at various times through the past couple of years," said a senior federal official, who briefed journalists yesterday about Prime Minister Paul Martin's trip to Brussels tomorrow for next week's NATO leaders summit.

"There have been some Canadians that have been part of NATO that have gone to Iraq and have participated in those training and mentoring activities," said another senior federal official. "They go for periods of weeks, to a period of a month or two. It really depends on the activity that they're doing."

NATO leaders will confront the divisive issue of the Iraqi training program when they meet Tuesday.

U.S. President George W. Bush wants his NATO allies to contribute troops to the reconstruction of Iraq -- on Iraqi soil -- but alliance leaders will likely put forth a compromise plan that calls for the creation of a training program outside Iraq, and a trust fund to pay for transporting and housing Iraqi officers.

Yesterday, senior federal officials said Mr. Martin would use the summit to announce that Canada has pledged 30 trainers who would be stationed in neighbouring Jordan, and $1 million toward the NATO trust fund. The RCMP already uses Jordan as a training program for Iraqi police.

However, federal officials were vague on what the Canadians trainers would do, or when they would be deployed.

"Some of that training should take place inside Iraq and some of that training should take place outside Iraq in some of our NATO educational and training establishments," Lt.-Gen. Maisonneuve said.

He said NATO trainers in Baghdad are assisting Iraqis in setting up a training doctrine, and are co-ordinating arrangements to transport Iraqi officers outside the country to NATO training centres in Norway, Spain and Germany.

Canada, meanwhile, will use the summit to affirm its plan to bolster its presence in Afghanistan later this year by establishing a provincial reconstruction team in Kandahar, in Afghanistan's south.

The area is the heart of Taliban resistance, and although the federal government would like the team to include aid workers and other civilians, it would likely comprise 180 to 250 military personnel, federal officials said yesterday.

© The Ottawa Citizen 2005

 

[Bav2002]

An interesting topic i've discussed with a few people of late, does anyone belive Canadian troops will be sent to Iraq within the next few years?  
Seeing as Bush has been to Europe to strengthen ties it seems as if hes looking for a little bit of support.     ???