Iraqi officer beginning course on fort Monday (Ft. Huachuca, AZ)

FORT HUACHUCA — The first Iraqi officer to attend training on this post starts classes Monday.

The officer has been on the post this week preparing for the Military Intelligence Captain’s Career Course, said Lt. Col. Brian Clark.

The Iraqi will be one of 14 foreign officers in the class, and he is the first of six Iraqis scheduled to go through training on Fort Huachuca this year, said Clark, commander of the 304th Military Intelligence Battalion.

The battalion provides training for hundreds of U.S. Army officers, as well as more than 200 foreign officers a year.

The name and rank of the Iraqi officer is not being provided, and any requests to interview the man will have to be approved by the Republic of Iraq Embassy.

While it may seem unusual to some to have an Iraqi officer attend the intelligence center, Clark said it isn’t.

And the reverse is true. Training foreign officers provides Americans more in-depth knowledge of other nations.

“It’s very important. It benefits the U.S. It benefits foreign nations,” the lieutenant colonel said.

Foreign officers go through Intelligence Center and infantry courses, he said. An Iraqi command sergeant major recently attended the Army’s Command Sergeant Major Academy at Fort Bliss, Texas.

Besides the Captain’s Career Course, the battalion also supervises the Military Intelligence Officer’s Basic Course.

Selecting a foreign officer for training in the United States is just the first step.

The person chosen is thoroughly “vetted by the security office at a U.S. Embassy,” a process that can take up to six months, Clark said. While officers come to an Army installation, the program is under the control of the State Department.

This year, 230 foreign officers are expected to be trained at the Intelligence Center, Clark said. The nations they come from nearly run the alphabet, from Albania to Yemen. One year, the attendees on post were from A to Z, Albania to Zimbabwe.

Officers who meet in classroom settings are sometimes from nations that may have political disagreements, the battalion commander noted. In all cases, the officers set aside those problems and look at the assignment in a professional military environment.

Americans in classes with foreign officers get knowledge of the different cultures and have a better understanding of what faces them if they are assigned to one of the nations.

Equally important is for the foreign officers to understand the variety of America’s cultures, he said. They also learn other aspects of what it is like to be an American.

The officers are taken on trips in Arizona, including going to Tucson, visiting the Arizona Legislature in Phoenix, the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam and other places in the Southwest, including an Indian reservation and Tombstone.

America has a variety of cultures, and showing the differences helps foreign officers develop a better picture of what makes up America, Clark said.

Foreign officers also speak with local groups. For some reason, they enjoy talking to Tombstone High School students.

Senior officers also spend a week in Washington, D.C., where they meet a member of Congress and visit their embassies.

There are social settings in which the foreign officers visit off-post residents in the Sierra Vista area, enjoying meals, television and other family events. Clark said the battalion is always looking for volunteers to be sponsors.

The foreign officers also come together sharing their backgrounds, teaching American officers.

The officers’ appreciation of the training can be seen by the number of plaques on the walls or on shelves outside Clark’s office.

A quick inventory of the countries that were presented included ones from Albania, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Egypt, Estonia, India, Jordan, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

The officers also see how the integration of men and women in America’s Army works, and get a taste of the importance of the Army’s noncommissioned officers.

They take part in physical training, which for some isn’t usually for officers in their homelands.

Within the classes, American and foreign officers challenged each other to physical contests, such as two officers from Albania taking on two American officers who were going on the 82nd Airborne Division. Diplomacy caused Clark not to tell the result of that challenge.

The basic course for Americans is 19 weeks and for foreign officers is 13 weeks. The career course is 19 weeks and four days for Americans, and 13 weeks and three days for foreign officers.

Whenever Americans are involved in classified training, the foreign officers receive unclassified training.

The object of the courses, especially the career course, is to prepare a leader and not create a specific job expert, Clark said.

In the American Army, those who work as analysts, interrogators and other jobs are the enlisted soldiers and NCOs, he said.

The object of having foreign officers train at the Intelligence Center is to develop a “sense of coalition,” Clark said.

Clark is no stranger to coalition work, having been involved in international land mine awareness programs in places such as Ethiopia and Cambodia during his 20-year career.

As for Iraqis coming to the fort, Clark said they are part of a larger program under The U.S. Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq.

The command is working with a number of Iraqi military people to help build a government that will respond to the needs of the people of their homeland, he said. America’s armed forces have military transition teams in Iraq to help.

“Iraqis have made it clear they want to stand up their nation,” Clark said. “The training here (at the Intelligence Center) is part of helping them.”

Same story from the Arizona Daily (RED) Star

Published: 03.04.2006

Iraqis to train at Huachuca

1st of 6 officers starts classes there Monday

By Carol Ann Alaimo

ARIZONA DAILY STAR

An extraordinary moment in Army history is about to unfold in an ordinary classroom at Fort Huachuca.

For the first time, an Iraqi military officer will be a member of the student body at the military intelligence school in Southern Arizona.

Monday marks the start of classes for the first of six Iraqi officers being trained this year at the Sierra Vista Army post. Those involved say it's a small but important part of overall U.S. efforts to help the war-torn nation become militarily self-sufficient.

"There is a sense of excitement" around the occasion, said Lt. Col. Brian Clark, commander of Fort Huachuca's 304th Military Intelligence Battalion, which runs the foreign officer training course.

U.S. officers at the fort are eager to compare notes, get to know the new arrivals and show them around the region, Clark said.

By day, the Iraqi officers will learn things like how to analyze data gathered from intelligence sources and how to compile it into reports that will be useful to military decision-makers.

After hours, they'll take sightseeing trips to places like the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum and the Pima Air and Space Museum. They also will make day trips to Tombstone, to the state Legislature in Phoenix, and visit attractions including the Hoover Dam.

The 13-week military training course aims to help Iraqi forces become more competent at home and better able to function in joint military operations with U.S. allies.
The social events build good will and also benefit U.S. troops by giving them a chance for relaxed, personal interaction with the foreign officers, Clark said.
"It's a tremendous benefit for the U.S. students. We understand their culture better after they've been here," he said.

"They are able to talk about things like what a tribal leader means in Iraq. That's the kind of thing you can read about in a book, but it means more when someone is telling you about it firsthand."

Some elements of their Arizona experience may seem peculiar to the Iraqis. For example, the fact that Fort Huachuca's military intelligence school is commanded by a woman, Maj. Gen. Barbara Fast, is something that would be unheard of in their homeland.

Clark said he doesn't expect any problems from such differences.

Fort Huachuca trains more than 200 foreign officers a year, some from nations that sometimes don't see eye-to-eye culturally with America. But officers from countries with different attitudes toward women, such as Saudi Arabia, typically set differences aside when they come to train in the United States, he said.

While the Iraqis are here, their identities will be closely guarded secrets. Their names are not being revealed, and they cannot be photographed. Doing so could put them in peril, since military officers have been targeted by insurgent assassins in Iraq, Army officials said.

Michael Pheneger, military intelligence expert, said training programs such as Fort Huachuca's are critical if Iraq is to function independently.

It's too bad the United States didn't launch such efforts soon after the Iraqi invasion, though, said Pheneger, of Florida, a retired Army colonel with 30 years of military intelligence experience, including stints at Fort Huachuca in the 1970s and 1990s. He said the failure to do so is more evidence of the poor postwar planning that's haunted American efforts in Iraq.

"Strategically, this is very important training," Pheneger said. "We're just terribly late getting on with it."

œ Contact reporter Carol Ann Alaimo at 573-4138 or at calaimo@azstarnet.com.

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