Fall of Ramadi has ex-troops frustrated with Iraqi forces, Obama’s strategy

Echoing concerns of Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, who said Iraqi troops have not shown a “will to fight” the Islamic State, many US servicemen and women have expressed frustration over the Iraqi army’s inability to defend its nation, and hold varying views on how much US engagement is the right way forward, The Washington Times reported Tuesday.

Carlos Madden, who returned from an Army deployment to Iraq in 2010, believes most service members aren’t eager to go back, saying it’s up to the Iraqis to ensure that terrorists aren’t welcome in their country.

“We gave up a lot to be there, and the problem right now is that, at the end of the day, the Iraqis need to do it themselves,” Madden told The Washington Times. “We’ve done so much for them. We’ve spilled a lot of blood on their streets. At some point, if they don’t stand up and do it themselves, it’s not going to happen.”

After leaving the Army as a staff sergeant in 2011, Madden earned his college degree and got a job at RallyPoint, a networking website for troops and veterans to receive career help and stay in touch with former unit members.

One question posed on a discussion board recently involved last week’s fall of the western Iraqi city of Ramadi into Islamic State control — something close to the hearts of service members who lost friends securing the city during the Iraq War.

On Sunday, Carter said Iraqi forces showed “no will to fight” Islamic State terrorists who seized Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province. The fall of Ramadi has sparked renewed questions about the effectiveness of the Obama administration’s approach in Iraq, which consists of retraining and rebuilding the Iraqi army, prodding Baghdad’s Shiite-led government to reconcile with Sunnis and bombing Islamic State targets from the air without committing US ground troops.