By North America correspondent Michael Vincent Monday 12 January 2015
Photo: An Islamic State tank rolls into a Syrian town in June 2014 (Reuters: Stringer)
It was the week before Christmas when the general in charge of America's effort to fight Islamic State delivered his blunt assessment.
When a reporter at the Pentagon asked Lieutenant General James Terry when there would be a significant "turning point" on the battlefield, he nominated Christmas 2017.
"I think you're at least talking a minimum of three years," the Operation Inherent Resolve commander said.
"[Islamic State] has proved to be resilient. And again, as I look at it from a military standpoint, the first air strikes were, what, 8 August? And so this is December. What's that? Four months.
"I think we've made significant progress in halting that offensive... the ability for them to continue to expand, you know, in terms of terrain and geography out there."
US-led air strikes may be containing the militants, but the main "boots on the ground" needed to retake Iraqi territory and defeat Islamic State are not ready.
The international effort to train the Iraqi national army has not yet begun.
In case General Terry's timeframe was not clear, he repeated it.
"I still think, in terms of building some of the capabilities that are required there, [we're] probably about three years down the road minimum," he reiterated.
Obama administration's mixed messages on ground campaign
Photo: A pair of US Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles flying over northern Iraq early in the morning of September 23, 2014. (AFP: US Air Force/Senior Airman Matthew Bruch)
The messaging from the Obama administration has been mixed.
The president has said he is not Iraq's air force. But, for now, he clearly is.
I still think, in terms of building some of the capabilities that are required there, [we're] probably about three years down the road minimum.
Lieutenant General James Terry
So far the US Congress is backing him, budgeting $US5 billion for the air strikes and army training over the next nine months.
US secretary of state John Kerry clearly expects a concerted ground campaign against Islamic State soon.
He told a Washington DC forum on Mid East relations on December 7 that "Iraq's national army is preparing to launch a counter-offensive. And we are confident that they will do so when the time is right, not in a matter of years but a matter of months."
That's a much more optimistic timeframe that America's military has in mind.
Reconstructing Iraqi army 'like building an airplane in flight'
Photo: Iraqi troops discuss strategy during a training exercise
"It's easy to create an individual soldier. Eight weeks and you've got a man who is basically trained," says retired Major General Paul Eaton.
General Eaton oversaw the last US mission to train Iraq's military after the fall of Saddam Hussein.
He likens the current attempt to reconstruct the army during this conflict to "building an airplane in flight".
The Iraqi defence force has multiple problems it must overcome, but it has to succeed in its impending counter-attack - or there will be dire consequences.
"Initial failure carries a severe penalty," General Eaton warns.
"This should be a soft timeline based on success as opposed to [setting] an artificial date.
"[The aim] is to stabilise, contain [and] collapse the perimeter around ISIS until they are no longer a problem."
Problem 1: Iraq's ghost soldiers
Photo: Iraqi soldiers hold a checkpoint east of Baghdad in January 2014, after Islamic State-linked fighters took control of Fallujah (AFP: Ali Al-Saadi)
By some estimates the Iraqi national army has collapsed from a total of 400,000 soldiers to just 85,000.
The problems are well documented - soldiers going AWOL or simply not existing.
"We had problems with ghost soldiers even back before 2011 [when the US pulled out]", General Eaton said.
Inflated numbers have been blamed on officers inventing names on paper and pocketing the salaries.
That's why the US sent hundreds of assessors into Iraq in 2014 to audit exactly what the numbers and capabilities of the Iraqi forces were.
Problem 2: Going AWOL
Photo: Islamic State fighters at a checkpoint in Mosul in June (Reuters)
Thousands of Iraqi soldiers fled when Islamic State swept across Iraq.
"We also had soldiers go home and not come back," General Eaton said.
But now there has been "a system in Iraq where soldiers question their own legitimacy, their chain of command, their mission and their own government - that's the issue."
General Eaton blames previous prime minister Nouri al-Maliki for purging the Iraqi forces of competent officers and widening the Sunni-Shia sectarian divide.
So after all of America's billions in support, his assessment of the Iraq military folding in the face of Islamic State is "it's a disappointment, but not a huge surprise".
It may only take two months of training to give a new soldier the necessary physical and military skill sets - "how to operate their kit, form a rifle squad platoon", as General Eaton describes it.
But he says building morale and convincing troops there is a reason to fight will take time.
"Belief in institutions, the government, the constitution, the chain of command - knowing that they will be resupplied with food and water and ammunition when they need it - that you will be medevac'd if you get hurt - that resilience - that is the most difficult to develop," he said.
That goes to the current US military's timeline of three years.
The biggest battle: Mosul
Photo: The aftermath of the Iraqi army's retreat from Mosul in June 2014 (Reuters/Stringer)
Mosul, Iraq's second biggest city with a population of a million people, fell to Islamic State fighters after four days of fierce fighting in June.
"Urban combat is challenging in the best of conditions - that would be a really bad place to find out if you've pulled together an army that's going to work," General Eaton said.
"Mosul is a serious undertaking - bigger than Fallujah. Fallujah was tough - there were very heavy losses to US forces when we had to retake Fallujah [in 2004]."
"These ISIS guys, they will reinforce Mosul. We've seen the fanatic fighters of ISIS. Urban warfare and fanatic fighters means you're going to have casualties, and casualties heavy enough to put into question the continuation of the battle."
He predicts that Iraq's army will face smaller battles to "blood" it, just as the Allies invaded North Africa first before attempting to invade Europe during World War II.
"Little steps for little feet - it would be far better for the Iraqi army to see small successes building to a large success in Mosul," he said.
That's where the foreign advisors will come into play.
Photo: Iraqi families flee into Kurdistan after the Islamic State capture of Mosul (AFP: Safin Hamed)
"[Prussian general and military theorist Carl von] Clausewitz calls it the directed telescope. You have an advisory body, [a] 10-man team at the battalion level who will report back and say these guys are ready or they're not ready. They give an assessment. That will allow the US leadership to properly advise at a higher level whether the forces are competent and whether there's a reasonable expectation of a victory that's not going to be Pyrrhic."
US political pressure will also play its part.
"The American citizen will see value in supporting an alliance to exorcise this evil called IS. So as long as the casualty count is very low, and dollar amount manageable, there will be modest pressure to accelerate an outcome," General Eaton said.
"I personally believe that we're talking a long effort - years. Good, slow and relatively inexpensive, but successful."
A success the next US president will be hoping to inherit.
