American Sniper - Boekje Pienter

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The Iraqis were there. Front, no. Center—as a matter of fact, yes.
But not quite in the way you’re thinking.
Before the assault began, we were ordered to help put an “Iraqi face
on the war”—the term command and the media used for pretending
that the Iraqis were actually taking the lead in making their country
safe. We trained Iraqi units, and when feasible (though not necessarily
desirable) took them with us on operations. We worked with three different
groups; we called them all jundis, Arabic for soldiers, although,
technically, some were police. No matter which force they were with,
they were pathetic.
We had used a small group of scouts during our operations east of
the city. When we went into Ramadi, we used SMPs—they were a type
of special police. And then we had a third group of Iraqi soldiers that
we used in villages outside of the city. During most operations, we
would put them in the middle of our columns—Americans at the front,
the Iraqis in the center, Americans at the rear. If we were inside a
house, they would sit on the first floor, doing security and talking with
the family, if there was one there.
As fighters went, they sucked. The brightest Iraqis, it seemed,
were usually insurgents, fighting against us. I guess most of our jundis
had their hearts in the right place. But as far as proficient military
fighting went . . .
Let’s just say they were incompetent, if not outright dangerous.
One time a fellow SEAL named Brad and I were fixing to go into a
house. We were standing outside the front door, with one of our jundis
directly behind us. Somehow the jundi’s gun got jammed. Idiotically,