By Ernesto Londoņo
Washington Post Foreign Service
August 13, 2008
KIRKUK, Iraq -- Col. Abdul Karim Aziz, a fighter pilot who survived the war between Iraq and Iran during the 1980s, had all but given up hope of flying again when his mother told him in 2005 that it was time to get back in the air.
"When the war began, I didn't think of coming back," said Aziz, 49, speaking about the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Referring to the American military, he added: "I didn't like the friendly side."
The U.S. military all but paralyzed the Iraqi air force after the 1991 Persian Gulf War, turning veteran pilots like Aziz into grounded bureaucrats. The little that remained of the country's once-mighty fleet was obliterated during the early weeks of the Iraq war. And Iraq's skies became the domain of the U.S. military, controlled from an operations center in Qatar.
Now in an about-face, the U.S. Air Force is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to get Aziz and others to fly again, train a fresh generation of pilots and build up the Iraqi air force's fleet and infrastructure from scratch. The Air Force project is part of a broader effort to train and equip specialized units of Iraq's security forces, which U.S. commanders see as a critical step to set the conditions for the withdrawal of U.S. troops.
As violence has decreased in Iraq in recent months, these initiatives have become one of the U.S. military's top priorities. But they are getting off the ground as Iraqis have stepped up calls for the withdrawal of U.S. troops and as U.S. lawmakers, who in recent years have allocated billions of dollars to train and equip Iraq's security forces, are increasingly demanding that Iraqis pick up a greater share of the tab for security.
U.S. lawmakers appropriated $8.5 billion to train and equip Iraq's security forces in 2007 and 2008. Of that sum, roughly $457 million went to the Iraqi air force.
Building an air force takes years, if not decades. And rebuilding Iraq's has been a particularly challenging mission, U.S. officials say. It was been hindered by the ongoing conflict, what U.S. officials describe as a chronic inability by the Iraqi government to promptly fund operational needs, and a generational divide between seasoned -- albeit rusty -- pilots and the small group of rookie officers who are about to complete flight training.
Though small, modest and -- for now -- devoid of firepower, the Iraqi air force has a solid foundation and has given Iraqis something to be proud of, U.S. officials say. Iraqis, accustomed to U.S. helicopters that hover over their cities round-the-clock, wave excitedly when they see aircraft with the Iraqi flag.
"It's a symbol of their government protecting them," said Lt. Col. Mark S. Bennett, one of the U.S. trainers.
The Iraqi air force was among the best equipped and trained in the region when the country went to war with Iran in 1980. The eight-year conflict took a considerable toll on the force, but when the Persian Gulf War started in 1991, it still had hundreds of combat aircraft and skilled pilots operating out of dozens of bases.
The Iraqi air force, however, was no match for the U.S.-led coalition, which quickly crippled it. United Nations sanctions and regulations that came after the war prevented Iraq from acquiring spare parts for aircraft and from flying over much of the country.
When U.S. troops invaded Iraq in 2003, the air force was so weak that Saddam Hussein opted not to order the few remaining pilots and aircraft into the air. Some fighter planes were buried, and air force members, like others in the Iraqi military, vanished shortly after the invasion.
In 2004, the U.S. military gave the Iraqi government three of its old Hercules C-130s, a type of transport airplane. Around the same time, the Iraqi government began reaching out to former air force pilots and investing in new aircraft. With U.S. support, last year it opened a training school on the outskirts of Baghdad.
The Iraqi air force's fleet currently has 76 aircraft, most of which were donated by the United States and other nations. Most are designed for training, transport and surveillance missions. Although the force has no fighter planes, U.S. military officials say Iraqi pilots will soon be allowed to carry out air attack missions.
"I'm a fighter pilot," said Aziz, who has a deep, booming voice and often erupts in laughter as he jokes around with his American counterparts. "I'm dying to do this again."
U.S. officials say they share Iraqis' long-term vision for a well-equipped air force capable of protecting the country from foreign enemies. But they think Iraq needs to focus on basics before investing in front-line combat aircraft.
"They don't have the infrastructure to support it," said Brig. Gen. Brooks L. Bash, the lead Air Force official overseeing the rebirth of the Iraqi air force.
The air force training school opened in September at Taji Air Base, outside Baghdad. It is run by Iraqi and U.S. instructors, and most maintenance work is done by Western contract employees. About 1,000 airmen have completed basic training, and the Iraqi air force expects at least 600 more to graduate by the end of the year. Helicopter pilots are trained in Taji, and airplane pilots are trained at a base in Kirkuk, in northern Iraq.
Iraqi aircraft were deployed to Basra and Mosul this year to carry out transport, medical evacuation and surveillance missions in support of military operations. They regularly carry out surveillance missions over the country's main oil pipelines.
All of the Iraqi pilots flying missions worked for the former air force. The first three rookie pilots are expected to start flying missions later this year. Recruiting pilots has been challenging because they must be fluent in English, the global language of aviation. The starting pay, roughly $700 a month, is a deterrent.
The Iraqi government has allocated more than $1 billion for its air force since last year. But U.S. advisers say getting approval for expenditures, which must be submitted in writing to Baghdad, can be a herculean task.
"Iraq has a difficulty spending money," said Lt. Col. Mark Daley, 39, of Alexandria, Va., one of the U.S. Air Force advisers in Taji. "Everything from flight suits to gloves, boots. They can't seem to pull together the supplies they need."
Getting big expenses approved is especially hard, Bash said, because many Iraqi officials are often afraid to sign off on them.
"They don't want to put their signature on it because of the charges of corruption that could come up," he said.
The generational gap between the former air force pilots and the rookie officers is another challenge, U.S. advisers said.
"You have an air force whose average age is in the 40s," Bash said. "That's a problem. . . . Ten years from now, they'll all be retired."
So the future of the Iraqi air force is in the hands of men such as 2nd Lt. Ali Sabah, 21. The Mosul native fled with his family to the Netherlands in 1996, along with a wave of Kurds from northern Iraq who were being persecuted by Hussein.
After the 2003 invasion, Sabah's father returned to Iraq to work as an engineer at the airfield in Kirkuk. One day he called his son and asked him if he would be interested in becoming an Iraqi air force pilot. It was a tough decision. Ali Sabah was a Dutch citizen completing his last year in college studying computer sciences.
"If I finish the university in computer technology, I'll get a job at Microsoft and I'll work my whole life as a computer nerd," he said, describing his thinking at the time. "To become a pilot is a little more adventurous."
It has been an arduous but proud homecoming, he said. "It's a great feeling what you can do for your country," he said. "Right now, lots of people don't think the Iraqi air force exists."
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