American military advisors are dismayed at how many units of the Iraqi military are loyal to one political faction or another, and not the country they have sworn to defend. As bad as that is, it's just a sign that the new Iraqi armed forces are suffering from many past problems. The big one is that the Iraqi military was never "the army of the nation." That is, the many factions in the country were represented as separate military units.
This is not, to say the least, ideal, given Iraq's history. On the other hand, just as I wrote that I am not upset at factions within Iraqi society as long as those factions settle their disputes through rule of law rather than bullets, I'm not sure that army units loyal to civilian groups that resolve their disputes through ballots instead of bullets is a practical problem. My main worry is that the military will be a source of coups.
Factionalism will reduce the military's effectiveness, to be sure, but this will not nullify all the gains of training and experience. And the military is new, so we have time to mold it further. It has come a long way already.
We have a long way to go in making the Iraqi military a force for stability. We are setting an example already, really.
