re: 60 Iraqi battalions unaccounted for or defeated

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There is a VICE episode that focuses on the Iraq "military" and their effectiveness. They expect American military units to handle the combat and they just tag along and shoot at random things, giving the impression that they are comically inept. Very few of them were actually fit for combat and the notion that so many are unaccounted for is still surprising.

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There were some good and brave individual soldiers, platoons, companies, etc, but there was just no cohesion or standard (like, at all). They didn't know how to do staff work; logistics were always a complete clusterF with them.

I worked with an Iraqi battalion commander who was quite good...or at least as good as they can be in that country. He spoke some English as well. However, he was both Sunni and a former officer (a major or lieutenant colonel) in Saddam's army, so the chances of him retaining his command after the U.S. left are probably about 0%.