Major Roger Swartwood, a reservist with the 98th Division (Institutional Training), served as the leader of a battalion advisor support team (AST) to the new Iraqi Army in 2004-2005. He begins this interview by discussing the predeployment training he received at Camp Atterbury, Indiana, saying, "Most of the training we did [there] was common core task training. There was a lot of that training and they really dragged it out. We did have combat lifesaver training, which was very good. We also had 40 hours of language training…but it ended up being that we couldn't remember a lot of it." Swartwood states that they were not trained in any AST-specific tasks at Atterbury, nor were they trained as the teams they'd be on in Iraq. He says, "I think the team should have been finalized by that time. Out of the 10 guys I had at Camp Atterbury, I only ended up with three of them in Iraq. It was consequently harder to build team chemistry and it took longer than it should have once we got into Iraq." He does note that the training they received in Kuwait was very good, and singles out the cultural awareness training in Taji as the best. From Taji, Swartwood's team went to Fallujah for a relief in place, which went well but lasted only two days. Assigned to advise the 1st Battalion of the 1st Brigade of the 1st Iraqi Army Division - considered the "best unit in the Iraqi Army" - within the 1st Marine Division's area of operations, they integrated well, especially at the company level since they were all enduring the same conditions. Concerns that the Iraqi soldiers with recent combat experience would not respect advisors with none proved to be groundless, as Swartwood explains: "It ultimately didn't end up that way because the Iraqis view the Americans as superior forces." Although he characterizes the overall experience with the Iraqis as positive, the battalion commander proved to be a problem when, after being accused of embezzling the entire battalion's payroll, "I lost my Iraqi executive officer, two of my company commanders and eventually my operations officer….They transferred out of 1st Battalion because they felt Colonel Ali should have been relieved and wasn't. They couldn't work for him." After several months in Fallujah, they went to Rustamiyah, Mosul and Ramadi, working with the 25th Infantry, 10th Mountain, 3rd Infantry and 2nd Marine Divisions in various advisory missions. Swartwood closes his interview by recommending that teams train together as long as possible, find information on where you are going, and communicate with those you will replace far in advance of the relief.

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