By Alaa' Al--Howeijel BAGHDAD, Feb 17 (KUNA) -- The US army is training Iraqi law and order forces to use Western weapons rather than Soviet-made ones as it was the case under the former regime of the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
The change has been gradual with some Iraqi soldiers gradually being trained to use US-made automatic rifles instead of the age-old Russian Klashnikov ones.
The same pattern was used with regard to armored cars, according to a US report published on Sunday.
"US training has replaced the Soviet one (in Iraq)," the report said.
Other training has targeted the Iraqi infantry and artillery forces, which were trained on US and Western made equipment instead of soviet installations.
"We are looking forward, in such training, to using new weapons and fighting and tactical ways," one soldier undergoing a training period was quoted by the report as saying.
The presence of UK forces in Iraq's south has hastened the transformation of Iraqi forces into a western-trained force, the report said. (end) aa.eh KUNA 171642 Feb 08NNNN