By Joel Himelfarb. U.S. weapons intended for Iraq’s embattled military are winding up in the hands of Shiite militias backed by Iran, Bloomberg reports.

Obama administration officials and U.S. lawmakers say the Baghdad government, which received $1.2 billion in training and equipment assistance in the omnibus spending bill passed by Congress last month, has been turning military hardware over to the militias.

A senior administration official told Bloomberg’s Josh Rogin and Eli Lake that the U.S. government is aware of this but is caught in a dilemma. Iraqi security forces are unable to fight ISIS without the assistance of the militias, who are sometimes commanded by officers of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps.

But if Washington were to stop arming the Iraqi military, the situation would get even worse, with ISIS overrunning even more of Iraq and committing atrocities on an even larger scale. The official said the risk of failing to help the Baghdad government was greater than the risk of doing so. (Read more about Iraq giving US weapons to Iranian militias HERE)

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U.S. Military Back to Training in Iraq, but it’s a Little Different this Time

By Loveday Morris. Years after the U.S. military tried to create a new army in Iraq — at a cost of over $25 billion — American trainers have returned to help rebuild the country’s fighting force.

But this time, things are different.

With the Iraqis dependent on their own logistics, there is a shortage of weapons and ammunition available for training. For the time being, soldiers at Camp Taji are restricted to shouting “bang bang” to simulate firing during exercises. And, mindful of how Iraqi troops fled their positions last June during a major offensive by Islamic State extremists, U.S. trainers have added some new elements to boot camp. (Read more from this story HERE)

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