Former U.S. commander says the Iraqi army is in crisis

WATCH: Tom Clark talks to the former U.S. Commander who developed training operations for Iraqi troops during Operation Iraqi Freedom

U.S. President Barack Obama is authorizing the U.S. military to deploy up to 1,500 more troops to Iraq to train, advise and assist Iraqi military and Kurdish forces fight ISIS.

There have also been published reports in the U.S. indicating Washington has asked NATO to organize a mission to train Iraqi soldiers, many of whom — despite years of American training and billions of dollars worth of military gear — performed poorly during last summer’s Islamic State offensive.

“The Iraqi Army, Tom, is in crisis right now and it’s a political crisis more than anything else,” said retired Maj.-Gen. Paul Eaton, the former U.S. commander who designed and directed operations to train Iraqi troops during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

During that conflict the Americans spent $25 billion training Iraqi troops so what will these new trainers be able to do that hasn’t already been done?

“The most important component is to give feedback to the U.S. political structure to the Canadian political structure on what the trainers are seeing on the ground, and to allow us to help shape Iraq politically,” Eaton said in an interview on The West Block with Tom Clark.

Eaton says what’s lacking in the Iraqi army is trust in governmental institutions.

“The resilience that soldiers get when they know that if they get hurt, they’re going to be evacuated, that they’re going to be taken care of. That’s not resident in the Iraqi army right now,” Eaton said.

“So we have got to help the Iraqis develop their chain of command and help the Iraqi soldier trust in that chain of command.”

– with files from The Canadian Press