Who is the Iraqi Army? That seems like a strange question. What do I mean?
The Bush administration claims the Iraqi Army is a unified force of Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds who fight together for the centralized government of Iraq. That's complete nonsense.
In fact, the different divisions of the army are segregated by sect. The so-called Iraqi Army fighting in the south right now is mainly the Badr Corps. This is a rival Shiite militia to Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army.
The Badr Corps is connected to the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council. Don't get freaked out, they're theoretically the good guys. Well, at least they are the largest political party in Iraq and the ones we are supporting. Here's the problem -- they're not the good guys at all. They ran death squads and torture chambers out of the Interior Ministry throughout the period of ethnic cleansing in Iraq.
And get this, out of all the parties in Iraq, the one most closely linked to Iran is -- the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council and their militia partners in the Badr Corps.
Who Is the Iraqi Army? | War on Iraq | AlterNet
Also see: "Iraqi army forces defect to Moqtada al-Sadr"
The backbone of the force squaring up against the militants has been the three brigades sent from Baghdad, and local men such as Lt Abbas - whose motivation is not entirely selfless. He was a member of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, a rival Basra militia that will be only too happy to see its Mehdi Army rivals vanquished. Telegraph.co.uk
More about the New Iraqi Army on Global Security.org