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Originally, the U.S. military predicted Iraqi helicopters would be flying by the summer of 2004, but as of last month, it has about 20 working helicopters and planes. It once had more than 500 combat aircraft, but there are none now, the report said.

Part of the slow progress was an Iraqi government order of a fleet of Russian helicopters from a Polish contractor in 2004 and 2005 that turned out to be corrupt.

Col. Dan Groeschen of the U.S. Air Force, the deputy commander of the Coalition Air Force Transition Team said training Iraqis was slowed when the original plan of embedding U.S. soldiers with Iraqi air force personnel was scrapped.

He said he pulled his soldiers out as the Iraqis refused to guard their camps well at night, failed to provide enough fuel for electrical generators and "did not seem to be bothered by highly unsanitary conditions", the newspaper said.

There are now 915 Iraqi personnel repairing and flying aircraft at U.S.-run bases in Baghdad, Taji, Kirkuk and Basra, the report said.