IrresponsibleUseOfFr's Journal: Reflections on: Imperial Life in the Emerald City

Imperial Life in the Emerald City (Inside Iraq's Green Zone) by Rajiv Chandrasekaran is an eye-opening account of failures in immediate aftermath of the Iraq war. The book does not paint a coherent picture of what should have been done to correct the situation. There are always disagreements. Using the advantages of hind-sight, it is easy to say different decisions should have been made. Or if "they" would have listened to a suggestion or addressed this problem, things would have worked out better. That type of nit-picking is natural and in some essences unavoidable. I personally don't believe that it reasonable to expect flawless execution in any new situation. What is expected is to make more correct decisions than bad ones; to improve and make long-term progress.

In that sense, Iraq post-war planning was a failure from the get-go. The defense department's expectations for how post-war Iraq was going to unfold was optimistic. The rampant looting should have been the first indication that this assumption was misguided, but wasn't heeded. The looting set back reconstruction immeasurably, which set unfavorable conditions for the aggressive policies the coalition provisional authority (CPA) would try to pursue. This, in collusion with, having under-qualified people on the ground made the start-up costs particularly staggering. I think we sent intelligent and talented people to Iraq. However, we did not send the most informed, experienced and wise people at our disposal to lead the effort. The administration chose to send the loyal and idealistic. This coupled with bubble environment that was the Green Zone perpetuated the misunderstanding of the reality of the everyday Iraqi and the people working for the CPA.

The first priority should have been to establish pre-war levels of employment, basic services and security. Instead, the CPA pursued an ideological based agenda towards trying to establish a modern representative democracy and a western free-market economy, no doubt influenced by Milton Friedman's ideas that the two go hand-in-hand. The factors of the setbacks in reconstruction due to the looting in conjunction with the fundamental overhauls that the CPA was trying to achieve caused enough chaos to fuel an insurgency. If more pragmatic policies would have been pursued, much of the dissatisfaction would not have come about.

I feel that another misunderstanding is the belief that the insurgency can be defeated militarily. It cannot, although that is one way that it must be fought. The insurgency developed because of high unemployment, degradation of the Iraqi's standard of living, and a continuing sense of social disorder. In order to fight the insurgency, it is necessary to fight its growth and the root causes. The growth can be handled militarily, but the root causes must be addressed politically and making real progress on the ground. I believe that the rise of the civil war we are now faced with is a direct result of trying to establish democracy too quickly without providing a proper social and economic framework for it to flourish. Setting up such a framework is unworkable in the short-term. The immediate problem is that people in Iraq are desperate. Desperate for security, food, water, electricity. These immediate needs will be provided by local warlords who seek to destabilize the existing rule and try to establish their own.

I have always been against the war in Iraq. I consider it to be a mistake of almost comical proportions. But, I subscribe to the viewpoint that is attributed to Colin Powell: you break it, you own it. I considered an Iraq under Saddam Hussein's rule a low threat to the United States. In spite of the fact that he was a "bad man." However, I believe if the United States were to leave now, we will see Iraq turn into an extreme terrorist state. We will be blamed for the ensuing conflict which will likely involve years of fighting and have bouts of ethnic cleansing.

In order to come to an acceptable conclusion to the Iraq conflict, we must establish security, basic services, and employment. All three must be pursued simultaneously or none will be achieved. I don't believe the end result of that effort will necessarily be a moderate democracy. But, we have to leave a stable state, not a govenment on the brink of collapse, ripe with sectarian conflicts ready to erupt.

I don't know if what I suggest is tenable. It is harder to implement than it is to say. And I know that it will probably cost 1000's of American servicemen their lives. However, I believe the threats to our nation caused by another extremist Islamic state fueled by massive oil reserves, and on brink of nuclear capabilities is too great to ignore. I believe Iran will fill the power vacuum that an immediate American withdrawl from Iraq would bring.

I'm not for this war. I wish the US had not started it. But, I believe we have Iraq in at least as stable of a state as it was before we invaded. Anything less will cause Iran and North Korea scale problems in the future.