Life in Baghdad since the fall of Saddam- 2008

[Peter1469]

Life in Baghdad since the fall of Saddam- 2008

This article was written in March of 2008- I was actually in country then on what turned out to be my last deployment.

The situation in Iraq on the eve of the anniversary of "Operation Iraqi Freedom" has both opponents and supporters of the American military campaign puzzled. The body of a Catholic archbishop is found near the northern city of Mosul, and yet the US embassy in Baghdad is holding a garage sale as if it were peacetime. There has been a slight rise in the number of attacks again, and Douglas Feith, one of the Pentagon's principal architects of the war, is about to publish a book in which he seeks to justify his decisions. The United States has been in Iraq longer than it fought in World War II. The conflict is getting long in the tooth.

At this time the Iraqis most happy with the US occupation were those seeking US government contracts and those getting paid for US caused damage to their land. I wore many hats on that last tour. To include Foreign Claims Officer. I caught a local attorney filing claims using the same photos as evidence of damage. I confronted the dude and he admitted it and said, but I am asking for less compensation for my clients than other attorneys.... OK.

The prognoses are relatively worthless as long as it is unclear what exactly the results of the turnaround have been. Optimists point to successes among Sunnis. Close to 80,000 former Sunni insurgents have changed sides and now work for the Americans, each of them earning $300 a month. Al-Qaida terrorism has been dealt a serious blow.

And when the money stopped coming, many switched back.

The progress of the war has long depended on both people and developments no one would have imagined five years ago. General Tommy Franks, who directed the US invasion of Iraq, merely rolled his eyes when he was asked at the time what would happen after the war, former US Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith writes in his upcoming autobiography "War and Decision." Franks' response to the question was that he didn't have time for that kind of "bull$#@!." Indeed, there are failures everywhere Feith casts his eyes. But, as the reader soon learns, Feith is convinced that the triumvirate of planners -- then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, President George W. Bush and Feith himself -- was infallible.

Oh, one would think that it is important to know what happens after you defeat the enemy's army. That is if you plan on sticking around.

The article is pretty long and includes interviews with the locals.

The subtitle to the article is The Iraq Fiasco, 2003-2008.