Out on the Street, Losing Iraq -The New Yorker

[Rose Siding]

snip>
Not long after, Garner himself was fired, and President Bush named L. Paul Bremer III as the head of what became known as the Coalition Provisional Authority. On May 16, 2003, Bremer issued a sweeping ban of the Baath Party: all senior party members were barred from public life; lower-level members were also barred, but some could appeal. In effect, Bremer had fired the entire senior civil service. The origins of the decree have never been clarified, but Coalition officials I spoke to said they believed that Bremer was following orders from the White House. A week later, he disbanded the Iraqi Army.

Browning recalled a meeting that he and other officials had with Bremer before the announcement. “Bremer walked in and announced his de-Baathification order. I said that we had established a good working relationship with technicians—not senior-level people—of the Baath Party, and I expressed my feeling that this measure could backfire. Bremer said that it was not open for discussion, that this was what was going to be done and his expectation was that we would carry it out. It was not a long meeting.”

The order had an immediate effect on Browning’s work. “We had a lot of directors general of hospitals who were very good, and, with de-Baathification, we lost them and their expertise overnight,” he told me. At the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, which was another of his responsibilities, “we were left dealing with what seemed like the fifth string. . . . Nobody who was left knew anything.”

An American special-forces officer stationed in Baghdad at the time told me that he was stunned by Bremer’s twin decrees. After the dissolution of the Army, he said, “I had my guys coming up to me and saying, ‘Does Bremer realize that there are four hundred thousand of these guys out there and they all have guns?’ They all have to feed their families.” He went on, “The problem with the blanket ban is that you get rid of the infrastructure; I mean, after all, these guys ran the country, and you polarize them. So did these decisions contribute to the insurgency? Unequivocally, yes. And we have to ask ourselves: How well did we really know how to run Iraq? Zero.”

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?041115fa_fact

[DianeG5385]

1. And why did we re-elect this bumpin know nothing...?

I am sick to my stomache at the damage this so-called Prez has done to our country, and the slaughter that has resulted from his ignorance. Babies are coming home With no legs!!!~! Who is their advocate!!!! How many Iraqi citizens are being slaughtered for our end game? There is somethining seriously wrong here folks. I can't hit every board but...Our babies are dying for nothing!! I have a nephew in Falluja and I don't want him dead...Enough.

[opihimoimoi]

2. The Ignorance Level in The Bush Co Is alarmingly HIGH

Arrogant Ignorance is worse.... and this seems the case.

Fed by its own brainwashing shit, they believe they can do no wrong.

Then when shit hits the FAN, they Blame Clinton or some other excuse.

These don't know that history cannot be tampered with. that this is all recorded and their names will go down in History as MUD/or WORSE

[NMDemDist2]

3. the WH?Armitage and Pearle it sounds like to me PNAC all the way n/t

[Ducks In A Row]

4. Remember, the WH wants civil war.

it's an excuse to cleanse the rest of iraq, just like fallajh.

then we get all the oil.