America’s Failure In Iraq

For a time after the initial fighting stopped Iraq was calm. But when Paul Bremer disbanded the Iraqi army and national police, all calm went out the window. By 2004 things started picking up, as insurgents went after Iraqi civilians and Coalition forces like ducks in a pond. But we had captured Saddam, and hadn’t found any weapons of mass destruction, so the entire operation was put into question. We had created the very “power vacuum” Bush the First was supposedly trying to avoid in 1991.

The Coalition is dysfunctional and impossible to make sense of, but nowhere more than the Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq (MNSTC-I), the command element responsible for 'standing up' the new Iraqi Army and National Police after they were disbanded by Paul Bremer. MNSTC-I is responsible for the “transition” of control from the Coalition to Iraq. Yet, its construction section, the J-7, is building new military installations in Iraq without securing title to the land, and not following the Iraqi rule of law.  If we are supposed to be instilling democracy in Iraq, why are we doing things like this?

While I was in Iraq, a news article appeared in the Washington Post on August 6, 2007. The article described how 190,000 weapons that had been purchased by MNSTC-I for issue to the Iraqi Army and National Police had disappeared, and were likely being used to kill American soldiers. They had been purchased by MNSTC-I in 2004-2005 when it was commanded by Major General David Petraeus. He later returned to Iraq as a 4-star general to command all Coalition forces.

Why has America failed so much in its foreign policy efforts over the past several decades? Look at Vietnam and the damage it has caused our country since. Why did we get involved in Iraq, especially when the leaders of our country were all alive when Vietnam was being fought? Why did we invade a country that was not a threat to us based on justification that was groundless? There is no possible way that Vietnam and Operation Iraqi Freedom cannot be compared. I am continually amazed at the lack of will on the part of our leaders, namely our presidents, to use the force we have that our taxes have paid for, to good effect. 

Contractors got work in Iraq because it meant money for firms just by filling their position. Is our purpose for being in Iraq to help its people and show them how things are done right, or is it just about money, promotions, some adventure, and forget the Iraqis?  There were two types of contractors in Iraq:  security firms like Blackwater, and everyone else. Security firms had carte blanche to shoot at anyone or anything and get away with it. There were no “Rules of Engagement” for our security contractors in Iraq.  Too bad Iraqi civilians who got in their way didn’t know that.  Are we going to build up our active duty forces to fight the war on terrorism by reinstituting the draft and increasing the number of volunteers? Or, are we going to remain increasingly dependent on reservists and guardsmen who do it part-time, and contractors who do it for a profit?