New Iraq
Recently a New York Times article suggested that we are making progress in Iraq. The judgment was based on increased security.
When will we learn? The whole point is to have a stable society in Iraq. We need a government that functions. We need jobs for the young people rather than high unemployment. The war destroyed much of the infrastructure in Iraq. We need utilities to be stable, public services to be regular and dependable. Before the war Iraq was a leading oil exporter, and should be again.
One of our major problems during the past five years is that our true emphasis has been on security . The argument is that until we have security it is very difficult to build a nation. That seems true, however it is misleading. Our military conquered Iraq quickly but our rebuilding is extremely slow and poorly managed. Instead of utilizing locals, we tend to import companies and workers to do the job. As a result unemployment increased rapidly. In addition some people in Iraq came to resent us, and young, unemployed males are a recruiting ground for our enemies.
It is sad that we learned so little from the aftermath of WWII. The “greatest generation” sensed that a destroyed Europe was bad for us. We needed stable allies and trading partners, so we devised the Marshall plan which stabilized western Europe. I believe those actions stimulated our prosperity of the 1950s. Maybe a generous rebuilding plan in Iraq would help our own economy. It is worth a try.