Nation Building

This article from the Washington Post reminds me of an email I read at the beginning of the occupation of Iraq from a colleague. Her cousin was a low level State Department functionary who was sleeping in one of the palaces in Baghdad. The thrust of the email was, we have no idea what we are doing! It was incredible in many of assumptions and its honesty. This is not to say that they don't know how to plunder, privatize, establish death squads, and build military bases but there is lots of incompetence along with the master plan. I think the article in the Post was suposed to be flattering!