I’ve been remiss in my duties… I’ve not featured the star of the show, SIGIR’s Stuart Bowen, I humbly apologize… That Youtube is a short compilation of his testimony to Congress in mid 2007!

I allude to ‘Original Sin’ in the title because Bowen has repeatedly cited one specific issue that has created the most problems, besides the PPP and the actual decision to take out Saddam in the first place… Insufficient Troop levels from the LOD (Line of Departure)… The veritable point of no return…! The Crossing of the Rubicon, if ya will…

Yesterday’s excellent Book Salon with Steve Fainaru, confirmed my views;

Yeah, some people would say the original sin was getting into this awful war in the first place, the lies about WMD, etc. I’m talking about the original sin in the prosecution of the war. If from the outset the administration had heeded the warnings of Shinseki, et al, about the need for more troops, this book would never have been written, and Iraq almost certainly would be a vastly different place.

That’s a pretty strong indictment…

So, where I left off… Viceroy Bremer had just signed the CPA’s first edict; The De-Ba’athification of Iraqi Society… Tragically, Society meant Society, thoroughly eradicating what was left of Saddam’s Civil Government! In which Bowen writes:

Estimates of membership in the Ba’ath Party, which was organized in a multi-tiered hierarchy, ranged up to two million. Before the war began, Pentagon planners debated the delicate trade-off between the need to eliminate the Ba’ath Party and the need to retain an effective administrative bureaucracy in post-war Iraq. The consensus favored removing the most senior members of the Ba’ath party from government office, but no one defined what exactly constituted the most senior ranks. Ambassador Bremer viewed party members down to the fourth rung of the party ladder as "loyalists who, by virtue of their positions of power in the regime, had been active instruments of Saddam’s repression."

Okay, so there went the remaining Civil Government, what’s next? Oh Yeah! But of course, the Iraqi Military…! Hence, Order #2… The "DISSOULUTION OF ENTITIES" … The key entity being…

1) Any military or other rank, title, or status granted to a former employee or functionary of a Dissolved Entity by the former Regime is hereby cancelled.
2) All conscripts are released from their service obligations. Conscriptions is suspended indefinitely, subject to decisions by future Iraq governments concerning whether a free Iraq should have conscription.

*Poof* There goes the entire Iraqi Military… All those Armed and Trained individuals vanish into the ether, did I mention that the bulk are Sunni, too…?

Why not, everything else is going just swimmingly, Commander Codpiece even told us so on a flat top…! But, wait, it went even further as Bowen pointed out…

One week after issuing the de-Ba’athification order, Ambassador Bremer handed down another momentous and equally troubling order that also had unanticipated negative consequences. CPA Order Number 2, titled "Dissolution of Entities," abolished seven institutions: the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Information, the Ministry of State for Military Affairs, the Iraqi Intelligence Service, the National Security Bureau, the Directorate of National Security, and the Special Security Organization. The order put every member of Iraq’s Army, Air Force, Navy, and Air Defense Force, as well as the Republican Guard, the Special Republican Guard, the Directorate of Military Intelligence, and the Emergency Forces–some 500,000 men–immediately out of work.

Have I mentioned that Bowen tends to understate some of the probs…?

Once again, continuing with another central theme that plagues this entire misadventure, is the utter lack of communication and/or coordination between any of the critical players…

The genesis of this order, which led to disorder and significant long-term problems, has been the subject of dispute. Bremer’s order surprised some interagency policymakers in Washington. The National Security Council had not vetted the decision and the NSC’s Iraq Coordinator, Frank Miller, said that the President had expected the army to remain because the Coalition could not "afford to put 300,000 men with guns in their hands on the street." Neither National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice nor Secretary Powell had been fully briefed on the order before its issuance. Secretary Powell first learned of it at a May 22, 2003, NSC principals’ meeting at which Bremer, via secure video-teleconference from Iraq, announced his intent to issue the order the following day. Ambassador Bremer maintains that the order was drafted by the Office of the Secretary of Defense and circulated to senior military leaders, including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Under Secretary Feith later acknowledged that it was an error in judgment not to have discussed disbanding the army with senior-level officials of other agencies before formally approving the issuance of the order. But he maintains that it was the right decision because the Iraqi army, which was top heavy with generals, had been an instrument of oppression in Iraq, and thus was not widely respected.

One thing that pisses me off is the fact that "The Stupidest Man on The Planet" continued to play a significant role…! *gah*

Of course, everybody on the ground in Iraq denounced the fiat…

Key U.S. generals on the ground in Iraq strongly opposed Bremer’s order. CENTCOM’s Phase IV plans–reflecting the President’s March 10, 2003 decision–anticipated using the Iraqi army to help stabilize the country and start the reconstruction process. Before the invasion, the military had dropped leaflets across Iraq urging soldiers not to fight and promising no reprisals against those who laid down their arms. Many U.S. commanders disagreed with the CPA’s assertion that the army had "dissolved." The Iraqi soldiers had gone home, but had not disappeared.[...]
Leading Iraqis disagreed with the CPA’s assessment of Iraq’s army. Ali Allawi said Iraqi attitudes toward the army were far more complicated than Americans understood and varied from region to region. While the police and other internal security forces were "detested," the armed forces "generated considerable sympathy and respect throughout Iraq." According to Allawi, the public at large saw the army "as an integral part of the identity of the state of Iraq," and it was difficult "even for the Shi’a to accept a wholesale dissolution of the armed forces and to leave the country bereft of an army."
Laith Kubba–one of the founding members of the Iraqi National Congress, an advisor to the Future of Iraq Project, and later a spokesman for the Iraqi government–said Bremer’s early orders made it much more difficult to promote reconciliation and rebuild the country. "The measure to dissolve the Iraqi army was not a smart one," he said. "I thought the measure suddenly to announce that all Ba’ath Party members are suspects and have no future in Iraq was a bad one."

It’s truly amazing how deluded the the neocon agenda was in the execution and planning for a post-invasion Iraq…! In my next post I shall try to highlight the CPA’s inept hiring of Shrub ‘True Believers’ over experience and knowledge… Along with the squandered billions that were either stolen outright or spent on failed projects spanning the entire spectrum of our ‘reconstruction’ efforts…

Bon Apetit!