Situation in Iraq much worse

The Christian Science Monitor has an article today about what the U.S. has learned (so far) in Iraq.

I read a number of paragraphs about what's been done wrong in Iraq:

Pentagon leaders ignored analyses that indicated they needed more troops to keep order. The military was slow to develop a clear plan to counter the insurgency. For too long, US generals kept assuming that the day when Iraqi troops would be able to stand on their own was just around the corner.

Furthermore, neither the Americans nor the Iraqis moved fast enough to counter the rising influence of the radical Moqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army militia.

This via Paul Bremer's (who headed up the Coalition Provisional Authority) updated book about Iraq.

And then further on there's this:

"If we learn from our mistakes, our next engagement to help rebuild a collapsed state (bolding mine) might have a more successful outcome," writes Larry Diamond, a democracy expert and former senior adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority, in his book on his Iraq experience.

I guess my question is, when did we being to interpret our invading Iraq as "an engagement to help rebuild a collapsed state?"

If I remember correctly we went into Iraq to topple Saddam Hussein because we THOUGHT he had nuclear weapons. There was no collapsed state until we went in there. It was THEN that the state collapsed and then needed rebuilding and still does.

Kofi Annan says today

The current situation in Iraq is "much worse" than civil war.

Calling the situation "extremely dangerous," Kofi Annan said that the international community must help the country to rebuild because he is uncertain Iraq can accomplish it on its own.

theteach