National building a tough task

I’ve written before that I believe that the US government failed to understand the long-term impacts of removing Saddam Hussein from power and was unprepared to win the peace in Iraq. Troop levels were significant to win the war, but assumptions that stability would return quickly and that the people of Iraq would flock, peacefully, to democracy were short-sighted. The fact that insurgent groups have flocked to Iraq from neighboring states has fueled the violence and discontent.

The result of this lack of preparation and foresight is that the US now faces a nearly impossible task of winning the peace and building a stable government (ideally democratic, but even stable will be hard to achieve). Rival factions within the government have little incentive to cooperate absent a strong central government and the Iraqi military and police forces have been unable to prevent violence.

The longer that US troops are required to provide security the more resentment there will be (the latest incident bound to fuel resentment occurred last night when coalition troops killed two women, one in labor, while on their way to a hospital) and the more difficult it will be for us to shape the future of Iraq.