Democratic Underground - Insiders shape postwar Iraq, Republican ties often trumped experience

Mods, I am breaking the 4 paragraph rule but this is a VERY long article, top headline in the tribune and then a full page and a half inside. Edit if you must.

Insiders shape postwar Iraq
Republican ties often trumped experience in coalition

By Andrew Zajac, Tribune staff reporter. Tribune foreign correspondent Christine Spolar contributed to this report
Published June 20, 2004

A little over a year ago, Stuart Bowen Jr. was lobbying for a company looking for work in the impending reconstruction of Iraq.

A former longtime aide to President Bush, Bowen tapped administration contacts on behalf of URS Group, a consulting firm, and the company eventually landed contracts worth up to $30 million for overseeing Iraqi construction projects.

Today, Bowen works for the Coalition Provisional Authority, the U.S.-led bureaucracy running Iraq. In his new job as inspector general, Bowen is the corruption watchdog over more than $20 billion of rebuilding, including the activities of URS, the company he represented.

snip---------

Occupation planners often selected "ideologues without international experience who see the world through blinders," said Peter Galbraith, a senior career diplomat and an adviser to the Iraqi Kurdish leadership.

"I don't think the Iraq venture was doomed to fail," Galbraith said. "If we had had qualified people with time to plan and a coherent strategy, the situation . . . would certainly be better."

Defense Department officials in charge of reconstruction wanted leaders who shared their belief that a capitalist democracy could be quickly installed in the country, said Tim Carney, a retired diplomat who was the occupation's adviser to the Iraqi Ministry of Industry and Minerals in spring of 2003. Such a rosy outlook ruled out many seasoned State Department hands.

snip---------

and below is my favorite, highlights mine:

Competitive bidding "is a new world for the Iraqis," Fleischer said. Under Saddam Hussein, "it was all done by cronies. The only paradigm they know is cronyism. We are teaching them that there is an alternative system with built-in checks and built-in review."

The above quote comes from the CPA's top economic advisor, Michael Fleisher, brother of the formen presidential press secretary, who I am SURE got his job based purely on qualifications and not cronyism!:eyesroll:

more (free subscript. req'd.)--> http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0406200283jun20,1,6574250.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

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