It's Amateur Hour In Iraq

Newsweek -- Garner’s staff probably never had the expertise required for the mission. The Pentagon filled the top ranks of ORHA with Defense officials and retired generals; the State Department added a handful of ex-ambassadors, most with backgrounds in Arab affairs. Neither contingent had hands-on experience in nation-building. Of 200 key officials, the ORHA team included only a dozen specialists who had worked in war zones such as East Timor or Kosovo. Veterans of the United Nations and private humanitarian aid groups, or nongovernmental organizations, were told they weren’t welcome. “The NGO community asked and asked for a meeting with responsible Defense officials,” says Ken Bacon, a former Pentagon spokesman who is now president of Refugees International. “We never got one.” A USAID official says he and his colleagues repeatedly warned that combating civil disorder should be the top priority. “But they just didn’t get it,” he said. “They planned for the best-case scenario every time.”