Is This Simply a Case of a Mismanaged War?
Todd and Josh have said it well--this war in Iraq is not simply about management. It's about a misbegotten war. This war was a mistake from the beginning. There was no way that there could be a good outcome, considering the forces that were on the ground just waiting to be released. As it happens, as this coffee house debate is happening, I'm reading a terrific, readable and insightful book by Brandeis University prof Yitzhak Nakash which I heartily recommend to tpmcafe readers: Reaching for Power: The Shi'a in the Modern Arab World, published recently by Princeton University Press.
