THE PRODIGAL SONS

U.S.-Backed Iraqi Exiles Return to Reinvent Nation (DOUGLAS JEHL, 5/04/03, NY Times)

A look at the team, assembled in a mere two months by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz, shows how boldly the United States is trying to import secular, democratic notions to an Iraq whose political future remains the subject of profound division and flux. It also underscores some of the considerable risks involved. [...]

Pentagon officials have described the team of advisers, which works from United States-financed offices in Virginia and is called the Iraqi Reconstruction and Redevelopment Council, as primarily administrators whose job will be to smooth a transition to an Iraqi-led authority by resuscitating moribund ministries and restarting basic services.

"It's an enormously valuable asset to have people who share our values, understand what we're about as a country, and are in most cases citizens of this country, but who also speak the language, share the culture and know their way around Iraq," Mr. Wolfowitz said in a telephone interview. He said the Iraqi advisers would not play political roles. "They are going to give us technical advice," he said.

But some Iraqi exile leaders say the creation of the team was too narrow and overly influenced by the views of Mr. Wolfowitz and fellow conservatives, who have espoused a vision of bold change in Iraq.

There can't be any harm in having such a team advise us; whether they're a suitable new adminstrative body for post-war Iraq is up to the Iraqis to
decide, isn't it? Posted by Orrin Judd at May 4, 2003 8:12 AM