now that the lessons have been learned, the u.s. will be able to repeat the process more efficiently.

Exactly how would Chalabi have slowed or stopped the insurgency, given (we now know) that the "insurgency" was the war-plan of the Ba'athist party and al-Qaeda?

Steve:

They'd have had trouble recruiting; the regular citizenry would have begun their recent informing more quickly; al Sadr would have had trouble getting any traction; and under Iraqi orders we could have been more brutal.

Why is it no one at CIA has had to pay a price for this total foul-up and the defamation of an ally? Could it be that too many members of Congress and the Administration share in the CIA's drug profits and that if anyone in the club faced the music that he would start singing like Beyonce'?

We no longer even need a CIA, if we ever did need a foreign intelligence service separate from DOD. It should be folded up and its employees thrown into the street as unceremoniously as possible, but not before full body cavity searches for payoffs from the Soviets, the PRC, the drug cartels and the Saudis have been made.

Your bad, you mean.

You were among those who said Chalabi was a non-starter because he was an exile.

So who do we have at the top now? An exile.

Didn't matter which stooge we put in if we didn't give him any infantry.

Chalabi would likely have lost in the electiuons, but could have handled the transition rather easily. we've shown there's not much need for infantry there.