--- Jon Gabriel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > The point he's making is a valid one. He didn't say > we shouldn't have > liberated Iraq in this thread. When we removed the > regime in power we were > in charge of law enforcement until a native police > force could be > reestablished. It is obvious that the museums were > inadequately secured and > they were our responsibility. We definitely screwed > up in allowing the > museums to be looted.
If they had been looted, we would have screwed up, maybe. I don't know what constraints we were operating under. But they weren't looted. _At most_ a miniscule proportion of the Museum's items were taken, certainly by insiders, and almost certainly before American soldiers ever arrived in Baghdad. What could we possibly have done to stop that? > > You know, looting and even rioting could have been > easily predicted when we > liberated Iraq. Quite honestly, I was surprised the > changeover went so > smoothly. > > Jon Me too - well, not surprised, per se, but impressed and pleased. But the Administration's opponents have seized on this damn Museum issue as a way of, first attacking the war in general, and second, attacking the reconstruction effort, when it is, in fact, going much better than a fair observer would have expected. So I'm not ashamed to take a special pleasure in pointing out that the Museum thing _didn't happen_ - it was a myth created by credulous people eager to believe the worst of the United States and the Bush Administration, and its revelation as a myth is something that should further lessen their credibility, if there was any left. ===== Gautam Mukunda [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Freedom is not free" http://www.mukunda.blogspot.com __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Calendar - Free online calendar with sync to Outlook(TM). http://calendar.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
