Watch Frontline's "The Lost Year in Iraq" online

[BurtWorm]

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/10/21/frontline-the-lost-year-in-iraq/

From PBS.com:

In the first weeks after the statue of Saddam Hussein fell, a group of young American bureaucrats led by Ambassador L. Paul Bremer III set off to establish democracy in Iraq. "We had an ambitious goal," Bremer tells FRONTLINE, "to try to bring better government to Iraq and help them rebuild their economy their country." One year later, as Bremer made a secret exit to evade insurgent attacks, the group left behind a thriving insurgency, economic collapse and much of its idealism. "Our grand initiative there to bring democracy to Iraq," says Rajiv Chandrasekaran, former Baghdad bureau chief for The Washington Post. Instead, says Chandrasekaran, "we were leaving with our tail between our legs."

You can watch the program in it's entirety at PBS.com. If you want to know the truth behind what went wrong during the most crucial time period of the Iraq War and why, you must see this.

[MrCoffee]

1. no don't...i watched it this morning,

and it's really good. it made me feel sympathy for L. Paul Bremer, which i was then dumb enough to post about in GD, and got bitch-slapped for it.

it's a great documentary, btw.

[rodeodance]

2. a friend of mine said it was great--but too short--need more hours to

really tell the whole story of the lost year.

[hwmnbn]

3. I watched it last Tuesday....

and agree it is an indictment of the civilian leadership in the DoD. This was a major fuck-up from the get-go. These neo-con leaders had no idea what they were in for.

The telling point was soon after the fall of Baghdad, when the statue came down, many of the top military commanders realized what was about to happen with the insurgency. They all retired (like Tommy Franks) or were reassigned out of the theater of operation.

We are now facing the ultimate aftermath of their misguided policies. A savage civil war NOT a beacon of democracy as promised.

[Bozita]

4. "The adults are back in charge" -- Remember that while watching

It's MUST SEE TV.