The other day, the New York Times quoted one of that ever-helpful breed, a "senior administration official," as expressing surprise at the horrendous condition of Iraqs "infrastructure," even before the destruction brought about by the war and its aftermath. "From the outside it looked like Baghdad was a city that works," the senior official said. "It isnt."
The quintessential city that works (or, at least, has a cleverly cultivated reputation for being the city that works) is, of course, Chicago. The ward heelers and aldermen of that city understand (or, at least, are celebrated in song and story for understanding) that political power flows not from the barrel of a gun, and not even, necessarily, from the ballot box (whose contents can change in the counting), but from the ability to fix potholes. Garbage that gets collected, buses and trains that take people places, cops that whack bad guys upside the head, taps that yield clean water when you turn them, lights that go on when you flip the switch, all lubricated by taxes and a bit of honest graftthese are what keep streets calm, voters pacified, and righteous "reformers" out of City Hall.
By Chicago standards, Baghdad, along with almost all the rest of Iraq, is a catastrophe. For that matter, conditions are disastrous even by the looser standards of places like Beirut, Bogotá, and Bombay. Reports from the scene are in general agreement on the essentials. Iraq is well rid of the murderous regime of Saddam Hussein. But the blithe assumptions of the Iraq wars Pentagon architectsthat a grateful Iraqi nation, with a little help from American know-how and Iraqi oil cash, would quickly pick itself up, dust itself off, and start all over againare as shattered as the buildings that used to house Saddams favorite restaurants. In Baghdad, and in many other Iraqi cities and towns, civic society has degenerated into a Hobbesian state of nature. Despite the heroic efforts of a scattered minority of midlevel Iraqi civil servants, the services that make urban life viable are functioning, at best, erratically. More often, they do not function at all. "In the most palpable of ways, the American promise of a new Iraq is floundering on the inability of the American occupiers to provide basic services," the Timess Neela Banerjee reported a few days ago. (Perhaps with an eye to educating her White House readers, she added that Baghdad is "about the size of metropolitan Houston.") Telephones are dead. Electricity and running water work, if at all, for only a few hours a day. Because the water pumps are hobbled by power outages, raw sewage is pouring into the Tigris River and is leaking into the fresh-water system, spreading disease and making the city stink. Hospitals that are secure enough to remain open overflow with patients, but they are short of food, medical supplies, and personnel. (Only a fifth of prewar health staffs are showing up for work.) Worst of all is the pervasive, well-founded fear of crime. Armed thugs rule the streets, especially in the pitch-black nights. "Amid such privations," Banerjee writes, "one of the few things that thrives now in Baghdad, at least, is a deepening distrust and anger toward the United States."
The quintessential city that works (or, at least, has a cleverly cultivated reputation for being the city that works) is, of course, Chicago. The ward heelers and aldermen of that city understand (or, at least, are celebrated in song and story for understanding) that political power flows not from the barrel of a gun, and not even, necessarily, from the ballot box (whose contents can change in the counting), but from the ability to fix potholes. Garbage that gets collected, buses and trains that take people places, cops that whack bad guys upside the head, taps that yield clean water when you turn them, lights that go on when you flip the switch, all lubricated by taxes and a bit of honest graftthese are what keep streets calm, voters pacified, and righteous "reformers" out of City Hall.
By Chicago standards, Baghdad, along with almost all the rest of Iraq, is a catastrophe. For that matter, conditions are disastrous even by the looser standards of places like Beirut, Bogotá, and Bombay. Reports from the scene are in general agreement on the essentials. Iraq is well rid of the murderous regime of Saddam Hussein. But the blithe assumptions of the Iraq wars Pentagon architectsthat a grateful Iraqi nation, with a little help from American know-how and Iraqi oil cash, would quickly pick itself up, dust itself off, and start all over againare as shattered as the buildings that used to house Saddams favorite restaurants. In Baghdad, and in many other Iraqi cities and towns, civic society has degenerated into a Hobbesian state of nature. Despite the heroic efforts of a scattered minority of midlevel Iraqi civil servants, the services that make urban life viable are functioning, at best, erratically. More often, they do not function at all. "In the most palpable of ways, the American promise of a new Iraq is floundering on the inability of the American occupiers to provide basic services," the Timess Neela Banerjee reported a few days ago. (Perhaps with an eye to educating her White House readers, she added that Baghdad is "about the size of metropolitan Houston.") Telephones are dead. Electricity and running water work, if at all, for only a few hours a day. Because the water pumps are hobbled by power outages, raw sewage is pouring into the Tigris River and is leaking into the fresh-water system, spreading disease and making the city stink. Hospitals that are secure enough to remain open overflow with patients, but they are short of food, medical supplies, and personnel. (Only a fifth of prewar health staffs are showing up for work.) Worst of all is the pervasive, well-founded fear of crime. Armed thugs rule the streets, especially in the pitch-black nights. "Amid such privations," Banerjee writes, "one of the few things that thrives now in Baghdad, at least, is a deepening distrust and anger toward the United States."
I think America at this point wants nothing more than to leave Iraq with a stable government and good military security. 
