The single worst foreign policy decision in American history

It's not just Iraq, it's not just war, and it's not just the American government. I've seen relief projects in Africa where First World service groups brought in used shoes or school books in an language they couldn't understand because those things provided tax write-offs and good feelings at minimal cost. The Africans were left wondering how a pile of beat-up shoes is going to feed the orphans with AIDS or provide the most basic medical care in outlying villages.

But a deeper question, aside from the obvious cultural misunderstandings and differing goals on the two sides, is are we really helping when we do help actual needs? I did a water project to provide water for school children in an African country, but eventually I started wondering: "There are lots of healthy young men here. Why don't they get some shovels and dig a well so their children don't have to walk two kilometers everyday to get water from a polluted stream?" Are we enabling indifference on their part? Maybe their culture doesn't put a big priority on taking care of physical needs. Can we change that? Should we even try?

So many times our "help" in "less fortunate" places is so much more about benefiting ourselves, and comes mixed with generous helpings of patronizing superiority and preconceived notions about the people being helped.

I don't regret the water we provided to the innocent children, but were we simply moving them from a culture of apathy to a culture of dependence? Others have gone back to similar projects a few years later, only to see the well useless and broken for lack of maintenance, and the children again toiling on the path to the stream. Is there any way an outsider can come in and actually help in the long term? Honestly, I don't know the answer. I wish I did.

Where by American history we understand the author's career with the State Department. With such an all-reaching title, I'd have expected him to compare Iraq to at least Vietnam, if not various WW1 or WW2 decisions.

> the U.S. did more to destabilize the Middle East than we could possibly have imagined at the time

That was the entire point of our entry into that region.

America has now secured the next 50-80 years of its energy needs (in the form of oil).

How? Well, when you come in and destroy a country, or destabilize it, you pretty much secure the rights to make any and all deals within it for it's resources. Before you had a hard-liner to deal with (saddam, gaddafi, etc) and now you have either a government that's always at a tipping point, or factions... Both of which will agree to sell you X amount of oil, and sell everyone else Y amount of oil, and always for US dollars only. If you don't get why that last part about US dollars is important, I'm not going to help you understand why having the world currency based on the US dollar is important (clue - energy is what the world runs on and is always buying).

With 5 years over and 3 years ahead to implement much-needed changes, what has the current administration achieved in Iraq? (serious question)

Edit: I don't want this to sound like I'm on the attack here. Just trying to generate discussion about where we're at, right now, on the ground in Iraq.

I'm no fan of the Iraq War, but the headline isn't backed up by the text - there's essentially no discussion of history before 2003.

Of all the retrospectives on the Iraq War, this is probably one of the most relevant for HN readers. The image of the unneeded chicken factory in the desert, propped and funded by wishful thinking and a mad rush to spend money, brings to mind the often derided startup bubble.

The big mistake was thinking that the occupation was going to be easy.

I have not read the article, but I agree with the premise.

The Iraq invasion will be looked back upon as the day America lost its status as the moral superpower. Since that decision, people began to give far more weight to Putin, Chavez, hard-liners in China, and anyone else who took a more principled and honest stance at the time.

Bush tried to make the world black and white, but instead made it far more grey.