'RAND normally prepares a classified version of such reports for internal use by the Army’s commanders and a public version that covers the high points of what was found and what was recommended for the media and academic researchers.
Both versions of the volume of the report titled “Rebuilding Iraq” are locked in the same vault, where they can do no good in educating officers or the American public to the realities that led to a near-catastrophic failure by both the military and civilians to plan for what would happen after we’d toppled Saddam Hussein’s government and assumed control of a fractured, feuding nation of 25 million people...'Some inconvenient truths, conveniently locked in a safe
Should the 'public' version of the report be made public?
Of course it should, but it won't anytime soon, by the sound of things. The official explanation:
“After carefully reviewing the findings and recommendations of the thorough RAND assessment, the Army determined that the analysts had in some cases taken a broader perspective on the early planning and operational phases of Operation Iraqi Freedom than desired or chartered by the Army,” Mr. Muchmore said in a statement. “Some of the RAND findings and recommendations were determined to be outside the purview of the Army and therefore of limited value in informing Army policies, programs and priorities.”
But as the NYT has said, the report is heavily critical of the total lack of planning for the re-structuring of a post-war Iraq, with responsiblilty for the castastrophe going all the way up to Rumsfeld and Bush:
My interpretation of the article, NNN, was that RAND has been asked to rewrite the report, to make it more palatable for both the Bush administration and the American public.
