Rex:

Right. The practical effect of COIN/Money As A Weapon, in an accurate post-conflict analysis, will be none too pretty, whether by DoD, DoS, or SIGIR.

The focus should have been less on "Win Friends and Influence People" and more on the [practicalities of getting basic systems restored and getting out of their way to rebuild their own country.

The Tikrit poultry plant was always a shiny bangle for the self-licking puppies, even when there was no capacity for basic poultry production: feed, feed mills, hatcheries, and fattening barns were more important than the poultry processing plant---the gap was basic civilian infrastructure, security and free movement of goods--- roads, bridges and free movement of goods, not poultry plants and refrigerated bongo trucks.

The Iraqis would reopen the poultry industrial components once there was an economics to support it. Money was never an issue for the rich folks who owned this stuff.

It took a lot of courage for the folks who tried to put breaks on this stuff and steer back to basics.