Where Did All The $$$ Go In Iraq? TNR: Treasury's Reconstruction Efforts Are As Flawed as the Rest

[maddezmom]

(The New Republic) This column was written by Jeremy Kahn.
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In the latest James Bond thriller, "Casino Royale," 007's mission is to stop an amoral money man for international terrorist organizations from winning a high-stakes poker game. Bond is assisted in this effort by a dashing British agent, Vesper Lynd, played by the beguiling Eva Green. And, in a modern twist on the old Ian Fleming formula, Lynd does not work for Her Majesty's Secret Service, but rather for the Chancellor of the Exchequer — she's a Treasury agent.

John B. Taylor, the Stanford economist who served as Undersecretary of the Treasury for International Affairs throughout President Bush's first term, wants everyone to know that U.S. Treasury officials play just as important — and sometimes just as daring — a role as Lynd in the real-life war against terrorism. Taylor has a new book out, "Global Financial Warriors: The Untold Story of International Finance in the Post-9/11 World," that seems intended to ensure that Treasury's — or, perhaps more accurately, Taylor's — contribution to America's current war effort is not overlooked.

To drive home the point, Taylor placed an op-ed in last week's New York Times defending Treasury against California Representative Henry Waxman, who, in a hearing last month, criticized the Bush administration's decision to fly large shipments of cash into Iraq immediately after the invasion. "Who in their right mind would send 360 tons of cash into a war zone?" Waxman demanded. Taylor didn't see anything wrong with his mind; he called the cash transfers "one of the most successful and carefully planned operations of the war."

Taylor is right that Iraq really needed that cash after the invasion — and also that the conversion from old Iraqi dinars to a new currency, which he also lauded in the op-ed, went off without a hitch. But Taylor's narrative overstates the success of Treasury's efforts in Iraq, ignores Waxman's basic point — which was about oversight in the reconstruction effort — and, through omission, seeks to whitewash the Treasury's culpability in many of the policy failures that have hampered U.S. efforts in Iraq since 2003.

more:http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/06/opinion/main2538972.shtml