corrente

David Ignatius of WaPo writes:

The [national security] interagency process is completely dysfunctional," says one Republican former Cabinet secretary with decades of foreign-policy expertise. "In my experience, I've never seen it played out this way."

Even the Republican know "wise men" the system is broken—although I assume they're leaking this stuff now so aWol has a chance to patch things up or at least fake it by 2004.

Whatever Rice's political weaknesses, several experts agreed that the current disarray is less her fault than the president's. "In a situation where there are Cabinet-level divisions, something's got to give. That's where I fault the president himself," says the Republican former Cabinet secretary.

Right. And we know how (weak, though vicious) aWol likes to take responsibility...

The administration's poor planning for postwar Iraq is a case study: The effort was hobbled by sharp policy disputes between State and the Pentagon that were never resolved.

For weeks, the two agencies and the CIA quarreled about the personnel and policies that would govern postwar Iraq. The Pentagon dithered in approving State's nominees for the civil administration, which made effective planning almost impossible during the crucial months of March and April.

Adding to the confusion was the bizarre battle over Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmad Chalabi, who became an ideological litmus test for administration neoconservatives.

A similar lack of clarity has hobbled efforts to deal with the North Korean nuclear threat. For two years, hard-liners blocked continuation of the Clinton policy of engaging Pyongyang. When the Bush administration finally reversed itself and decided to hold direct talks, it had wasted crucial time and allowed North Korean to push toward deploying nuclear weapons.

Tell me again why the Republicans are supposed to be better at protecting the country? Somehow, I just keep forgetting.