"This includes allowing 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi businesses in all economic sectors except oil."

If only we would do here what we tell Iraq it should do.

"Permitting foreign ownership of banks helps ensure that capital markets won't be repressed by the state as an act of political favortism."

To quibble, it also means that there's no political downsides to nationalizing the banks; it's not like Iraqis will lose anything.

Hopefully this succeeds, because a prosperous Iraq is just as important as a democratic Iraq in converting the hearts and minds of Iraqis and those in neighboring countries.

reverting back is redundant and annoying

Sorry to burst the bubble, but the positive twist given to Kamil Mubdir al-Gailani’s policies is a little too heavy on the academic benefits of a free market, and a little too unconsidering of the reality of Iraq. In reality Kamil’s statement and planned actions have nothing to do with opening the market to the advantage of the Iraqi people and are all about establishing control. Control of an emerging market before it emerges. Controlling access to Iraqi markets and funneling gain into his and his associate’s pockets. A game Chalabi knows well (Kamil is only another maw to feed his master).

Two points missing in the post: 1) Bremer was reported to be livid with Chalabi/Kamil on this issue and was vociferously opposed (though the last few days strangely silent; not a good thing) 2) Kamil’s policies allow gains to flow out of Iraq, removing the restriction that capital gains must remain and be reinvested in Iraq. Great for foriegn investors, not good today for Iraq.

I really hope Bremer can rein this back. But without high level Administration support behind him, it’s a done deal. This kind of economic policy change, at this juncture, is a very bad thing for Iraqi reconstruction.

In ten years when we look back on the history of the Iraqi reconstruction there will of course be good and bad. But when all of the bad are categorized and studied - all of the abortive strategies and tactics, false starts and misconceived good intentions attempted by the US in this matter are considered - the support of Chalabi will stand as one of, if not the, major blunder by the US during this time.

I want to be wrong about this, but I have a feeling that what we’re seeing now is just the opening gambit to a really bad nightmare

An Iraq that is not prosperous stands no chance to be a stable democracy. There is no long-term downside to this plan. Free trade indisputably has more benefits than unfree trade. For all the criticism of NAFTA (jobs were, in fact, lost), objective analysis reveals it was much to our advantage (economic statistics show that the loss of jobs was more than made up for by the benefit to consumers of less expensive goods and job gains in the export sector).

Agree, there is no long-term downside to free trade. But this plan is not about free trade, it is about consolidating political and economic control. I've lived, worked and developed relationships in the Middle East for 20 years. I know the culture and the business environment and seen where and how it can work effectively and where it goes awry. Kamil’s plan plays to the worst aspects of Middle East business conduct. If it goes forward as Chalabi would like the end result will not be a free democracy but a dictatorship behind a democratic store front bolstered by a bureaucracy based on influence and graft worse than anything currently in the Middle East. This is Chalabi et al playing the rhetoric as a smoke-screen to consolidate control, grabbing foreign investors by the purse to get the vested interest hooked and added to support his personal agenda. Using international financial concerns to mitigate US restraint on himself and the provisional Iraqi council by leveraging the influence of global, international investors (US, European, Russian, Asian Rim) where the money ties much more easily pass, and influence directly on, the national agendas of these nations which Chalabi cannot reach directly. Iraq has an opportunity to start fresh and this is a wonderful thing to establish the free market the rhetoric implies. But it is also a wonderful opportunity to completely fill this vacuum with an influence-based bureaucratic structure that will completely disenfranchise the Iraqi people and take decades, if ever, for the Iraqi’s to recover from. Absolutely, Iraq needs free trade and a free market to prosper and support its evolving democracy. But to achieve this takes time and patience. There are valid reasons for the time-table the Administration and the US’s Iraqi reconstruction team has set to build-up to free elections. These same reasons apply to establishing financial market freedoms. Kamil’s plan will undermine both.