t he p erils of o ptimism 297the victorious American soldiers and Marines occupied key points in
the city. Too few U.S. troops were on hand, though, to establish real
order in Baghdad, and massive looting occurred at ministries, museums,
hospitals, and other public sites. American soldiers did protect the Iraqi
oil ministry, which unfortunately suggested to the Iraqi people an
ulterior motive behind the invasion.
Saddam’s departure marked the accomplishment of the fi rst major
objective—regime change—that Bush had established. Organized
fi ghting by Iraqi army units petered out as the soldiers disappeared into
the population. Most Iraqi offi cials likewise chose to lay low; government
ministries, utilities, and more ceased to operate. In many places Amer-
ican and coalition forces received the kind of welcome that Wolfowitz
had predicted in his response to Shinseki. Rumsfeld, with his invasion
plan evidently vindicated by the results, believed he had demonstrated
the validity of the doctrinal revolution he had been struggling to
impose on a recalcitrant military. Reluctantly, he agreed to the request
by McKiernan to commit the unused 4th Infantry Division to support
Phase IV operations, but another reserve division would not be
deployed. Th at the unsettled security situation in Iraq did not trouble
the defense secretary became clear when he dismissed the outbreak of
large-scale looting with his famous “Stuff happens” retort. His attitude
signaled to the troops on the ground that the looting was not their
concern.
As for a second purpose for invading Iraq, eliminating the WMD
threat, the arriving troops turned up nothing, and despite vigorous
search efforts in the following months no such weapons were ever
found. Th e administration subsequently trumpeted fragments of evi-
dence to suggest that Saddam had preserved the capacity to reconsti-
tute his programs at some future date. Even this was a stretch: facilities
for producing chemical agents that might be converted into weapons
also had benign civilian uses. Over time, the administration would
insist it had acted in good faith, that Saddam refused to prove he did
not have WMD and was still a danger, but damage was done to the
president’s credibility. It took time for the information about the lack
of unconventional weapons to sink in back home, but at least half the
public later said it would be less likely to believe such claims by Bush
in the future.