Fight new Iraqi enemy

Will the last American to leave Iraq please turn the lights on?

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other U.S. officials insist that there isn't a deadline for withdrawal. Still, there's a growing sense that the Bush administration wants many U.S. troops to come home soon. Most attention is on political and military issues, but the inability to provide basics such as sanitation, clean water and reliable electrical power is an equally serious threat to timely withdrawal. When Robert Zoellick, second in command at the State Department, went to Fallujah this week, city leaders talked about the insurgency and last year's U.S. offensive to drive rebels from that stronghold, but lack of municipal services was the hottest topic of conversation.

Mr. Rumsfeld, visiting Iraq earlier, admonished government ministers not to award jobs based on religion, ethnicity or bribes but to hire people based on their competence to operate water and power plants and the country's essential departments. The Bush administration's own hiring practices and allegations of still more Halliburton overcharges might cause some to snicker about Mr. Rumsfeld's lectures against cronyism and corruption. His point, however, is valid.

The Los Angeles Times reported this month that of more than 40 water and sewer plants built with American aid and turned over to Iraqis, none is being run correctly. The same is true of 19 electrical plants that U.S. firms -- and dollars -- have repaired. While American taxpayers can be disgruntled about the waste of their money, their irritation is nothing compared to the Iraqis' disgust with continued poor living conditions.

U.S. administrators are schooling Iraqis in politics, helping to work out compromises that resulted in the democratic selection of an interim prime minister, president and parliament speaker who are the proper mix of Shiite, Kurd and Sunni Muslim, respectively. Keeping them on track to write a constitution and hold elections by year's end will be even harder.

The U.S. military continues to train Iraqis to take over for U.S. forces, a frustrating job that must be finished before a U.S. withdrawal, if the new government is to survive. It is becoming clear, though, that training Iraqis to maintain and run power, water and sewer facilities also is important to defeating the insurgency. Iraq's new government must have political power, military power -- and just plain power.