A SUPERB ARTICLE found here likens the mission in Iraq today to that of the occupying forces in post-war Japan. And note the sanity check from an Army Officer near the end of the extract below.

In recent weeks, commanders have redirected a larger share of the U.S. troops in Iraq to the chores that accompany controlling and operating any large city such as Baghdad: patrolling the streets, staffing prisons, guarding valuable real estate, imposing gun control, restoring electricity and water distribution, and supervising trash collection.
"For the U.S. military to be occupying a country, trying to take charge of basic services, trying to keep order, really trying to make the country work from scratch, this is something we haven't seen since the 1940s," said Thomas Carothers, a foreign-policy expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and a former legal adviser to the State Department.
In some ways, Mr. Carothers said, the task for the U.S. military in Iraq, a country of more than 20 million, is more daunting than that faced by Gen. Douglas MacArthur in Japan 58 years ago. Unlike Iraq, Japan was a more unified society and had a fairly vibrant economy, with people who knew how to run it.
"I think we are just going to see a long, slow road to reconstruction," Mr. Carothers said. "Nothing will happen fast. There will be gradual improvements."...
An Army officer said in an interview that despite negative articles in the U.S. press about Baghdad's reaction to the occupation, the vast majority of Iraqis gladly accept the American presence.
"Only those that accompany troops on patrol see a different reaction of the population from those reporters that write their stories from the Palestine Hotel," said the officer, who asked not to be named. "In the hotel, they cook up stories of chaos and animosity toward our troops. The truth is that 99 percent of the locals are glad we're there."