Last night at 11 p.m. in Baghdad, heavily armed American soldiers in flak jackets and helmets stormed the headquarters of the Iraqi National Congress, a pro-American group that has been working for years to bring freedom and democracy to Iraq. “It was just like a movie,” our correspondent in Baghdad, Adam Daifallah, reported to us by satellite phone after the raid, which he witnessed firsthand. The U.S. Army burst into the Hunting Club, where the INC has been based, and ordered the 30 to 35 Iraqis present to lie on their stomachs. “Shut up,” they shouted, binding the wrists of the Iraqi National Congress officials with temporary handcuffs. One man who wouldn’t stop talking had his mouth taped shut. The Iraqis were held for an hour as the American troops searched the compound for illegal weapons.

The raid was apparently carried out on the basis of a tip. But there are any number of people in Baghdad with motivations to cast aspersions on the INC. It could have been a rival faction or even someone still loyal to Saddam Hussein.

The troops sent to carry out the raid were 18-year-olds who hardly knew what the INC was. But they seem to have a better understanding of the principles of international relations than whoever is giving them orders. When our Mr. Daifallah tried to explain to the American GIs that the people they were handcuffing were pro-American, one soldier remarked, “Well, they won’t be pro-American anymore, I guess.”

No occupation is perfect. American troops performed superbly in liberating Iraq, and the world owes them and their commanders a debt of gratitude. Yet by such actions as last night’s raid can the peace be lost. The leader of the Iraqi National Congress, Mr. Chalabi, has testified before Congress and met with Vice President Cheney. The INC was authorized by the American government to receive Pentagon funds. Mr. Chalabi and his allies have fought for years to unseat Saddam at great personal risk. Yet they are thanked by an America that raids their beachhead of freedom as if it were one of Saddam’s lairs or a ghetto crackhouse. Given the security problems in Iraq — snipers on the roads between Kuwait City and Baghdad, agents of Iran at work trying to establish an Islamic terrorist state, looting and shooting in the streets — the most charitable description of the decision to send troops to raid the INC compound is that it was just unbelievably boneheaded.

It’s unclear at what level of the American military or civilian leadership the decision to raid the INC compound was made. The correct response in the immediate instance would be for someone serious in Washington — President Bush, Vice President Cheney, or Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld — to find out and to order whoever was responsible to apologize to the Iraqi National Congress. There may be a role here for some of the leaders of both political parties — like Senators Kyl, Lieberman, or Brownback — who helped pass the Iraq Liberation Act in 1998.

But righting last night’s error will require more than an apology. One way to prevent something like it from happening again would be to assign Americans fluent in Arabic and sophisticated about Iraqi politics and history to escort and guide every squad of U.S. troops patrolling Baghdad. But given that there are only perhaps a dozen Americans who would qualify for such a task, the better alternative is for our side immediately to start working more closely with the pro-American, pro-democracy, pro-freedom Iraqis, giving them the authority to rule Iraq, training their free Iraqi security forces. The American troops would remain under American command, but work with the new Iraqi government. The sooner America ceases to be an occupier in Iraq and starts to be a support for the new Iraqi government, the less likely it is that there will be another disaster like last night’s raid on the most pro-American faction in the country.