Iraq Power Grid Shows U.S. Flaws [Surrender Here]

Los Angeles Times ^ | Sep 12/2004 | T. Christian Miller

[nicollo]

Iraq Power Grid Shows U.S. Flaws

BAIJI, Iraq (news - web sites) — During the 1991 Persian Gulf War (news - web sites), two Tomahawk cruise missiles slammed into the hulking power complex here, leaving dumpster-sized transformers crumpled like balls of tissue paper.

The strike crippled Iraq's largest source of electricity, cutting off almost 10% of the country's power supply. It took two months and 23 days for Iraqi engineers to get the plant running again.

During last year's war, the U.S. military carefully avoided attacks on Iraq's electrical infrastructure, and the plant escaped unscathed. After Baghdad fell, U.S. engineers rushed in with aid to fix the damage from years of disrepair and a spasm of postwar looting.

~snip~

[... and, after all the anguish and blind hope that all-is-not-well that the title implies, we find -- OMG -- buried deep in the story, the real story:]

As the economy has slowly recovered, Iraqis have gone on a spending spree. New air conditioners, refrigerators, microwave ovens and other power-hungry appliances are for sale everywhere as Iraqis dole out long-hoarded cash and the consumer market opens wider than under Hussein.

~ snip ~

[nicollo]

Thought a shot of cartilage would help.

I see the gimmie-gimmie, white flag wavers and associated nuke-em-now crowd are out again today on various threads. No apologies if this thread doesn't make you feel good about having waved the white flag during the April/May Fallujah operations since the "politicians" didn't do as you want. And no apologies if you didn't get to feel so good as you wanted over Najaf. If you really want to enjoy your dissatisfaction, put yourself sometime, oh, say, 1777, 1814, 1863, 1893, 1917, 1932, 1943, 1968, and so on. You'll find a home.

And for this I won't apologize, either: we're winning.

[kayak]

Great find ... both to show success in Iraq and prejudice in the media.

[nicollo]

Thanks & hi, Kay! I needed to vent. Too much hand-wringing around here over the specifics of the war and not enough backbone over the war in general.

Worry is a present-tense disease. Of course we fret, but we musn't let it overcome our faith and purpose. This President is taking the straight line. We must ride it with him.

[Dan Evans]

As the economy has slowly recovered, Iraqis have gone on a spending spree. New air conditioners, refrigerators, microwave ovens and other power-hungry appliances are for sale everywhere

They buried the lead! That should have been up front.

The Iraq war will cause global warming.

[Indie]

Today, 17 months and $172 million later, the Baiji power plant — a vast "Lawrence of Arabia" meets "Blade Runner" complex 125 miles north of Baghdad — produces less than half the electricity it generated when it was built two decades ago.

The Marxist media subtly implying sodomyinsane did it better, of course.

bastards. traitors.