October 9, 2003

ALMOST TOO EASY:

Iraq's electricity supply is finally restored to pre-war level (Jack Fairweather, 08/10/2003, Daily Telegraph)

After six months and an outlay of £80 million, Iraq's American-led administration said yesterday that it had finally restored the electricity supply to pre-war levels.

The milestone is one the administration has been eager to reach after a summer of blackouts and deepening resentment among Iraqis over the time taken to restore basic services.

Increasing the nation's power supply further is now at the centre of reconstruction efforts.


Two years after WWII, Europeans were living on something like 800 calories a day.

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 9, 2003 4:36 PM
Comments

Well, WW2 lasted a little longer than two weeks.

Posted by: M Ali Choudhury at October 9, 2003 5:14 PM

Though an awful lot shorter than the 12 years the Iraq War took.

Posted by: oj at October 9, 2003 5:21 PM

Bombing started on the 20th of March and the war was effectively declared over on the 15th of April.

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_Iraq_war_timeline

Everything since has been minor skirmishing.

Posted by: M Ali Choudhury at October 9, 2003 5:59 PM

Most pre- and post-war comparisons have tended to be very Bagdadh-centric, and thus highly misleading. Saddam deprived most areas outside of the Sunni-traingle to satisfy his "constituencies=thugocracy". Outside of Bagdadh return to normality was much quicker, and in many ways is now outstripping it.

Posted by: MG at October 9, 2003 7:14 PM

Bombing started in January 1991.

Posted by: oj at October 9, 2003 7:19 PM

Source for that? I don't believe any large population con survive 2 years on an average 800 calories/day.

Posted by: Harry Eagar at October 10, 2003 4:23 PM

Here's one:

http://www.usembassy.de/usa/etexts/burtstutt5688e.htm

I recall the number from William Manchester's Power and the Glory (I think, might have been Paul Johnson's Modern Times, or both)

But just put Marshall Plan calories per day Europe in a search engine and you'll find numerous references.

Posted by: oj at October 10, 2003 4:28 PM
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