Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome to The New Coffee Room. We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
When Is a Success In Iraq Not a Success?
Topic Started: Apr 28 2007, 03:30 PM (214 Views)
QuirtEvans
Member Avatar
I Owe It All To John D'Oh
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/29/world/mi...1&hp&oref=login

Quote:
 
In a troubling sign for the American-financed rebuilding program in Iraq, inspectors for a federal oversight agency have found that in a sampling of eight projects that the United States had declared successes, seven were no longer operating as designed because of plumbing and electrical failures, lack of proper maintenance, apparent looting and expensive equipment that lay idle.

The United States has previously admitted, sometimes under pressure from federal inspectors, that some of its reconstruction projects have been abandoned, delayed or poorly constructed. But this is the first time inspectors have found that projects officially declared a success — in some cases, as little as six months before the latest inspections — were no longer working properly.

The inspections ranged geographically from northern to southern Iraq and covered projects as varied as a maternity hospital, barracks for an Iraqi special forces unit and a power station for Baghdad International Airport.

At the airport, crucially important for the functioning of the country, inspectors found that while $11.8 million had been spent on new electrical generators, $8.6 million worth were no longer functioning.

At the maternity hospital, a rehabilitation project in the northern city of Erbil, an expensive incinerator for medical waste was padlocked — Iraqis at the hospital could not find the key when inspectors asked to see the equipment — and partly as a result, medical waste including syringes, used bandages and empty drug vials were clogging the sewage system and probably contaminating the water system.

The newly built water purification system was not functioning either.
It would be unwise to underestimate what large groups of ill-informed people acting together can achieve. -- John D'Oh, January 14, 2010.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Copper
Member Avatar
Shortstop

Well if those Iraqis can't be expected to use our help properly then what can we do?
The Confederate soldier was peculiar in that he was ever ready to fight, but never ready to submit to the routine duty and discipline of the camp or the march. The soldiers were determined to be soldiers after their own notions, and do their duty, for the love of it, as they thought best. Carlton McCarthy
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Axtremus
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
Copper
Apr 28 2007, 07:58 PM
Well if those Iraqis can't be expected to use our help properly then what can we do?

I can think of four options:

1. We give up.

2. We try harder.

3. We continue to do what we have been doing, and blame the Iraqi when things continue to fail as it has been failing.

4. Wipe out the Iraqis and put in people who we think can better use our help "properly."

Which would you pick?
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Copper
Member Avatar
Shortstop
Axtremus
Apr 29 2007, 04:59 AM
Copper
Apr 28 2007, 07:58 PM
Well if those Iraqis can't be expected to use our help properly then what can we do?

I can think of four options:

1. We give up.

2. We try harder.

3. We continue to do what we have been doing, and blame the Iraqi when things continue to fail as it has been failing.

4. Wipe out the Iraqis and put in people who we think can better use our help "properly."

Which would you pick?


My post was a comment on the article’s obvious political attack, not on any practical approach to helping people in need.

As the nation best positioned to do so, the US’s answer must always be #2.

The critics, like the Times and the Post and Quirt, can be a pain sometimes, but the answer is still #2.


The Confederate soldier was peculiar in that he was ever ready to fight, but never ready to submit to the routine duty and discipline of the camp or the march. The soldiers were determined to be soldiers after their own notions, and do their duty, for the love of it, as they thought best. Carlton McCarthy
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
ivorythumper
Member Avatar
I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
Copper
Apr 29 2007, 08:10 AM
Axtremus
Apr 29 2007, 04:59 AM
Copper
Apr 28 2007, 07:58 PM
Well if those Iraqis can't be expected to use our help properly then what can we do?

I can think of four options:

1. We give up.

2. We try harder.

3. We continue to do what we have been doing, and blame the Iraqi when things continue to fail as it has been failing.

4. Wipe out the Iraqis and put in people who we think can better use our help "properly."

Which would you pick?


My post was a comment on the article’s obvious political attack, not on any practical approach to helping people in need.

As the nation best positioned to do so, the US’s answer must always be #2.

The critics, like the Times and the Post and Quirt, can be a pain sometimes, but the answer is still #2.

:thumb:
The dogma lives loudly within me.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
« Previous Topic · The New Coffee Room · Next Topic »
Add Reply