Agence France-Press spins Iraq

The other day I posted a story about Iraq's energy minister announcing the expectation that Iraq would produce excess power by 2011.

Now I see AFP, the French state news source, announcing that the minister said that the power grid would not be "restored" until 2011.

That's a big difference, and at the bottom line the AFP story is not justified.

Iraq has been through three major wars in the last thirty years. Before that, in the 1970s, the power grid may have been in pretty good shape. During the long years of war against Iran, the power grid suffered because Iraq poured its resources overwhelmingly into its own defense. After a few years respite, Hussein invaded Kuwait and his country suffered extensive bombing aimed at infrastructure during the Gulf War.

Operation Iraqi Freedom also targeted infrastructure to prepare for the ground invasion.

It is ridiculous to imply that the electricity infrastructure in 2002 serves as the aim for 2011. It was a mess. In addition, energy demand has gone way up since 2002.

I note that Eli Lake of The New York Sun reports the story differently, saying that Baghdad in particular will be supplied at levels that approximate pre-war electrical service. That is at least a more realistic way to report the story than did AFP.