From: Hubert Mania (mania@welfen-netz.com)
Date: Thu Sep 27 2001 - 02:01:48 MDT
Robert Bradbury wrote:
> However, the suggestion under discussion in this thread needs
> a reality check.
>
> What was the population of Berlin during the airlift?
> A few million?
About 2,5 million.
>What is the population of Afghanistan?
> 28 million. That looks something like 28000 *tons* of
> food per day. The payload capacity of a C5 is ~92 tons
> and the C17 is even less at 77 tons. So you are talking about
> something like 300+ air missions per day.
Well, thatīs the reality shock I was not prepared for. Robert, when I
suggested to get the raisin bomber fleet started I was not thinking at all
about feeding 28 million people every day for a long term. I knew it could
only have a small impact, not much more than a symbolic effect. But then:
there are 19 countries as memebers of the NATO and every nation could send
some of its aircrafts with its most famous food on board: French cheese,
Italian pasta, German bread, and so on.
> The right way to do this is via a truck
> convoy with the obvious problem that you will need to
> control the roads over which the trucks travel.
You`re probably right. It can`t be effectively done before the roads are
under control. And considering the danger of being shot by Taliban missiles,
as Damien and others have objected, it will - at least in this historically
symbolic form - remain a dream.
For a minute, the raisin bomber proposal seemed to make sense, if you had
seen the German secretary of defence. He is a non-martial softie, a little
short sighted, stumbles oer his own feet most of times but - best of all -
he is madly in love with his new woman, so serotonine, endorphines and other
hormones with funny names all pop up at the right places in his brain. He is
so damn happy right now, you won`t believe he has anything to do with German
war business and he'd rather vote for a love peace and happiness ralley in
Afghanistan than helping to kill a single Taliban.
You may say I`m a dreamer. But, imagine ... there is a war and all innocent
civilians will be fed.
humania
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