Iraq: The Wrong Type of Sand - At War Blog - NYTimes.com: "On the very long and expensive list of materials that the American military had to ship to Iraq since 2003 — many of which it is now shipping out again — one might not have expected to find sand.
Yet there it is.
This might seem strange for a country that is 10 parts sand to 1 part water, 1 part oil and 0.1 parts electricity. Counterintuitive. Absurd, even.
However, American commanders overseeing the drawdown of forces and equipment currently under way from Iraq confirm that Iraqi sand was deemed inadequate for the blast walls that have become perhaps the defining visual feature of post-invasion Baghdad and other cities, stretching for mile upon mile around government ministries, airports, military bases and other important buildings."
