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The reason for scaling back the barracks? The U.S. government is running out of money. The higher than expected cost of protecting workers against insurgent attacks - about 25 cents of every reconstruction dollar now pays for security - has sent the cost of projects skyward.

The result: Some projects have been eliminated and others cut back.

"American money has dried up," says Brent Rose, chief of program/project management for the Army Corps of Engineers in southern Iraq.

And tracking the billions of dollars that flooded into a war zone in the wake of the U.S.-led invasion has proved difficult, too. Nearly $100 million in reconstruction money is unaccounted for.

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Iraqi households still endure about 10 hours a day of power outages. In Baghdad, the power is out about 14 hours a day, according to the Electricity Ministry. Iraqi power plants are now generating nearly 4,800 megawatts, up from 4,400 before the U.S.-led invasion.

The increase hasn't been enough to keep up with demand. Since the end of the war, demand for electricity has increased by about 60% as Iraqis have bought new refrigerators, televisions, air conditioners and satellite dishes, says a Corps of Engineers spokesman.

The lack of dramatic economic progress has hurt efforts to win over Iraqis, says Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Unemployed young men are more easily drawn into the ranks of the insurgency than those with jobs.

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