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The Half Trillion Dollar War

Posted by NICK RIVERA in War.
Mar 5th, 2008 | 2 responses

According to the National Priorities Project, the War in Iraq has now cost American taxpayers $500 billion. That stands in stark contrast to the $100 billion to $200 billion pricetag estimated by President Bush’s chief economic advisor in September 2002 or the $50 billion to 60$ billion estimate offered by the White House Office of Management and Budget Director in December 2002.

The National Priorities Project explains how it calculates the cost of the war:

The Cost of Iraq War calculator was set to reach $456 billion September 30, 2007, the end of fiscal year 2007. As of October 1, 2007, it is ticking at the same rate, though Congress has not yet appropriated money for fiscal year 2008. The Cost of Iraq War calculator is occasionally reset based on new information and new allocations of funding and will be re-set depending on the decisions made by Congress.

The numbers include military and non-military spending, such as reconstruction. Spending only includes incremental costs, additional funds that are expended due to the war. For example, soldiers’ regular pay is not included, but combat pay is included. Potential future costs, such as future medical care for soldiers and veterans wounded in the war, are not included. It is also not clear whether the current funding will cover all military wear and tear. It also does not account for the Iraq War being deficit-financed and that taxpayers will need to make additional interest payments on the national debt due to those deficits.
The media (and others) sometimes cite a figure that is in excess of our estimate. However, the number cited by the media may include not just the Iraq War, but the Afghanistan War and for enhanced security abroad. Our figure is only covering the cost of the Iraq War as it relates to the U.S. federal budget (and does not include costs to others or other countries or any economic impact costs to Americans).

This number is based on an analysis of the legislation in which Congress has allocated money for war so far and research by the Congressional Research Service (latest report) which has access to Department of Defense financial reports.

To get a better grasp on exactly how much this war is costing American taxpayers, consider this: at the current rate of spending, the war in Iraq is costing approximately:

$100 billion per year

$8.5 billion per month

$280 million per day

$11.7 million per hour

NOTE: This post was cross-posted at The Coming Realignment.

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2 Responses to “The Half Trillion Dollar War”

The Half Trillion Dollar War says:

March 5, 2008 at 8:12 pm

[...] The Moderate Voice – Domestic and international news analysis, irreverent comments, original reporti… has something worth reading today (The Half Trillion Dollar War)Here’s a brief bit, but follow the link for the rest.The Half Trillion Dollar War March 5th, 2008 by Nick Rivera According to the National Priorities Project, the War in Iraq has now cost American taxpayers $500 billion. That stands in stark contrast to the $100 billion to $200 billion pricetag estimated by President Bush’s chief economic advisor in September 2002 or the $50 billion to 60$ billion estimate offered by the White House Office of Management and Budget Director in December 2002. The National Priorities Project explains how it ca [...]
Don Quijote says:

March 6, 2008 at 9:48 am

The three trillion dollar war
The cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts have grown to staggering proportions

Even Lindsey, after noting that the war could cost $200 billion, went on to say: “The successful prosecution of the war would be good for the economy.” In retrospect, Lindsey grossly underestimated both the costs of the war itself and the costs to the economy. Assuming that Congress approves the rest of the $200 billion war supplemental requested for fiscal year 2008, as this book goes to press Congress will have appropriated a total of over $845 billion for military operations, reconstruction, embassy costs, enhanced security at US bases, and foreign aid programmes in Iraq and Afghanistan.

As the fifth year of the war draws to a close, operating costs (spending on the war itself, what you might call “running expenses”) for 2008 are projected to exceed $12.5 billion a month for Iraq alone, up from $4.4 billion in 2003, and with Afghanistan the total is $16 billion a month. Sixteen billion dollars is equal to the annual budget of the United Nations, or of all but 13 of the US states. Even so, it does not include the $500 billion we already spend per year on the regular expenses of the Defence Department. Nor does it include other hidden expenditures, such as intelligence gathering, or funds mixed in with the budgets of other departments.

Because there are so many costs that the Administration does not count, the total cost of the war is higher than the official number. For example, government officials frequently talk about the lives of our soldiers as priceless. But from a cost perspective, these “priceless” lives show up on the Pentagon ledger simply as $500,000 – the amount paid out to survivors in death benefits and life insurance. After the war began, these were increased from $12,240 to $100,000 (death benefit) and from $250,000 to $400,000 (life insurance). Even these increased amounts are a fraction of what the survivors might have received had these individuals lost their lives in a senseless automobile accident. In areas such as health and safety regulation, the US Government values a life of a young man at the peak of his future earnings capacity in excess of

$7 million – far greater than the amount that the military pays in death benefits. Using this figure, the cost of the nearly 4,000 American troops killed in Iraq adds up to some $28 billion.

On the bright side, while we're busy fucking up the Middle East, we're not able to really fuck up some other part of the world.