The Cost of War and Who Pays For It
Via that ever-present news source, The Washington Leak, Pres. Obama’s decision on Afghanistan, due to be announced on December 1, became known today. He is sending 34,000 more troops:
As it now stands, the plan calls for the deployment over a nine-month period beginning in March of three Army brigades from the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Ky., and the 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum, N.Y., and a Marine brigade from Camp Lejeune, N.C., for as many as 23,000 additional combat and support troops.
In addition, a 7,000-strong division headquarters would be sent to take command of U.S.-led NATO forces in southern Afghanistan — to which the U.S. has long been committed — and 4,000 U.S. military trainers would be dispatched to help accelerate an expansion of the Afghan army and police.
[...]
The administration’s plan contains “off-ramps,” points starting next June at which Obama could decide to continue the flow of troops, halt the deployments and adopt a more limited strategy or “begin looking very quickly at exiting” the country, depending on political and military progress, one defense official said.
“We have to start showing progress within six months on the political side or military side or that’s it,” the U.S. defense official said.
The McClatchy article also indicated that the cost of this escalation could go as high as a trillion dollars (and if history is any guide, I’m sure it could go higher than that), and that it might not be possible for Obama to pay for it solely out of the existing defense budget.
33 Responses to “The Cost of War and Who Pays For It”
It took long enough for him to make a decision. Let's see how it pans out.
I suspect that Congress will cave in and give him the money. No tax increase for the rich. No shared comittment by the country.
Glad to see you post again, Kathy, and good catch!
Obama said today “After eight years, some of those years in which we did not have either the resources or the strategy to get the job done, it is my intention to finish the job. I feel very confident that when the American people hear a clear rationale for what we’re doing there and how we intend to achieve our goals, they will be supportive.”
I really hope so. As your title implies, now comes the time to assess the cost and decide the who's and how's of paying for it.
Dorian
Chief!!! Gosh, it's good to see you here.
(Chief is my co-blogger at Liberty Street, where these days he is holding up the fort mostly on his own.)
The “surtax” idea that's been mentioned in the news is typical class-warfare BS.
Meanwhile, ObamaCo is not going to change the [Evil] Bush policy on land mines.
(Obama must have conceded to reality in places like, say, the Koreas. Not to mention facing a need to seal or at least try to secure the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan…)
Hi Chief, nice to see you here, and thanks Kathy for telling us who Chief is… we all have a series of forts we're trying to hold, arent we? Yes. lol.
dr.e
deputy managing editor tmv
Thank you for the kind welcome. I hope that I can contribute something worthwhile.
As long as Me, My Password & Disqus don't get sideways I'll keep commenting.
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Now we know exactly who pays for these wars, and unfortunately it isn't the criminals who started them…
There has only been one kind of class warfare in this country for the last thirty years, the top 5% against everyone else, and everyone else has had their asses handed to them…
Getting the wealthy to pay a surtax for a war 50% of America doesn't want is a lot cheaper than drafting their asses and sending them to Afghanistan…
Besides which I thought you wanted to see the budget balanced… or did you mean balanced on the back of the poor, the working class and the middle class…
At one time income taxes and corporate taxes shared an equal burden. Now corporate taxes are just 1/4 of what the people pay. There is class warfare and the wealthy are robbing us blind. The trickle down/voodoo economics/neoliberal crowd wants that even lower…
I don't know about those other groups, but what I'd like to see is a fix in the laws and handouts that allow that wealth to be concentrated. In freer societies, rich people usually raise spoiled kids that squander their accumulated wealth while others figure out new businesses and technologies that allow them to become wealthy. When the same groups are rich for several generations, they've got a government supported lock on their wealth.
Prof Like the Kennedy, Hilton and Bush families…
The “surtax” idea that's been mentioned in the news is typical class-warfare BS.
Right. The wealthy surely aren't fighting this war, but they would have been the main benificiaries of the cheap energy the war in Iraq was supposed to bring. A certain subset of wealthy (including defense industry investors) has also benefitted enormously from the non-competitive government contracts that have been laviously and unaccountably dolled out. Yet, it is mostly the poor and middle class kids who have had their limbs blown off, suffered TBI, or have committed suicide over the stress of combat. And attempting to make the beneficiaries of the war pay a little bit for its execution is class warfare on the wealthy?? Reallly?!
I'm sorry DLS, but this is typical conservative elitist BS. Rah! Rah! Rah for war after war, unless you are asked to pay for it in blood or taxes. Rah! Rah! Rah for the troops, unless it means taxes for veteran benefits.
I'm more curious as to why we're still hearing about Rockerfellers, but yes, those are interesting also. The Bush family history is a subject in and of itself.
We are all going to pay for the wars and all the other 'big” problems that the government needs to fix, regardless of surtax or not. I have no problem with a surtax, however, since it focuses on the wars and perhaps could do some good especially if the monies would be used exclusively for the troops problems that are underfunded.
Welcome chief, I hope you aren't right but I'm afraid you will be. I don't think Americans as a whole have shared the sacrifice in any war since WWII, and that is, in a word, wrong. As we can see even in this thread, there a people who are fine with that disconnect from shared accountability. How will we ever have a country that is unified when there are so many forces dedicated to seeing it remain divided?
Looks like he is opting mid way between the medium and high risk options McCrystal outlines. Maybe he will send more and reduce the risk to better levels in the future, but it kinda reminds me of Rumsfeld not listening to Shinseki. Have to wait and see.
http://redirectingat.com/?id=593X1004&url=http%…
Well, Donald, I don't think the US Treasury will return your check if you happen to be the type of individual that is willing to put his money where his mouth is.
Then again, if you need the government to tell you what you should do, you're in a bit more of a quandry. I recall this same surtax being proposed by this same Dem rep in the same Dem majority House 2 years ago.
If the Dems didn't have the chutzpah to raise it as a protest against George Bush, are you telling me they will now have the chutzpah to foist it upon dear leader, who already has a plurality against him for his handling of Afghanistan.
Oh yes, for the record, I am not in favor of the troop surge since the liberals will be sure to be writing articles about how the fiscal conservatives don't want to spend on healthcare, yet want to spend on Afghanistan. Sorry to disappoint.
Hey, casual, If one could earmark checks for specific purposes, then I would send a check. However, I know that sending a check to any government is like giving a teenager a bottle of booze and the keys to the car. I'm not in a quandary, except when I try to be a moderate, and perhaps times have changed and the Dems, of which I am not, could do what they do best, namely dust off an old proposal and this time it might fly.
I did not vote for O and unlike many others of his own party, have a little more patience than they.
I think O should be commended for this move, because I believe he is listening, on this one, and not campaigning for a change. Furthermore, I think it took some balls to do this because it might lessen the possibility of a HCR bill (not enough money for a war on HCR and Af/Pak) which I am against (the current bill, not HCR).
I will say it again, a universal military draft will hold most of the answer as to “Who pays for it.”
We will then find out how few are willing to pay for it.
Sadly, because such an answer is not acceptable to most of those who start and advance these wars, I realize we will not see such an answer.
As Jspecer said: I don't think Americans as a whole have shared the sacrifice in any war since WWII, and that is, in a word, wrong.
And, I believe, we had the draft until 1973, so the draft does not cure everything, and certainly not “those who start and advance these wars”.
BTW: Since we can just print more money, how much does it cost to set a draft up?
“how much does it cost to set a draft up?”
Of course, I don't know this, albeit I am sure we can find out.
But I am willing to bet that the costs will pale when compared to the costs of one of our “wars of choice,” and I am not even talking about the human toll.
Maybe we can get the OMB working on that “cost”.
BTW: O said the Af/Pak was a war of necessity, not choice. I guess he didn't flip flop.
I was referring more to our invasion and occupation of Iraq as a “war of choice.”
Afghanistan, at least the initial phases, we were going after the 9/11 perpetrators.
The “surtax” idea that's been mentioned in the news is typical class-warfare BS.
It is so incredibly revealing that a surtax on wealthy Americans to pay for continuing a war that has gone on for eight years now would be considered “typical class warfare,” but cutting domestic spending to pay for the war would not be considered “typical class warfare” at all.
Class warfare only happens to the rich, because they are the only ones that own publications that say so.
Does a surtax have to only be for “wealthy Americans”. People here are talking about a full fledged Draft. Wouldn't that include “wealthy” and not so? So, if you are for a surtax, it might violate O's promise not to go below 250K.
LOL, good point, MSF.
Comment moved to be a reply to dduck.
A full-fledged draft never includes the wealthy. In order for a full-fledged draft to include the wealthy, it would have to include a no-deferments policy, and that's even less likely to happen than the draft itself.
Some people advocate it, practical or not. No Deferments, means no Draft bill. “It's politics, stupid.”
“incredibly revealing that a surtax on wealthy Americans to pay for continuing a war that has gone on for eight years now would be considered 'typical class warfare' [unrelated material deleted]“
No, Kathy, but rather incredibly obvious. Anyone who knows reality (and understands English) knows this already, too, and doesn't feel the need to reject reality and question it or reject it or disparage it.
You should also not be “surprised” (and I'll be disappointed to encounter any expression of surprise, later, by you, were we subjected to it) to see the surtax threshold and definition of “wealthy” (in this case, as is customary, actually meaning a high income) begin to be reduced, broadening the tax base (once it is again “discovered” tardily and reluctantly that there aren't enough “rich” otherwise to tax to raise the desired revenue).
Also, don't be surprised, or disparage, that the sun will appear to move from east to west tomorrow in the sky.
“cutting domestic spending to pay for the war would not be considered 'typical class warfare' at all.”
First of all, it obviously isn't. Second, perhaps you don't realize that most spending doesn't benefit primarily (much less exclusively) the poor, or isn't “regressive” (with respect to incomes) in nature.