War Costs.

Costs of War.

US cost of war at least $3.7 trillion and counting ...

By Daniel Trotta, Reuter's Correspondent.

War Notes. By Uncle Monty.

US War Images From WWW.

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When President Barack Obama cited cost as a reason

 to bring troops home from Afghanistan, he referred to

a $1 trillion price tag for America’s wars.

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Staggering as it is, that figure grossly underestimates the

 total cost of wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan to the

US Treasury and ignores more imposing costs yet to come,

 according to a study released last Wednesday.

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The final bill will run at least $3.7 trillion and could reach

as high as $4.4 trillion, according to the research project 

‘Costs of War’ by Brown University’s Watson Institute for

International Studies. (http://www.costsofwar.org/)

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In the 10 years since US troops went into Afghanistan to root

out the Al Qaeda leaders behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks,

spending on the conflicts totaled $2.3 trillion to $2.7 trillion.

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Those numbers will continue to soar when considering often

overlooked costs such as long-term obligations to wounded

veterans and projected war spending from 2012 through 2020.

The estimates do not include at least $1 trillion more in interest

 payments coming due and many billions more in expenses

 that cannot be counted, according to the study.

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In human terms, 224,000 to 258,000

 people have died directly from warfare,

including 125,000 civilians in Iraq. Many

more have died indirectly, from the

 loss of clean drinking water, healthcare,

and nutrition. An additional 365,000

 have been wounded and 7.8 million

 people — equal to the combined

 population of Connecticut and

Kentucky — have been displaced.

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‘Costs of War’ brought together more than 20 academics

 to uncover the expense of war in lives and dollars, a daunt-

ing task given the inconsistent recording of lives lost and

what the report called opaque and sloppy accounting

 by the US Congress and the Pentagon.

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The report underlines the extent to which war will continue

 to stretch the US federal budget, which is already on an

 unsustainable course due to an aging American population

and skyrocketing healthcare costs. It also raises the

question of what the United States gained from its

 multitrillion-dollar investment. ‘I hope that when we

 look back, whenever this ends, something very good

has come out of it,’ Senator Bob Corker, a Republican

 from Tennessee, told Reuters in Washington.

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SEPT 11, 2001: THE DAMAGE CONTINUES ...

In one sense, the report measures the cost of 9/11, the

American shorthand for the events of Sept. 11, 2001.

Nineteen hijackers plus other Al Qaeda plotters spent

an estimated $400,000 to $500,000 on the plane attacks

that killed 2,995 people and caused $50 billion to $100

 billion in economic damages. What followed were three

 wars in which $50 billion amounts to a rounding error.

 For every person killed on Sept. 11, another 73

have been killed since.

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Was it worth it? That is a question many people want

 answered, said Catherine Lutz, head of the anthropology

department at Brown and co-director of the study. ‘We

decided we needed to do this kind of rigorous assessment

of what it cost to make those choices to go to war,’ she

 said. ‘Politicians, we assumed, were not going to do that

kind of assessment.’ The report arrives as Congress

debates how to cut a US deficit projected at $1.4

 trillion this year, roughly a 10th of which can be

attributed to direct war spending.

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What did the United States gain for its trillions?

Strategically, the results for the United States are mixed.

Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein are dead, but Iraq

 and Afghanistan are far from stable democracies. Iran has

 gained influence in the Gulf and the Taleban, though ousted

 from government, remain a viable military force

in Afghanistan.

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‘The United States has been extremely successful in pro-

tecting the homeland,’ said George Friedman, founder

 of STRATFOR, a U.S.-based intelligence company.

‘Al Qaeda in Afghanistan was capable of mounting very

sophisticated, complex, operations on an intercontinental

 basis. That organization with that capability has not

 only been substantially reduced, it seems to have

been shattered,’ Friedman said.

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Economically, the results are also mixed. War spending 

may be adding half a percentage point a year to growth

 in the gross domestic product but that has been more than

offset by the negative effects of deficit spending, the

 report concludes.

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COMPREHENSIVE STUDY

Some US government reports have attempted to assess the

costs of war, notably a March 2011 Congressional Research

 Service report that estimated post-Sept. 11 war funding at

 $1.4 trillion through 2012. The Congressional Budget Office

 projected war costs through 2021 at $1.8 trillion.

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A ground-breaking private estimate was published in the

2008 book ‘The Three Trillion Dollar War,’ by Linda Bilmes,

 a member of the Watson Institute team, and Nobel-winning

economist Joseph Stiglitz. That work revealed how much

 cost was added by interest on deficit spending

and medical care for veterans.

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The report draws on those sources and pieces together

many others for a more comprehensive picture. The report

also makes special note of Pakistan, a front not generally

 mentioned along with Iraq and Afghanistan. War has pro-

bably killed more people in Pakistan than in neighboring

Afghanistan, the report concludes.

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Politicians throughout history have underestimated the costs

of war, believing they will be shorter and less deadly than 

reality, said Neta Crawford, the other co-director of the

report and a political science professor at Boston University.

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The report said former President George W. Bush’s adminis-

tration was ‘shamelessly politically driven’ in underestimating

Iraq war costs before the 2003 invasion. Most official sources

continue to overlook costs, largely because of a focus on

just Pentagon spending, Crawford said. ‘Over the las de-

cade, we have spent a trillion dollars on war,’ Obama said in

last week’s speech on reducing US troop levels in Afghanistan.

 At the very least, he was rounding down by $200 billion to

 $300 billion, when counting US congressional appropriations

 for the post 9/11 wars. ‘I don’t know what the president

 knows, but I wish it were a trillion,’ Crawford said. ‘It

would be better if it were a trillion.’

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ELUSIVE NUMBER

In theory, adding up the dollars spent and lives lost should be

 a statistical errand. The US Congress appropriates the money,

and a life lost on battlefield should have a death certificate and

a casket to match. The team quickly discovered, however,

the task was far more complicated.

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Specific war spending over the past 10 years, when expressed

in 2011 dollars, comes to $1.3 trillion, the ‘Costs of War’

project found. When it comes to accounting for every dollar,

that $1.3 trillion is merely a good start. Since the wars have

been financed by deficit spending, interest must be paid —

$185 billion of accumulated so far. The Pentagon has received

an additional $326 billion to $652 billion beyond what can be

attributed to the war appropriations, the study found.

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Homeland security spending has totaled another $401 billion

so far that can be traced to Sept. 11. War-related foreign

aid: another $74 billion. Then comes caring for US veterans

 of war. Nearly half of the 1.25 million who have served in

 uniform in Iraq and Afghanistan have used their status as

veterans to make health or disability claims at an expense

of $32.6 billion to date. Those costs will soar over the

next 40 years as veterans age. The report estimates the

US obligations to the veterans will reach $589

 billion to $934 billion through 2050. So far, those

 numbers add up to a low estimate of $2.9 trillion and

 a moderate estimate of $3.6 trillion in costs to the US

Treasury. No high estimate was offered. ‘We feel a

conservative measure of costs is plenty large to attract

 attention,’ said report contributor Ryan Edwards, an

economist who studied the war impact on deficit spending.

Those numbers leave out hundreds of billions in social

costs not born by the US taxpayer but by veterans and their

families: another $295 billion to $400 billion, increasing the

range of costs to date to some $3.2 trillion to $4 trillion.

That’s a running total through fiscal 2011. Add another

 $453 billion in war-related spending projected for 2012 to

2020 and the total grows to $3.668 trillion to $4.444 trillion.

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THE HUMAN TOLL

If the financial costs are elusive, so too is the human

toll. The report estimates between 224,475 and 257,655

 have been killed in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan,

though those numbers give a false sense of precision.

There are many sources of data on civilian deaths,

most with different results.

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The civilian death toll in Iraq — 125,000 — and the

 number of Saddam’s security forces killed in invasion

 — 10,000 — are loose estimates. The US military does

not publish a thorough accounting. ‘We don’t do body

 counts,’ Tommy Franks, the US commander in Iraq,

famously said after the fall of Saddam in 2003.

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In Afghanistan, the civilian death count ranges from

11,700 to 13,900. For Pakistan, where there is little

 access to the battlefield and the United States fights

mostly through aerial drone attacks, the study found it

impossible to distinguish between civilian and insurgent

deaths. The numbers only consider direct deaths —

 people killed by bombs or bullets. Estimates for indirect

deaths in war vary so much that researchers considered

 them too arbitrary to report. ‘When the fighting stops,

 the indirect dying continues. It’s in fact worse than land

mines. The healthcare system is still in bad shape. People

are still suffering the effects of malnutrition and

so on,’ Crawford said.

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Even where the United States does do body counts —

for the members of the military — the numbers may come

 up short of reality, said Lutz, the study’s co-director. When

(US) veterans return home, they are more likely to die in

 suicides and automobile accidents.

‘The rate of chaotic behavior,’ she said, ‘is high.’

http://warnewsupdates.blogspot.com/

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Uncle Monty With Victoria Cross Holder
British Lance Corporal Johnson Beharry, VC.

Mentality of War.

 By Uncle Monty
£££
The American mentality of war is part of it's "Culture

of Death" that is seen in its long history of violence and

murder. The graveyards of America from sea to shining
sea are full of men and women who have died for no
other reason than because of America's insatiable
appetite wage war at home and abroad. From the 19th
 century American Civil War to 20th century Vietnam
 War  to the present 21st century Afghanistan & Iraq
 Wars, Americans have slaughtered millions of people 
whoever dare gets in their way no matter how ugly or
how unjust or how murderous and how useless such
wars are. But our American cousins never, never,

 learn that their wars bring sorrow and hate with
 it all. The US Military not only brutalizes its own
 soldiers, but everybody and everything else
 that comes in its brutal and violent wake.

£££
America's has created a 21st century version of the
Medievel Crusades with its tentacles of war around the
 world. American patroitism is utterly blind to the sorrow
 and anguish that their militay has inflicted on the world
 due to their insatiable appetite for war and more war.
 Such wars will eventually bankrupt Empire America, if
it isn't already close to that with its projected $3.7
 trillion just for its latest wars in Afghanistan,, Iraq,
 and now with its "Drones War" inside Pakistan
and even at Somalia of recent days.
£££
Imagine what America could have done so good with

such trillions of dollars instead of on such endless wars
 that at the final reckoning isn't worth all the loss of lives,
the destruction of other people's countries, their welfare
and their safety! The hatred and anti-Yankee sentiments 
will live on for generations to come with the utter arro-
gance of Empire America toward the rest of the world
 while its international business of indiscriminate deaths
that keeps rolling on and on, nonstop! The human families
on both sides of America's wars are left bereaved and
 uncomforted be the sheer brutrality of it all, the harm to
the environment and habitat of all living creatures, and in
the end America no longer wepts for the war crimes and
criminal behavour of those who serve the war powers of
 such war makers like vile and ignorant George W.
Bush & odious and wicked lackey Tony Blair.
£££
As the British military theorist Capt. Sir Basil Liddell-Hart
 noted years ago, that battle or war fatigue eventually takes
 its toll. Such will surely come for the American military at a
 point of no return no matter with all its trillions of war money
 that spectre of fatigue will become real and at that point
America will start to lose its place as the world's most
militant military force in the world. Once that happens, and
 it will sooner or later, the Chinese will take their place as
the world's supreme military power with America simply
fading with its "has been" warriors of yesteryear's
 modern warfare.
£££
As for the costs of war, the US, of course, always has
 the option of printing billions more in greenbacks or Yankee 
dollars, which it already probably has done for its war costs.
America could become like the Nazis in WWII and print
 money to the point of it becoming almost worthless at
where one will need $100 or 100 bucks to buy a loft of
 bread from Wal-Mart because the dollar has become
almost worthless to pay for the the costs of their
non-ending wars around the world.
£££
And, will America withdraw from the world stage?
 Yes, if China emerges as super, super, military power,
which it surely will, by becoming the world's mightiest
military power on earth. Such will make America look
 like Kentucky ROTC college recruits! As for Iran -
still getting stonger day by day and the archenemy of
Israel and the US - the chances of an Israeli and/or
 US military attack aganist the Islamic Republic, still
stands. And what if Iran decides to first attack Israel 
 or even the US? Is that possible? You bet!
Anything is possible when the desire for war rears
 its ugly head be it Christian or Islamic or Jewish.
War making is a human condition that is driven by
prevailing factors of religion, geopolitics, national
culture, or burning ideaoloy of whatever nation or
government or people decide to go to war. And
above all, such is due to the "Culture of Death" that
is so prevalent in the American, Iranian, and Israeli
 political mindset of today that points to further
wars beyond Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and
even Somalia of late.
£££
The Founding Father of Amercia - Washington, Jefferson,
Adams, etc. - must be turning in their graves at the folly of
 modern America's failure to learn from past wars and the
huge costs like the Vietnam War and the American Civil
War that today's Americans have totally and blissfully 
ignored. Such is all always present in the mentality of the
warmonger who invariably ignores the history of their own
wars that everybody else must then suffer from because
of such mindless pro-war idiots like Bush and Blair,
 and now Obama ...
£££
I've never known of a war not started because of what
it would first cost. Warmongers act out their war plans
no matter what because of their mental pathology that
borders on a kind of irrationality and insanity that
consumes their every thought and lifestyle before,
during, and after their wars. Such warmongers in power
 demand more taxes from the people to pay for whatever
war is in vogue at any given time. It always seems those
 political liberals and foul-mouth leftists on the surface
are oftentimes the most pro-war and most pro-death!!
Of course, nationalists like Bush sometimes do the same.
£££
With the 10th Anniversary of America's 9/11 just weeks
away, it seems the American people are no further away
from their pathological revenge to the attacks by Islamists
 on the US. It will take generations to reduce such pathology
of revenge that will see trillions more dollars wasted and
countless more lives killed or destroyed in the name of
America's modern war mentality that is rooted in its
 historic and national character. "In God We Trust,"
should be read as "In Wars We Trust."
Shame then on America ...
£££
USS Ronald Reagan.

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But one day, it will all come to an end as the Chinese start
 to dictate who is "the new kid on the block" and America
with wither under the miliitary aggressions and modern army
of war that the China will counter against the last remnants
of America's present day military might. The sinking say of
the USS Ronald Reagan or USS George Washington, and/
or USS Nimitz (one of the world's largest warships) by
 the Chinese military will be a cataclysmic event that will
be the decisive turning point that will leave America
gasping and crying far well beyond 9/11.
9/11 will then become a mere footnote in the annuls
of American history as thousands of her citizens die
hopelessly in the open icy sea. The sinking of The Titanic
will then become a kind of replay from 100 years ago.
But this time it will not be an iceberg that did it, but
by a series of deadly Chinese bombs and torpedoes
of the like the Yankees have never before seen!! It'll
then be goodbye forever to Ron, George and Nimitz
with nothing to show for the billions spend on such 
US war supercarriers that once inspired complete
 awe and dreaded trembling around the world.  Not
so anymore, thanks to those little Chinamen!
.
USS George Washington.

CARRIER-KILLER. By Eric Talmadge.

Edited By Uncle Monty.
http://thebiggerissueorg.blogspot.com/2010/09/carrier-killer-by-eric-talmadge.html
£££
The costs of war and the mentality of war cannot
function without each other. Mentality first, costs
later. So will America listen up? Hell, No!!!
...
Truly, Uncle Monty.
+Eve of America's Independence Day
or 4th of July, 2011.
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:: Story Update::
China building an army of unmanned military
drones 'to rival the U.S.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2011533/China-building-army-unmanned-military-drones-rival-U-S.html
.
Iran showcases homegrown arms in war games.
Ali Akbar Dareini & Brian Murphy.
http://www.onenewsnow.com/AP/Search/World/Default.aspx?id=1384730
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...
Feedback & Comments:
thebiggerissue@k.st
...

http://www.brussellstribunal.org/statements.htm

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US expands its drone war in push for victory over

 al-Qa’ida. The strikes bring to six the number of countries

where the drones have been used. US officials increasingly

identify the East African country as a major terrorist base.

By Rupert Cornwell in Washington.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-expands-its-drone-war-in-push-for-victory-over-alqarsquoida-2305062.html

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Why does the Afghanistan war go on?

By Eugene Robinson.

Iran's Leading International Daily.

http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=243020

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While talking about America's Wars, Now

Take A Little Look At Her Injustice System ...

DSK: An American Police, Judicial & Media Travesty.

By Uncle Monty.

http://thebiggerissueorg.blogspot.com/2011/05/dsk.html

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