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Welcome to Informing Voters!
The purpose of this web site is to inform the American public about issues that affect us. This site is nonpartisan and attempts to provide a realistic and balanced view and analysis of the current issues in the news. The author of this site has a masters degree in economics from George Washington University and has spent the past fifteen years in the Washington, DC area looking at the fish from inside the fishbowl. He is a political independent who has worked for both the Republican and the Democratic parties in the past (though for neither of them currently). For more about the author, please click HERE. This site will be updated as current events requires and time permits.
February 1, 2005:
$9 Billion in Pocket Change
I really don’t understand how you just fail to account for $9 billion. Now, I realize that Iraq is a war zone, which substantially complicates things…but $9 BILLION? I’m sorry, but that is a LOT of money! Given this apparent lack of accountability, I think it’s important to put some things in perspective:
So far, the Bush administration has spent more than $150 billion in Iraq over and above the normal operating costs of the U.S. military. That’s $1 million per soldier ABOVE THEIR NORMAL OPERATING COSTS. This works out to about $500,000 per year above and beyond the military’s regular operating costs, such as the salaries of our regular troops. Some of this is undoubtedly to pay for reserves that have been brought into active duty, but reserves in Iraq number only about 30,000, and their salaries are nowhere near $500k per year!
I imagine that some of this $500,000 per soldier (above and beyond their salary) is for things like bullets, fuel, etc., which can get expensive. But $500,000 per soldier? I wonder how much of this is for $50 meals from Dick Cheney’s old company, Halliburton, and other fatty contracts set aside for staunch Bush supporters?
Perhaps a bit of perspective is in order. Here are total expenditures for some major wars the U.S. has fought in the past, ADJUSTED FOR INFLATION (so these are comparable dollars):
World War I (peak of 2,000,000 soldiers in combat):
Total war costs: $613 billion (~$205,000/soldier/year*)
Vietnam War (peak of 536,000 soldiers in combat):
Total war costs: $623 billion (~$236,000/soldier/year*)
Iraq War: (peak of 150,000 soldiers in combat):
Total war costs (so far): ~$150 billion (~$500,000/soldier/year**)
* Based upon year-end troop totals for each year of combat by U.S. forces.
** Excludes routine costs, such as salary, benefits, training, normal fuel consumption, etc.
Keep in mind that these are only military expenditures (i.e., not including the cost of reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan, most of the money for which has not been spent). Also keep in mind that most of the time period during which this money was spent was “after major combat operations”, according to President Bush.
While I believe we absolutely should support our troops over in Iraq and wish them the bets of luck getting that country on its feet, I don’t believe most of this money is going to our troops. There are huge (multi-billion dollar) private contracts being paid to Halliburton and others. I think our elected members of Congress, Democrats and Republicans alike, need to do their job and get some serious accounting (and accountability) from Rummy and friends over at DoD!