$200 Billion a Year for War: Taxpayer’s Shock and Awe
Darrell Williams
October 03, 2007
The present administration is requesting $200 billion a year for the Iraq war.
Where is this money coming from and where is it going? That’s $200,000,000,000.00 per year. This is $4,000,000,000.00 each year from each state. Does any state have an extra $4 billion surplus that can be squeezed out of local city budgets? Can any state reduce spending on school construction, school repairs, teachers salaries, hospital supplies, hospital repairs and construction, medical benefits for citizens, infrastructure repairs, road construction, bridge repairs, levee repairs, natural disaster repairs, freeway construction and maintenance, police and fire services and all state government expenses? Informed citizens know that most state and city budgets are already operating with insufficient funds. Do the taxpayers of any state want their annual taxes raised $4 billion dollars to pay for this unnecessary war?
During the past few years, truckloads of U.S. cash have been shipped to Iraq. In order to make distribution of this cash available to the Iraqi government quickly, almost no record keeping or accountability procedures have been used. This money has been distributed freely to hastily established Iraqi government departments and some obviously corrupt and untrustworthy Iraqi politicians and sectarian Iraqi military units. The truth is that no one knows where most of these millions of taxpayer’s dollars are disappearing to. Millions are unaccounted for. The same is true for millions of taxpayer’s dollars that are being given to U.S. corporations operating in Iraq. No bid contracts are continually being awarded to select companies for construction jobs that are being shoddily managed. Crony contractors are making millions by hiring subcontractors to do inferior work. Actually, the entire policy of trying to rebuild a whole nation while a violent war is still being waged, makes no sense at all. Peace should be established before reconstruction should begin. At the present, the nation is being destroyed and rebuilt at the same time. Just like the political unaccountability, there is no corporate accountability. Millions of taxpayer’s dollars are disappearing through deceit, waste and corruption. Never in U.S. history has the U.S. Treasury been looted as it has been by the present administration.
Excessive war expenses can bankrupt a nation. In 1776, one of the major reasons that Great Britain lost the Revolutionary War with the U.S. colonies was the great expense of maintaining British soldiers so far away from their own country. The war expenses for the U.S. colonies to maintain the colonial army in their own country was relatively small in comparison. The U.S. is now facing the same situation in occupying the nation of Iraq. It is costing the U.S. military billions of dollars to maintain the U.S. soldiers in a nation so far away from their own country. By contrast, the Iraqi resistance (whether they are called insurgents or patriots) have relatively small expenses to continue fighting against the American occupiers. During the U.S. Revolutionary War, the Americans estimated that Great Britain could not continue the war expenses for more than seven years. They were approximately correct. The Revolutionary war lasted approximately seven years. The U.S. will soon approach it’s seventh year in the occupation of Iraq. The U.S. government is now facing a severe strain on the escalating costs of this war and the U.S. military is facing a severe stain on troop deployment. U.S. troops, many of which are National Guard soldiers who were never intended to be used as regular Army soldiers in a foreign war, are being required to serve repeated tours of duty. They are continually being recalled because there are no volunteers to replace them. At the beginning of this war, the young American soldiers were eager, cheerful and enthusiastic about embarking on an exciting adventure. Now, after four long years and having experienced the brutal reality of war, they are disillusioned, depressed and exhausted. They just want the war to be over so they can go home and resume their normal lives.
The surge of U.S. troops deployed to Iraq has been accompanied by a surge in the costs of the war. Ever year the war costs are exponentially greater than the previous year. The U.S. expenditures are approaching the breaking point. The U.S. government (like Great Britain during the Revolutionary War) is approaching bankruptcy. The astronomical financial costs of the Iraq war will be inherited by our children. For the first time in American History, a president has not raised taxes to pay for a war. This administration has done the opposite. They have increased spending exponentially while simultaneously cutting taxes. This policy is financially and morally irresponsible.
The U.S. present policy of spending $200 billion a year of taxpayer’s money on another country, defies common sense. Even conservative Americans should be shocked. This is $200 billion a year that is not being invested in our own country. Anyone with any sense of vision can imagine how much better it would be for our nation if $4 billion a year was being spent on each of the states. Imagine how many needed improvements could be made to our schools, hospitals, roads, bridges, levees, freeways, public transportation, natural disaster repairs, poverty, caring for the homeless, medical care, fighting environmental pollution, creating jobs… the list is endless.
But aside from the astronomical financial cost of maintaining the Iraq war, there is still the unanswered question of why the U.S. is pursuing this nation building adventure.
What legal international right does the U.S. have to invade a sovereign nation for the avowed purpose of destroying and replacing their government, of eliminating and then replacing their army, of eliminating and then replacing their police force, of eliminating and then replacing their economic system, of eliminating and then replacing their constitution? This is nation building on a massive and expensive scale. It is an expense that the U.S. taxpayers cannot afford, even if it were legally justified.
The nation of Iraq, just like the nation of Vietnam in 1965, was a very weak nation, both militarily and economically. International sanctions had already isolated and weakened Iraq. Inspectors had already concluded that Iraq had no WMD. Neither of these nations were a threat to the U.S. Both of these wars were completely unnecessary. The U.S. remains the most militarily powerful nation on Earth. The U.S. military presently has tens of thousands of nuclear weapons ready for deployment. Enough nuclear weapons to destroy all life on the surface of this planet. The U.S. military is currently developing newer and more effective types of nuclear bombs. The U.S currently has more WMD than any nation on Earth. There is no other nation that could possibly threaten our nation. It’s time for the American people to stop being afraid of a few vocal religious fundamentalists who only want to stir up trouble and discontent. The U.S. invasion of any Muslim nation is exactly what these troublemakers want. This ill conceived war has created thousands of new terrorists and decreased the security of our own nation. This war is squandering billions of taxpayers dollars and depleting our military equipment, arms and readiness to confront other international problems.
The definition of aggression is clearly defined in international law and in many international agreements signed by the U.S. The U.S. invasion of a sovereign nation that had not attacked the U.S. and was so militarily weak that it posed no threat to the U.S. or to any of it’s neighbors, is clearly an act of aggression. This was at no time an act of defense by the U.S. The preemptive invasion was totally an offensive act. The majority of people in the Middle East clearly understood that the invasion was undertaken solely for economic reasons. The U.S. goal was to seize control of the Iraqi government and to seize control of the Iraqi oil resources. While this was the common opinion in the Middle East, the American public and U.S. Congress were completely misled. The U.S. administration has for six years spent millions of taxpayer’s dollars on propaganda, fallacies and fear tactics to convince the American public that the invasion was for other reasons. The major American news media has been a tool of this administration. One by one, the administration’s reasons for the invasion have been proven to be false. There were no WMD in Iraq. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Iraq had no connections to any terrorist organizations. There were no terrorists in Iraq. Al-Qaida was not in Iraq. The Taliban was not in Iraq. Hussein had no nuclear weapons or any materials or technology to make any. Hussein was so weak militarily, that he could not even defend the city of Baghdad. When the U.S. invaded, he ran away and hid in a hole in the ground. He was never a threat to anyone. These were all unsubstantiated excuses used by the present administration for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. They are all fallacies and deceptions. The only reason that has continued to be valid, is the desire of the U.S. to control and exploit the Iraqi oil resources.
The act of invading a sovereign nation for the sole purpose of exploiting it’s natural resources is nothing but an act of 18th century colonialism.
The U.S. has economic interests in most nations of the world. Globalization is inevitable. In the immediate future, more and more U.S. corporations will continue to establish businesses in foreign nations. There are both good and bad consequences of this policy, but there is little chance that it will be discontinued. However this Globalization by U.S. corporations must be accomplished by peaceful means. It must be achieved by international agreements with the nations involved. It must be achieved with maximum benefits not just for the corporations involved, but with maximum benefits for the citizens of both nations.
Globalization cannot be allowed to advance militarily. The U.S. government cannot be used as a tool by U.S. corporations for the purpose of invading, occupying and controlling the resources of other nations. The U.S. Army cannot be used as security guards for establishing and protecting U.S. corporations in other nations. This has already occurred during the present administration. U.S. taxpayer’s money should not be used to hire paid mercenaries to substitute for American soldiers. This is an expensive evasion of responsibility. Mercenary soldiers have no restrictions on their behavior and no motivation other than profit. They have no patriotism or loyalty to any country. They are strictly hired guns. These private security firms have never been held accountable for numerous accusations of violent acts against Iraqi civilians. They are not restricted either by Iraqi laws or U.S. laws.
The present U.S. policy of nation building is nothing but a policy of forced military Globalization. A national policy of using military force and preemptive strikes to establish U.S. corporations in another nation and to exploit that nation’s resources. The U.S. propaganda fallacy of preemptive strikes and nation building for the purpose of spreading democracy, never had any truth to it at all. Western style democracy was never possible in predominately Muslim nations like Iraq or Iran. In a nation that is dominated by Islam, democracy has a limited meaning. It means nothing more than rule by the majority. In any free general national election, the Islamic party or sect with the majority of members will win the election. This sect will then establish an Islamic theocracy. In Iraq and Iran the majority sects are the Shiites. A free election in either Iraq or Iran will only enable the Shiites to acquire control the government. This is the only possible outcome in these countries. The war in Iraq and the subsequent national elections has given the Shiite fundamentalist Muslims control of the Iraqi government. Since Iran also has a Shiite majority and Islamic theocratic government, it is only a matter of time until these two Shiite nations join together politically and economically. This will be detrimental to the U.S. interests and all of the nations of the Middle East.
The U.S. is presently spending billions of dollars training and equipping both the Shiites (in Baghdad) and the Sunnis (in Anbar province). Never before in U.S. history has the U.S. trained and equipped the army that the U.S. is fighting against. While these two armies are fighting a civil war against each other to determine who controls the Iraqi Islamic government, they are simultaneously fighting against the American occupiers and the U.S. is supplying arms and equipment to everybody. This is insane. This is a war policy that will continually escalate the fighting for decades to come and produce no benefits whatsoever to the U.S.
The present administration began the aggressive policy of nation building with the naïve belief that because Hussein had a weak military, the U.S. could accomplish it’s objectives relatively easily and cheaply. They were totally wrong about every assumption. The costs of the war have soared out of sight. The American army was not greeted as liberators, they were received as trespassers, conquerors, occupiers and exploiters. The Americans were correctly viewed as invaders who had little understanding of the Iraqi culture or the Islamic religion. In a predominantly Muslim nation, there can be no separation of religion and government. This was totally misunderstood by the (predominantly Christian) Bush administration. The Iraqi people have voluntarily chosen to have an Islamic society. It is not the right of the U.S. government or any other government to question that right or to force them to change.
The Iraqi people have legally elected the present Shiite government and the U.S. government has no further responsibility or right to continue to try to control or influence that independent government. The U.S. also has no legal right to demand that the Iraq government share it’s oil reserves with the American oil companies. This is not an American decision. The Iraqi people must be allowed the freedom to determine their own future.
Where is this money coming from and where is it going? That’s $200,000,000,000.00 per year. This is $4,000,000,000.00 each year from each state. Does any state have an extra $4 billion surplus that can be squeezed out of local city budgets? Can any state reduce spending on school construction, school repairs, teachers salaries, hospital supplies, hospital repairs and construction, medical benefits for citizens, infrastructure repairs, road construction, bridge repairs, levee repairs, natural disaster repairs, freeway construction and maintenance, police and fire services and all state government expenses? Informed citizens know that most state and city budgets are already operating with insufficient funds. Do the taxpayers of any state want their annual taxes raised $4 billion dollars to pay for this unnecessary war?
During the past few years, truckloads of U.S. cash have been shipped to Iraq. In order to make distribution of this cash available to the Iraqi government quickly, almost no record keeping or accountability procedures have been used. This money has been distributed freely to hastily established Iraqi government departments and some obviously corrupt and untrustworthy Iraqi politicians and sectarian Iraqi military units. The truth is that no one knows where most of these millions of taxpayer’s dollars are disappearing to. Millions are unaccounted for. The same is true for millions of taxpayer’s dollars that are being given to U.S. corporations operating in Iraq. No bid contracts are continually being awarded to select companies for construction jobs that are being shoddily managed. Crony contractors are making millions by hiring subcontractors to do inferior work. Actually, the entire policy of trying to rebuild a whole nation while a violent war is still being waged, makes no sense at all. Peace should be established before reconstruction should begin. At the present, the nation is being destroyed and rebuilt at the same time. Just like the political unaccountability, there is no corporate accountability. Millions of taxpayer’s dollars are disappearing through deceit, waste and corruption. Never in U.S. history has the U.S. Treasury been looted as it has been by the present administration.
Excessive war expenses can bankrupt a nation. In 1776, one of the major reasons that Great Britain lost the Revolutionary War with the U.S. colonies was the great expense of maintaining British soldiers so far away from their own country. The war expenses for the U.S. colonies to maintain the colonial army in their own country was relatively small in comparison. The U.S. is now facing the same situation in occupying the nation of Iraq. It is costing the U.S. military billions of dollars to maintain the U.S. soldiers in a nation so far away from their own country. By contrast, the Iraqi resistance (whether they are called insurgents or patriots) have relatively small expenses to continue fighting against the American occupiers. During the U.S. Revolutionary War, the Americans estimated that Great Britain could not continue the war expenses for more than seven years. They were approximately correct. The Revolutionary war lasted approximately seven years. The U.S. will soon approach it’s seventh year in the occupation of Iraq. The U.S. government is now facing a severe strain on the escalating costs of this war and the U.S. military is facing a severe stain on troop deployment. U.S. troops, many of which are National Guard soldiers who were never intended to be used as regular Army soldiers in a foreign war, are being required to serve repeated tours of duty. They are continually being recalled because there are no volunteers to replace them. At the beginning of this war, the young American soldiers were eager, cheerful and enthusiastic about embarking on an exciting adventure. Now, after four long years and having experienced the brutal reality of war, they are disillusioned, depressed and exhausted. They just want the war to be over so they can go home and resume their normal lives.
The surge of U.S. troops deployed to Iraq has been accompanied by a surge in the costs of the war. Ever year the war costs are exponentially greater than the previous year. The U.S. expenditures are approaching the breaking point. The U.S. government (like Great Britain during the Revolutionary War) is approaching bankruptcy. The astronomical financial costs of the Iraq war will be inherited by our children. For the first time in American History, a president has not raised taxes to pay for a war. This administration has done the opposite. They have increased spending exponentially while simultaneously cutting taxes. This policy is financially and morally irresponsible.
The U.S. present policy of spending $200 billion a year of taxpayer’s money on another country, defies common sense. Even conservative Americans should be shocked. This is $200 billion a year that is not being invested in our own country. Anyone with any sense of vision can imagine how much better it would be for our nation if $4 billion a year was being spent on each of the states. Imagine how many needed improvements could be made to our schools, hospitals, roads, bridges, levees, freeways, public transportation, natural disaster repairs, poverty, caring for the homeless, medical care, fighting environmental pollution, creating jobs… the list is endless.
But aside from the astronomical financial cost of maintaining the Iraq war, there is still the unanswered question of why the U.S. is pursuing this nation building adventure.
What legal international right does the U.S. have to invade a sovereign nation for the avowed purpose of destroying and replacing their government, of eliminating and then replacing their army, of eliminating and then replacing their police force, of eliminating and then replacing their economic system, of eliminating and then replacing their constitution? This is nation building on a massive and expensive scale. It is an expense that the U.S. taxpayers cannot afford, even if it were legally justified.
The nation of Iraq, just like the nation of Vietnam in 1965, was a very weak nation, both militarily and economically. International sanctions had already isolated and weakened Iraq. Inspectors had already concluded that Iraq had no WMD. Neither of these nations were a threat to the U.S. Both of these wars were completely unnecessary. The U.S. remains the most militarily powerful nation on Earth. The U.S. military presently has tens of thousands of nuclear weapons ready for deployment. Enough nuclear weapons to destroy all life on the surface of this planet. The U.S. military is currently developing newer and more effective types of nuclear bombs. The U.S currently has more WMD than any nation on Earth. There is no other nation that could possibly threaten our nation. It’s time for the American people to stop being afraid of a few vocal religious fundamentalists who only want to stir up trouble and discontent. The U.S. invasion of any Muslim nation is exactly what these troublemakers want. This ill conceived war has created thousands of new terrorists and decreased the security of our own nation. This war is squandering billions of taxpayers dollars and depleting our military equipment, arms and readiness to confront other international problems.
The definition of aggression is clearly defined in international law and in many international agreements signed by the U.S. The U.S. invasion of a sovereign nation that had not attacked the U.S. and was so militarily weak that it posed no threat to the U.S. or to any of it’s neighbors, is clearly an act of aggression. This was at no time an act of defense by the U.S. The preemptive invasion was totally an offensive act. The majority of people in the Middle East clearly understood that the invasion was undertaken solely for economic reasons. The U.S. goal was to seize control of the Iraqi government and to seize control of the Iraqi oil resources. While this was the common opinion in the Middle East, the American public and U.S. Congress were completely misled. The U.S. administration has for six years spent millions of taxpayer’s dollars on propaganda, fallacies and fear tactics to convince the American public that the invasion was for other reasons. The major American news media has been a tool of this administration. One by one, the administration’s reasons for the invasion have been proven to be false. There were no WMD in Iraq. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Iraq had no connections to any terrorist organizations. There were no terrorists in Iraq. Al-Qaida was not in Iraq. The Taliban was not in Iraq. Hussein had no nuclear weapons or any materials or technology to make any. Hussein was so weak militarily, that he could not even defend the city of Baghdad. When the U.S. invaded, he ran away and hid in a hole in the ground. He was never a threat to anyone. These were all unsubstantiated excuses used by the present administration for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. They are all fallacies and deceptions. The only reason that has continued to be valid, is the desire of the U.S. to control and exploit the Iraqi oil resources.
The act of invading a sovereign nation for the sole purpose of exploiting it’s natural resources is nothing but an act of 18th century colonialism.
The U.S. has economic interests in most nations of the world. Globalization is inevitable. In the immediate future, more and more U.S. corporations will continue to establish businesses in foreign nations. There are both good and bad consequences of this policy, but there is little chance that it will be discontinued. However this Globalization by U.S. corporations must be accomplished by peaceful means. It must be achieved by international agreements with the nations involved. It must be achieved with maximum benefits not just for the corporations involved, but with maximum benefits for the citizens of both nations.
Globalization cannot be allowed to advance militarily. The U.S. government cannot be used as a tool by U.S. corporations for the purpose of invading, occupying and controlling the resources of other nations. The U.S. Army cannot be used as security guards for establishing and protecting U.S. corporations in other nations. This has already occurred during the present administration. U.S. taxpayer’s money should not be used to hire paid mercenaries to substitute for American soldiers. This is an expensive evasion of responsibility. Mercenary soldiers have no restrictions on their behavior and no motivation other than profit. They have no patriotism or loyalty to any country. They are strictly hired guns. These private security firms have never been held accountable for numerous accusations of violent acts against Iraqi civilians. They are not restricted either by Iraqi laws or U.S. laws.
The present U.S. policy of nation building is nothing but a policy of forced military Globalization. A national policy of using military force and preemptive strikes to establish U.S. corporations in another nation and to exploit that nation’s resources. The U.S. propaganda fallacy of preemptive strikes and nation building for the purpose of spreading democracy, never had any truth to it at all. Western style democracy was never possible in predominately Muslim nations like Iraq or Iran. In a nation that is dominated by Islam, democracy has a limited meaning. It means nothing more than rule by the majority. In any free general national election, the Islamic party or sect with the majority of members will win the election. This sect will then establish an Islamic theocracy. In Iraq and Iran the majority sects are the Shiites. A free election in either Iraq or Iran will only enable the Shiites to acquire control the government. This is the only possible outcome in these countries. The war in Iraq and the subsequent national elections has given the Shiite fundamentalist Muslims control of the Iraqi government. Since Iran also has a Shiite majority and Islamic theocratic government, it is only a matter of time until these two Shiite nations join together politically and economically. This will be detrimental to the U.S. interests and all of the nations of the Middle East.
The U.S. is presently spending billions of dollars training and equipping both the Shiites (in Baghdad) and the Sunnis (in Anbar province). Never before in U.S. history has the U.S. trained and equipped the army that the U.S. is fighting against. While these two armies are fighting a civil war against each other to determine who controls the Iraqi Islamic government, they are simultaneously fighting against the American occupiers and the U.S. is supplying arms and equipment to everybody. This is insane. This is a war policy that will continually escalate the fighting for decades to come and produce no benefits whatsoever to the U.S.
The present administration began the aggressive policy of nation building with the naïve belief that because Hussein had a weak military, the U.S. could accomplish it’s objectives relatively easily and cheaply. They were totally wrong about every assumption. The costs of the war have soared out of sight. The American army was not greeted as liberators, they were received as trespassers, conquerors, occupiers and exploiters. The Americans were correctly viewed as invaders who had little understanding of the Iraqi culture or the Islamic religion. In a predominantly Muslim nation, there can be no separation of religion and government. This was totally misunderstood by the (predominantly Christian) Bush administration. The Iraqi people have voluntarily chosen to have an Islamic society. It is not the right of the U.S. government or any other government to question that right or to force them to change.
The Iraqi people have legally elected the present Shiite government and the U.S. government has no further responsibility or right to continue to try to control or influence that independent government. The U.S. also has no legal right to demand that the Iraq government share it’s oil reserves with the American oil companies. This is not an American decision. The Iraqi people must be allowed the freedom to determine their own future.