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Iraq war price tag reaches three trillion US dollars: book
Washington (AFP) March 10, 2008 The war in Iraq will cost US taxpayers at least three trillion dollars, a respected, Nobel Prize-winning economist wrote in a new book which was excerpted in the US press this week. Joseph Stiglitz's book "The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict," concluded that US military operations in Iraq already have exceeded the cost of the 12-year war in Vietnam and is more than double the cost of the Korean War. "The only war in our history which cost more was the Second World War, when 16.3 million US troops fought in a campaign lasting four years, at a total cost (in 2007, inflation-adjusted dollars) of about five trillion dollars," he wrote in the work co-authored with Harvard professor Linda Bilmes. "With virtually the entire armed forces committed to fighting the Germans and Japanese, the cost per troop (in today's dollars) was less than 100,000 dollars in 2007 dollars. By contrast, the Iraq war is costing upward of 400,000 dollars per troop." The Pentagon took exception to the figures -- and to the premise that there have been undisclosed costs involved in financing the war. "It seems like an exaggerated number to us," said Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell. "The Pentagon has been extraordinarily transparent about what we know of the cost of the war Stiglitz, was winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize in economics and former chief economist at the World Bank. His co-author Bilmes is a professor of public finance at Harvard University. The book is published as the fifth year of the US-led conflict comes to a close.
earlier related report Major General John Kelly, commander of US forces in the west, said the marines were "very close" to turning control over security in western al-Anbar province to Iraqis. "My overall numbers are going down, various units, various capabilities that are going down," Kelly told reporters here via video link from Baghdad. "I'm now looking at closing some of the larger bases," he added. The larger bases require large forces to guard, and marines in al-Anbar already have spread out to small, company-sized bases to maintain contact with the population, he said. He said the force reductions were occurring as part of the larger drawdown of US "surge" troops from Iraq. Four combat brigades are leaving Iraq by July and not being replaced, lowering the total US force from about 155,000 troops to 140,000. Top US commanders in Iraq have argued for a pause of unspecified duration after the surge forces are out to see whether a sharp decline in violence continues to hold without them. Kelly said he favored a pause. "I would just argue, if I were asked -- and I haven't been asked -- by my superiors, why don't we just wait for a few months to see how this thing settles out," he said. Among the possibilities is a return of Al-Qaeda to its former strongholds in western Iraq. "There is a fair number that come out of the al-Anbar province, and fought us pretty hard here. So if they are on the run, our expectation will be they'll move back here," Kelly said. He said Al-Qaeda has focused its efforts on attacks on Iraq security forces, mayors and tribal sheiks, but there are indications that it may be shifting tactics back to big spectacular attacks. Currently, about 25,000 to 30,000 US troops are in western Iraq, most of them marines, said Kelly, who commands the I Marine Expeditionary Force. The Iraqi army and police in province have grown to 45,000, including 24,000 locally recruited police, since Sunni tribal leaders and US troops joined forces against Al-Qaeda a year ago. "The trend seems to be going in the right direction in my mind," he said. "But I think we need to wait some period of time after the surge comes off to see what we got." Community Email This Article Comment On This Article Related Links Iraq: The first technology war of the 21st century
Al-Qaeda in Iraq may try for spectacular attacks: general
Washington (AFP) March 10, 2008Al-Qaeda may be shifting tactics back to the big, headline grabbing attacks in Iraq that helped plunge the country into chaos, a senior US commander said Monday. |
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