Iraq War Cost - a bit of perspective

[Roland99]

Nov. 28, 2002
http://www.economist.com/finance/displayStory.cfm?story_id=1467522

Larry Lindsey, a top economic adviser to President George Bush, made precisely this argument recently: “When there is a regime change in Iraq, you could add 3m-5m barrels of production to world supply...successful prosecution of the war would be good for the economy.” The snag in this rosy plan is the dilapidated state of Iraq's petroleum infrastructure: oilmen say it would take 5-10 years for Iraqi output to reach such unprecedented levels (even assuming a post-Saddam Iraq would actually want to flood the world market with oil). Mr Lindsey offered an even more cheerful forecast: he estimated that even a prolonged war would not cost more than $100 billion-200 billion, or about 1-2% of America's GDP.


Dec. 6, 2002
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/12/07/politics/main532180.shtml

With new signs of trouble in the U.S. economy, President Bush fired two top members of his economic team on Friday. Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and senior economic adviser Larry Lindsey were forced out in the first major personnel shakeup of the Bush administration.


January 2, 2003
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/01/01/sproject.irq.war.cost/

White House Office of Management and Budget Director Mitch Daniels told The New York Times in an interview published Tuesday that such a conflict could cost $50 billion to $60 billion -- the price tag of the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

<...>

In September, Daniels disputed an estimate by Bush economic adviser Larry Lindsey -- who has since left the White House -- that war with Iraq could cost $200 billion.

Daniels said he believes Lindsey's estimate was "the upper end of a hypothetical," Duffy said.


Jan. 25, 2005
http://costofwar.com/

$151,601,000,000 (and climbing fast)


Jan. 25, 2005
http://www.reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml?type=bondsNews&storyID=7426192

The White House said on Tuesday it will seek more than $80 billion in new funding for military operations this year in Iraq and Afghanistan, shattering initial cost estimates and pushing the total for both conflicts to almost $300 billion so far.


And a bit of trivia: now Mitch Daniels is governor of Indiana.

[Toots]

1. They really do demonstrate the Peter Principle completely

:shrug:

[DistressedAmerican]

2. Check these folks out too!

http://www.costofwar.com

They have ticker for the ongoing cost and a calculator for converting that amount to other expenses like shcools, aids treatment, etc. Great site!

On edit: Somehow I missed it was in the original post. Good work!

[Roland99]

3. heh

;)

[EVDebs]

4. O'Neill was shown the door for questioning the permanence of the tax cuts

Plus he knew all about the race to Iraq from Day One.

Besides that, liberal friends like Bono of U2 made rightwingnuts hair stand on end ! Imagine, consorting vith der enemy !

[NewYorkerfromMass]

6. As was Lindsey- he is still on target

for a 200 billion dollar war.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

5. "$149 per minute since Jesus was born has been spent on Iraq war" Byrd