Something I wonder about the costs of our wars

[ThomWV]

I was thinking, what with the troops doing tour after tour these days its pretty clear that the number who actually participate in the wars is relatively small. We know that the wars have cost at least two Trillion dollars and probably a lot more before all is done. So that got me to wondering. I wondered if for the same money we could have sent every single one of those troops to college through the PhD level. But then I got to thinking about how much a trillion really is, and then I got to wonder if maybe they could have sent every man, woman, and child in the country to college for 4 years with the same money. Probably could. If they had done that I'd be willing to bet we wouldn't be broke now.

[tekisui]

1. 2.2 million have served in Iraq and Afghanistan according to

(I think) Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. I think I read it there. I am certain I have the correct number that they cited.

[ThomWV]

4. I wonder if that is tours served or individuals who have served?

That number sounds awfully high to me. The reason I say that is be because there are so many examples of soldiers who have served two, three, and even four or more tours in one or more of the wars. Just look at Iraq. The most troops we ever had there was during the invasion, and even then it was only 192,000. Most of the time it was more like 160,000. At that rate a million troops would serve in about 6 years, two million in twelve. But now go back to those troops who have done multiple tours, that cuts way deep into the 2 Million number. See what I mean?

[tekisui]

6. I do see and also thought it seemed high as well.

You may be right. The number was listed on the site without any clarification. I would be interested in finding the actual number. It can be my project for today.

[geckosfeet]

2. No - but the people would have benefited - not the MIC corporations.

[think]

3. America is being held hostage by our military spending war whore politicians plain and simple...nt

[pinboy3niner]

5. A study at Brown University put the costs at $3.2-4 trillion

Conservatively estimated, the war bills <for Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan> already paid and obligated to be paid are $3.2 trillion in constant dollars. A more reasonable estimate puts the number at nearly $4 trillion.

http://costsofwar.org/

I believe the conservative estimate works out to more than $10,300 for every person in the U.S. population.

[Selatius]

7. With that amount of money, we could've built a national mass transit grid instead of just nothing.

The amount of engineering and construction jobs created in the process of building the national transit grid would've employed millions. On top of that, millions more would have to be employed in its maintenance and operation from that point forward. It would help revitalize our stagnating economy, and it would reduce our dependence on foreign oil.

We'd probably still have enough money left over to fund Medicare for everybody, hire more teachers and reduce classroom sizes, and put every willing student through college or trade school without ever having to take out an interest-bearing loan.

We said no to all of that. We have war instead. We have death and misery. We would rather destroy whole countries and bring terror to them through high tech weapons than to build something that would bring more comfort and a higher standard of living.

We should be damned ashamed of what this country has become. For us to even recite the hollow mantra that we're the land of the free and home of the brave is an insult to all of those who came before, who sweated, who died, to give us a chance to do better than they did, and we failed.