- The Marshall plan of 1947 -worth $100bn in today's money- was conceived
to improve Europe's economy. The sums required to reconstruct Iraq have
been estimated at the middle of April 2003, to be about the same amount.
But there will be a difference:
- The money for the reconstruction will be self financed by the future oil
revenues, not by the USA and Britain.
- In the Marshall plan there were no strong restriction imposed on the beneficiaries
who had "ownership" of the plan. In Iraq the initial contracts
are going to US companies chosen by the USA and not anybody else, not even
Britain's.
On April 11, 2003, after 23 days of conflict the result can be summarised
as follow:
- Cost of the war;
$55bn -estimated cost- for the USA
£3bn -estimated cost- for Britain
$2.2bn estimated cost by UN, aid needed
$390m raised to date
$275m spent on aid by USA
£240m allocated to date for humanitarian needs
$100bn estimated cost to rebuilt Iraq
$130bn estimated size of Iraq's debt
- Military personnel
255,000 US military personnel present
45,000 British military personnel present
2,000 Australian military personnel present
400 Czech and Slovak military personnel present
200 Polish military personnel present
100,000 more US military personnel on the way
130,000 US and British troops in action
6,000 Arab volunteers are in Iraq to fight
- On August 27, 2003, the US government is spending about $4bn a month to keep its troops in Iraq. Moreover the cost of reconstruction increases everyday and cannot be accurately evaluated. It will cost about $2bn to provide the electricity required and $16bn to deliver drinking water. Moreover the attack on the UN Headquarters in Baghdad has stalled the reconstruction and will deter other countries to join because of the permanent security risks involved.
- On September 7, 2003, we were told that the Iraqi war cost to the US taxpayers for the next 12 months would amount to $80bn. The people are not happy, and as the US economy is not is such a good state now, Bush too is unhappy as his chances of being re-elected decrease. He will try to reassure America saying that the human and financial costs are worth considering the risks of doing nothing. He will insist that the war in Iraq is part of the war against terrorism.
- Until November 29, 2003, Iraqis have filled about 10,000 claims for personal injury, damage and wrongful deaths by the US military. $1.66m has been paid to settle more that 4,700 claims, 3,800 have been rejected and the rest are pending. The US is spending about $4bn per month to occupy Iraq.
- Until January 8, 2004, 11 helicopters crashed in Iraq, most, if not all, from hostile fire (3 UH-64 Apache, 5 UH-60, 1 CHO47 Chinook, 2 OH-58 Kiowa).
The number of coalition troops in Iraq was as follow on April 8, 2004:
- USA, 110,000
- UK, 8,700
- Poland, 2,500
- Italy, 2,500
- Ukraine, 1,650
- Spain 1,300
- Netherlands, 1,000
- Thailand, 900
- Australia, 850
- Romania, 700
- South Korea, 600
- Bulgaria, 580
- Japan, 500
- Denmark, 380
- Slovenia, 360
- Honduras, 360
- Dominican Republic, 300
- Nicaragua, 230
- Singapore, 200
- Mongolia, 180
- Czech Republic 150
- Portugal, 100
- Latvia, 121
- Slovakia, 105
- Norway, 100
- New Zeeland, 60
- Lithuania, 50
- Kazakhstan, 27
- The coalition is showing signs of slow disintegration especially among the smaller partners. Spain's prime minister elect said that he will pull out the Spanish contingent at the end of June unless the UN takes over. Japanese and South Korean forces have retreated to their compound after coming under fire. Ukrainian and Kazakh soldiers left Kut in the hands of the insurgents. Kazkhastan will not replace its 27 (!) soldiers when their tour of duty ends on may 30 and New Zeeland will do the same with its 60 soldiers in September. Poland and Singapore will not send more troops. And, of course, France, Germany, India and Pakistan will stay out if the UN does not take over.
- The Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers, said on July 2, 2004, that a force of 145,000 US troops might be needed in Iraq for as many as five years. Earlier in the week, the US military announced it will recall around 5,600 troops who already served in Iraq for support and logistics duty.
- On January 24, 2005, President Bush was expected to request $80bn from Congress for the 2005 cost of fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This would bring the total for those wars and the fight against terrorism to $280bn since September 11, 2001 or about half of what the USA spent during the whole of World War I ($613bn) or the $623 spent during the Vietnam War (all cost in 2005 $). Moreover the Army plans to keep about 120,000 soldiers in Iraq through 2007.
- President Bush hasn't revealed yet how much money he will need to keep fighting the war in Iraq, but his 2006 budget proposal Monday February 7, 2005, asks for another $459 million to try to secure the peace. The Bush administration has yet to spend most of the previously approved non-military aid. Just over $2 billion of the $18.4 billion that Congress approved in 2003 for Iraqi reconstruction has been spent, according to administration figures. The administration expects to spend most of the $18.4 billion by next year.
- Replacing military hardware lost in battle in Iraq and Afghanistan, including 18 combat helicopters, will cost the US Army 570 million dollars this year, we were told on Friday February 25, 2005. It will cost another four billion dollars to repair, rebuild and refurbish other gear such as tanks and trucks.
- In May 2005 it is still difficult to obtain a reliable figure for the estimated cost of the war in Iraq alone, including reconstruction. If we accept that the total cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will cost about $300 billions until the end of 2005 then the cost of the war in Iraq alone is close to $200 billions.
- The monthly cost to the US of the war in Iraq is now greater than the average monthly cost of the Vietnam War, a report by two anti-war groups said on August 31, 2005. The report put costs in Iraq at $500m (£278m) a month more than in Vietnam, adjusted for inflation. This makes Iraq the most expensive US war in the past 60 years. The report by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and Foreign Policy in Focus (FPIF) calculates the cost of current military operations in Iraq at $5.6bn (£3.1bn) every month. By comparison, the eight-year campaign in Vietnam cost on average $5.1bn (£2.8bn) a month.
- The United States has increased its forces in Iraq to the highest total of the war at 161,000 troops, and the Pentagon said on Thursday October 27, 2005, it expected a similar number in place for the December elections. The US increased its force in Iraq in advance of the October 15 referendum in which Iraqis approved a new constitution. The current total is about 23,000 higher than the usual level of 138,000.
- On February 6, 2006, we were told Bush administration will ask Congress soon for another $120 billion to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, bringing total spending since the September 11 attacks to about $440B. The war in Iraq is costing about $150 million a day, while continued fighting in Afghanistan is costing about $27 million a day. The cost of the Iraq war has substantially exceeded early estimates. In 2002, White House economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey suggested the cost could reach $200 billion. Mitch Daniels, then the White House budget director, said Lindsey's number was too high, and said the cost would be $60 billion or less. Lindsey resigned a few months later. Taken together, the two wars' projected $440 billion cost is almost as much as the Korean War, which cost $445 billion in 2006 dollars, according to the Centre for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. Only World War II and the Vietnam War were more expensive. The new request will not include any money for reconstruction in Iraq. Congress appropriated $18 billion for that in 2003, but much of it has been diverted to train and equip Iraqi forces.
- Iraq will need more money to rebuild than the $56 billion forecast by the World Bank and the United Nations in 2003, we were told on February 8, 2006. Insurgent attacks, lootings, and sabotages are increasing war recovery costs. Iraq's water, sewer, and electricity systems are in worse shape than previously thought. Iraq's oil refineries and pipelines are also in need of repairs. The World Bank, the United Nations and the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority estimated in 2003 that Iraq's reconstruction needs through 2007 would be about $56 billion. The U.S. authorized $18.4 billion for Iraq rebuilding, with an expectation that other countries and companies would contribute to the total, along with Iraqi oil revenue.
- The cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has soared and may now reach $811bn (£445bn), says a report by the Congressional Research Service on April 28, 2006.
- On July 12, 2006, the US Army has decided to end a Halliburton unit's multi-billion dollar contract to provide logistical support to soldiers in Iraq. It will relaunch the contract later this year. Army officials said the unit, KBR, will be allowed to take part in the new competition, but that one option under consideration is to split the work among three companies. Halliburton, formerly run by US Vice President Dick Cheney, has drawn scrutiny from auditors, congressional Democrats and the Justice Department for the quality and pricing of its work in Iraq that includes supplying water, dining and laundry services to the troops.
- The Iraq war is to overtake Korea and Vietnam as the second-most expensive overseas military operation in US history, with spending expected to reach $660 billion by the end of the decade. $US291billion has been allocated for the Iraq war, the equivalent of $US1000 for every man, woman and child in the US.
- The US Congress on Friday September 29, 2006, moved to block the Bush administration from building permanent US military bases in Iraq or controlling the country's oil sector, as it approved $70 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The restrictions included in a record $447 billion military funding bill were a slap at the administration, and Republicans have stripped them out of legislation in the past. US officials have predicted a lengthy US military presence in Iraq. The Senate unanimously passed the military spending bill, sending it to Bush for his signature. The House of Representatives passed it earlier in the week 394-22, as Congress rushed to leave town to campaign for November 7 elections that will determine control of Congress. Bush had complained the bill's funding fell short of his request. But he issued a statement saying he would sign the legislation that "will provide our men and women in uniform with the necessary resources to protect our country and win the War on Terror." With this bill, Congress has approved about $507 billion for the wars, with the bulk of that spent in Iraq where costs are averaging $8 billion per month.
- The US Army lost 130 helicopters in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,
about a third to shoot-downs, its aviation director said on March 24, 2007.
He complained that industry is not replacing them fast enough. He said it
takes 24 months to get replacement aircraft built and delivered and that
replacements for the early losses are just now arriving.
- Congressional analysts said on July 10, 2007, the boost in troop levels in Iraq has increased the cost of war there and in Afghanistan to $12 billion a month. Congress has appropriated $610 billion in war-related money since September 11, 2001. That's roughly the same amount that was spent on the war in Vietnam, taking inflation into account. Iraq alone has cost $450 billion.
- On October 24, 2007, we were told that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could cost the United States $1 trillion by the time President George W Bush leaves office in January 2009, making the conflicts more expensive than the Vietnam and Korean wars combined. Over the next decade, according to the US Congressional Budget Office, the wars could cost $2.4 trillion.
- On October 27, 2007, British Defence chiefs are facing painful cuts in
their equipment programmes to ensure that they keep within new spending
limits ordered by the Treasury. The Ministry of Defence is facing a shortfall
of £1 billion over the next three years. The MoD is currently engaged
in drawing up its expenditure plans for the next three years based on the
1.5 per cent increase in funding - to £36.9 billion from £34
billion by 2010-11 - that it was granted under the Government's Comprehensive
Spending Review.
- The flow of blood may be ebbing, but the flood of money into the Iraq war is steadily rising, new analyses show. In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the ``burn'' rate of its earliest years, we were told on March 9, 2008. Beyond 2008, working with ``best-case'' and ``realistic-moderate'' scenarios, they project the Iraq and Afghan wars, including long-term US military occupations of those countries, will cost the US budget between $1.7 trillion and $2.7 trillion -or more by 2017. Interest on money borrowed to pay those costs could alone add $816 billion to that bottom line. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has done its own projections and comes in lower, forecasting a cumulative cost by 2017 of $1.2 trillion to $1.7 trillion for the two wars, with Iraq generally accounting for three-quarters of the costs.
- Counting the true cost of war in Iraq and Afghanistan has been a difficult task. Earlier this year the USA estimated the cost of the conflict in Iraq to be at least Three Trillion Dollars -proportionately one of the most expensive of modern times and more costly to the US economy and society than the Vietnam campaign from the early 60s to 1975. The calculations have sharply shot upward and the real bill for the Americans will be around $5tn at least -an impost of about $50,000 per American family. Of course the burden isn't only on Americans and their economy. Not least there is the wreckage to the Iraqi economy and community -more than 60% unemployment, families and homes destroyed, half the doctors now working than there were five years ago.
- A civilian Pentagon official in charge of the largest US military contract in Iraq was removed from his job in 2004 after refusing to pay one billion dollars to KBR Inc. because the company was unable to credibly justify its expenses, we were told on Tuesday June 17, 2008. The US army denied that the official was removed because of the dispute.
- US House leaders struck a bipartisan deal on Wednesday June 18, 2008, on a major spending measure that would provide money for the war in Iraq through the end of the Bush administration, establish a significant new education benefit for veterans, and meet Democratic demands for added unemployment benefits. The bill, which could be voted on as early as Thursday in the House, would effectively bring to a close the two-year battle between President Bush and Congressional Democrats over war financing by allocating about $163 billion for combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan through early next year without imposing conditions like a withdrawal deadline. White House officials took part in the talks that produced the agreement, suggesting the president was willing to sign the emerging legislation.
- Senate approval of $162 billion in war funding on June 26, 2008, lets President George W. Bush keep his Iraq policy intact through the last days of his administration at the price of billions of dollars for domestic programs. An 18-month feud over funding for the war in Iraq largely is ending in a draw: Bush got all the money he wanted to continue his military strategy and Democrats won an expansion of benefits for veterans and the unemployed among other initiatives.
- The total cost of the Iraq war is approaching the Vietnam War's expense while spending for military operations after 9/11 has exceeded it. The U.S. has spent $648 billion on Iraq war operations, putting it in range with the $686 billion, in 2008 dollars, spent on the Vietnam War, the second most expensive war behind World War II. Since the September 11, 2001, the U.S. has spent almost $860 billion for military operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere around the world. All estimates -in 2008 US $-do not include expenses for veterans benefits, interest on war-related debts or assistance to war allies.
- Since 2003, the U.S. has spent at least $6 billion for the services of over 300 private security firms. The audit, performed at the behest of Congress, identified 77 companies that had secured a total of $5.3 billion in direct contracts and subcontracts to provide security for the Iraq reconstruction effort. The government doled out an additional $662 million in miscellaneous security services. What's more, those numbers are probably understated. That's a lot of guards and guns. But here's the kicker: Demand for private security will go up, not down, as U.S. forces draw down in Iraq.
- The cost of fighting two wars in Iraq in Afghanistan will cost American taxpayers dearly in 2009. An estimate by Secretary of Defence Robert Gates on January 8, 2009, puts the estimated total for the coming year at $136 billion that is $70 billion more to the $66 billion already approved last year.
- A new study (October 1, 2010) estimates that the cost for the United States of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will reach about $900 billion over the next 40 years and there's no plan to pay for it.
- The final bill American taxpayers will end up paying for the wars in
Afghanistan and in Iraq will be much more than the total amount put forward
by the Congress and the federal government, we were told on Wednesday June
29, 2011. A Brown University research project titled "Costs of War"
shows that between at least $3.7 trillion and $4.4 trillion -mostly in taxpayer
dollars- will have been spent on wartime expenses, mostly on the U.S. military's
missions in the respective countries that Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein
once called home.