In 2003, before the war in Iraq started, I remember a figure being stated as the estimated cost of the war; but I don’t remember the figure. $20 million comes to mind. But I want to know for sure. How much were we told the war would cost?
Lawrence Lindsey, an economic advisor to the White House, estimated $100 billion to $200 billion in September 2002. The White House sharply disagreed and Lindsey was chased out of his job soon thereafter. Mich Daniels, who ran the Office of Management and Budget, gave an estimate of about $60 billion a few months later.
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/US/12/31/sproject.irq.war.cost/
It is worth noting that there has been some debate about whether those costs were expected to be the total cost of the war, or the cost of the initial invasion. In any case, neither of these projections counted on a war that would last for years.
Heh— $20 million wouldn’t even cover the cost of the ammunition used in the initial invasion.
Maybe the figure I (don’t) remember was $2 billion. In any case, I remember a figure much lower than the $50- to $60 billion in the article.
As a follow up to your question, I’m wondering what the “line items” or categories are in such a budget cacluation. Obviously, things that have been purchased are used up, spent, or damaged, and their’s fuel, food, etc. But do they calculate human losses also? What about increases in pay, widow/er pensions, medical costs to the V.A., etc.
(Obviously, that is all just on the U.S. side of the "cost. It would be interesting to see what the cost and benefits are on the Iraqi side.)
Thanks.
Indeed. But that would move this over to GD. I’m just trying to find out what the President told us what the cost would be before he started the war.
Maybe not. The “line item” issue could be a matter of discussion, but not one that is unsettled if you consider looking for estimates that were made in the past and consider items that could be in the list even if not 100% agreement.
[sub]Removing my post. I read the topic wrong[/sub]
You might be thinking of how much the taxpayers actually paid for Gulf War I. That war cost the US about $95 billion, but a fairly large list of countries compensated the US for war costs – Saudi, Japan, Kuwait, UAE, and so on – so that the actual out-of-pocket costs for US taxpayers was in the neighborhood of $5 billion or so.
But I simply have to assure you, nobody in their right mind would seriously suggest that the invasion of Iraq would cost less than $50 billion. It was frequently commented at the time that $50 billion itself was on the verge of being an unrealistic number.
As an interesting comparason, there’s a website that keeps a running total of the money being spent in Iraq.
http://www.house.gov/schakowsky/iraqquotes_web.htm All our geniuses had it figured out.
Their oil was supposed to more than pay for it.
Yes, the head administrator of the USAID (the agency responsible for rebuilding in Iraq) predicted the total cost of U.S. taxpayers would be 1.7 billion. Here’s that infamous interview.
Bolding mine.
My usual smarty-pants reply to queries like this is “eleventy billion” but now it seems “eleven billionty billion plus” is more realistic.
Thanks!