The Price of Imperial Folly
By Phyllis Bennis, AlterNet. Posted July 15, 2004.
Lost in the Beltway debate over intelligence failure is
the enormous price we – Americans, Iraqis, the world
– are paying for the Bush administration's
self-serving war.
The
recently
released
Senate
Intelligence
Report
demonstrates
what
so
many
have
known
for
so
long:
The
claimed
justifications
for
the
invasion
of
Iraq
were
based
on lies. But lost in the Beltway debate over intelligence failure is the enormous price we –
Americans, Iraqis, the world – are paying for the Bush administration's self-serving war.
In sheer dollar amounts, the costs of this precipitate war are already far higher than any
number put forward by Bush officials at the outset of the war. The price tag so far is $151
billion and climbing – already three times the initial estimate provided by Bush's Office of
Management and Budget and embarrassingly close to the "$100 to $200 billion" that White
House economic advisor Lawrence Lindsay anticipated just before he precipitously left the
administration in December 2002.
For most of us, $151 billion is an incomprehensible amount of money. It's hard to imagine
what that kind of dollar amount actually means. Well, here are some facts to prod our
imagination.
To begin with, $151 billion can pay for health care for 23 million uninsured Americans; or
housing stipends for 27 million homeless people in this country; or a year's salary for 3
million new elementary school teachers; or more than 678,000 new fire engines.
The international impact of that kind of money is even more breathtaking. That same $151
billion could feed half the hungry people in the world for two years and provide clean water
and sanitation for the entire developing world and fund a comprehensive global AIDS
program and pay for childhood immunizations for every child in poor countries that
constitute the global South.
The United States instead chose to invade Iraq to depose a tyrant who posed little danger
to the United States or to the world.
Startling as $151 billion may be, the costs of the war go far beyond direct economic costs.
Local communities across the nation have been affected by the loss of vitally needed
federal funds slashed to pay for war. But even more important, they have lost large
numbers of 'first responders' – the firefighters, police, ambulance drivers, emergency
medical technicians and others who provide crisis care – who are also disproportionately
members of the National Guard and the reserves. And with one-third of the entire U.S.
military deployment in Iraq made up of Guard and Reserve troops, basic emergency
services are facing serious consequences.
Among military families themselves, the impact of this war goes far beyond the fear of
death or injury of loved ones. Polls indicate that increasing numbers of military families are
facing a serious financial crisis including bankruptcy, unemployment and hunger. The
so-called "all-volunteer" army is a creation of the "poverty draft," made up
disproportionately of the poor and people of color.
The impact on these families is severe. Between 30 and 40 percent of reservists and
national guard members earn a lower salary during military deployment than at their
regular job at home. As a result, more military families are forced to turn to emergency food
support; one study reported a "several hundred percent" increase in requests for food
stamps and subsidized meals by military families between 2002 and 2003.
The future of these families looks just as grim because the U.S. military is overstretched
and long tours of duty are likely to remain the norm. While there is talk of reviving the legal
draft, even without such a move the pressure on members of the reserve and the National
Guard, and on regular troops whose contracts have expired but who are prohibited from
leaving the military, will continue to escalate.
The tally of expenses also grows ever longer when we consider the long-term effects of
the war. Environmental degradation from the estimated 1000 tons of depleted uranium
dropped by U.S. forces, almost three times the amount dropped in the 1991 Gulf War, will
certainly have its most damaging effects on Iraqis, especially children, as well as on U.S.
and coalition soldiers. The effects are also almost certain to spread beyond the borders to
surrounding countries, such as Iran and Kuwait, which share the Shaat al-Arab waterway
with Iraq.
The Iraq war's long-term impact on the rule of international law – already made evident by
the torture chambers of Abu Ghraib – is likely to be just as destructive. The U.S. decision to
go to war without UN approval and in violation of the UN Charter, its assertion of the
legitimacy of preventive war (especially one based on false claims), and its law-of-empire
style rejection of its obligations under the Geneva Conventions and the Convention
Against Torture, all set the stage for international lawlessness and escalating conflict. Be it
an Indian attack on Pakistan, a war between Peru and Colombia, or a new Israeli invasion
of Lebanon and Syria - in each of these scenarios, the offending nation could argue that
their actions have been "legalized" by the precedent set by the Bush administration.
The war has also, of course, transformed Iraq into what it never was under Saddam
Hussein – a haven and mobilizing point for international terrorism. According to the
prestigious International Institute of Strategic Studies in London, the primary effect of the
U.S. occupation on Al Qaeda has been "accelerated recruitment."
And in conclusion, let's not forget the most important cost of this war: the loss of human
life. U.S. and so-called "coalition" forces have lost over 1,000 soldiers, including 880 U.S.
troops. Thousands more have been wounded, many of them grievously so. Iraqi civilians
have lost more than ten times that number. While the Pentagon refuses on principle to
track Iraqi dead, the most recent estimates range from 11,164 to 13,118.
That the Iraq war has failed to accomplish its stated purposes is undeniable: Iraq is
neither sovereign nor free; The Middle East is no more democratic; Americans are not
safer, nor is the world. We are already paying far too high a price for this spectacular
failure. Our refusal to change course will merely compound this colossally expensive folly of
empire.
In the latest opinion polls, 55 percent of Iraqis say they would feel safer if U.S. and other
foreign troops left the country immediately. For a change, the U.S. should give the Iraqis
what they want.
Phyllis Bennis is a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C. She is the lead
author of "Paying the Price: The Mounting Costs of the Iraq War," an IPS staff report. The
Institute is a think tank that works with social movements to forge viable and sustainable
policies to promote democracy, justice, human rights, and diversity. The full text of the report is
available online. |
