Monday, January 09, 2006

My Country Went to Iraq...

And all we got was a two trillion dollar bill:
The cost of the Iraq war could top $2 trillion, far above the White House's pre-war projections, when long-term costs such as lifetime health care for thousands of wounded U.S. soldiers are included, a study said on Monday.
Oh, yeah, and another generation of maimed, traumatized soldiers:
Columbia University economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and Harvard lecturer Linda Bilmes included in their study disability payments for the 16,000 wounded U.S. soldiers, about 20 percent of whom suffer serious brain or spinal injuries....

...Unforeseen costs include recruiting to replenish a military drained by multiple tours of duty, slower long-term U.S. economic growth and health-care bills for treating long-term mental illness suffered by war veterans.

They said about 30 percent of U.S. troops had developed mental-health problems within three to four months of returning from Iraq as of July 2005, citing Army statistics.
I guess I could include in this tally however many tens of thousands of Iraqis who've been killed or wounded and the cost of rebuilding a devastated Iraq, but apparently that's not our problem...

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