Congress predicts war costs

I discovered this story in The Canadian Press after I Googled Iraq war today.

Congress is estimating the war costs in Iraq to hit $2.4 trillion by the next decade. Ok, I understand where this would stir up some issues with some of the American public. That is a lot of money.

The Democrats are saying the voters won't stand for the issue.

A direct quote from the story:

"That estimate is a far cry from the administration's original claim of a $50-billion price that the Iraqis could pay themselves," said U.S. Representative Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the House of Representatives.

I found another story on the war costs from The Voice of America.

More than $450 billion has already been spent on the wars. President Bush has asked for another $160 billion for the fiscal year of 2008.

Again, the Democrats are angry. A quote from the VOA story.

"The truth is that this administration from its original $50 billion estimate on the cost of the war in Iraq right through the estimates being made outside this committee today, consistently low-balls, misstates to the American people the true cost of the dollars, and of course, the true cost in blood that we are paying for this go-it-alone misadventure," said Democratic Congressman Lloyd Doggett of Texas.


It's not the money thing that scares me. These estimates are assuming that there will still be 75,000 troops over in Iraq at that time - 2017. Are you kidding? That many troops ten years from now? Isn't that a bit more frightening than money!

It's interesting that I noticed this today. I was having a conversation last night with my boyfriend, who is indeed in the US Army, and he asked me what I thought if there was a World War 3 on our hands in the future. With 75,000 of our troops in Iraq in 2017 - doesn't that raise an interesting question. What if there is a World War 3 against terrorism on the horizon... what would come of it? What would happen to the Muslim community?

For another version of the original story visit CNN Money.



That's all for now...