"There's a lot of money to pay for this," Paul Wolfowitz explained in March 2003. "It doesn't have to be U.S. taxpayer money. We are dealing with a country that can really finance its own reconstruction, and relatively soon." Like a lot of things that Paul Wolfowitz said before the war in Iraq, this idea turned out to be not only wrong, but wildly so.

The Bush administration this week announced that it will ask Congress for another $80 billion for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. This will put the total spent on the Iraq war above $200 billion, a pricetag administration figures openly mocked when it was suggested prior to the war. In fact, when Bush economic advisor Larry Lindsey publicly warned in September 2002 that the war could cost as much as $200 million, his fellow Bushies came down on him, with Office of Management and Budget Director Mitch Daniels labeling his estimate "very, very high." Lindsey, who subsequently was forced out of the administration, was actually very, very low in his estimate of the cost of the Iraq campaign.

Let's still keep this in perspective, it's 200 billion and with no end in sight.

No price is too high to ensure that my 11 year-old niece can go to school every day and me not have to worry about some terrorist blowing it up for revenge.

Removing Sadaam Hussein and liberating Iraq was the best foreign policy initiative this country has done since the Reagan Administration helped end Communism in Eastern Europe.

If we have to spend another $200 billion then so be it. How much money did we give nations after WW2 for the Marshall Plan? Look at all the good that did, and all it did to help those countries resist Communist infiltration. Let's start cutting useless Welfare programs that really drain the system and concentrate on defending our country from Fundamentalists who want us dead.

Yeah Chris you make a great point. Iraq is really on a par with western Europe in terms of relavance to the United States. Culturaly the middle east is so far advanced too. The middle easts role in our countries history is endless. The statesman that area of the world has produced reads like a laundry list of deep thinkers. Give me a break... If Clinton was wrong to go in to Hati, Somalia and the Balkans Bush is twice the fool. The war in Iraq is fubar. Bush is no conservative and his advisors are blinded by their love for Israel at the expense for the USA.

I thought about pointing out to Christopher how utterly unconstitutional his proposal is and how it flouts the historic conservative notion of "limited government", but why bother?

Christopher says, "If we have to spend another $200 billion then so be it." It has become increasingly clear to me that supporters of this war do not value that document, or the wisdom of men like Washington, Jefferson, and John Quincy Adams. You see, "security" is the most important thing and many in this country will sacrifice anything to get it - to hell with the "rights of the Englishman", the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, a limited federal state, and fiscal responsibility ("deficits don't matter", right?)

And please stop bringing the Gipper into this by trying to imply he would have supported the Iraq war. I'm tired of how the neo-Lincolnian-Wilsonian-Rooseveltian-Johnsonian-conservatives have attempted to claim his legacy while they were among some of Reagan's most vehement critics during his presidency.

Uncle rico,

First of all. I have more respect for the people of the Middle-East then I do for those in Africa. They are far more educated, and their culture IS more advanced than Africa. So take out the Clinton argument for Somalia.

As far as the Balkans go, that was a United Nations decision to go in there and stop the genocide; and Clinton supported it (big surprise). Although you can make a claim that Sadaam did institute Genocide on his own people (and the Kurds), liberating Iraq and removing Hussein was a strategic security action for the United States. The Balkans posed no threat for us, so there was no reason for us to go in there except to stop the genocide. Iraq's presence of WMD's and their refusal to follow UN orders to disarm and so forth served as a couple of the many reasons to do what we did in Iraq.

As far as Haiti goes, that country is a pure mess. We just need to destroy everything on it and try and start over.

Further, Iraq, although not playing a role in our history, is a vital country in the Middle-East. We have vested interests in this area for energy reasons, and to have a dictator invading countries (as he did in the early 90's) and acting as a security threat to both us and yes, Israel, as well as Europe (remember the coalition of 28 nations with us), gives us just cause to take action. Relevance, you bet they're relevant. Want to discuss any more political theory or give me another history lesson, Uncle Cracker?

Between 1948-1953, the United State paid about $13 billion for the Marshall plan, $1.5 billion was a loan, which was paid back (forgot the year). Roughly in today's money, it would be $100 billion. Of course, this calculation does not include the financial cost of the war $290,000,000,000 (conservatively) in 1940's money which would be in today’s money about $2.4 trillion today. For some reason and for the moment, I forgot financial costs between the end of the war and the start of the Marshall Plan.

Another important cost the U.S. over 405,000 brave soldiers which is even more important than money ever could be. Plus, we cannot forget the other millions who died because of the dictators who started the war, about 25 million Russian, 6 million Jews, 3 Millions Polish and on and on.

I guess this is the cost of appeasement to eliminate tyrants who perpetrated a past war, and now we pay for the cost of a decade plus of appeasement of another dictator. Cost should not be a deterrent to stop the wicked. We need to pay for the building of Iraq to avoid another dictator and we need to keep our troops there until the job is done.

James King,

You just said exactly what I was trying to get across. Well said, I couldn't agree more.

Sure the war has cost us over 200 billion dollars. 911 costs us, according to some reports, in excess of 1 trillion dollars. We need to balance the costs of the war with the benefits of preventing another 911. Iraq has been beneficial, in that it has caused the terrorists to divert resources they would have used elsewhere to Iraq. This has helped to prevent or at least delay another 911 style attack. Also, we get the additional benefit of having a presence in the middle east where it will be much easier to gather intellegence on the terrorist enemy. Like many, I am generally loathe to support nation building efforts. Actually we don't seem to be doing much nation building at the moment. What the troops seem to be doing more of right now is acting as a buffer between the terrorists and the western world. It really comes down to where you want your front line. Do you want it in Baghdad or Boston and would you rather have civillians or soldiers as the first line of defense? Furthermore, if we are able to change Iraq to an ally, as opposed to an enemy, this will give us even more benefits. One example is having Iraq as an ally would assist us greatly in intellegence gathering capabilities. This is one of the many ways Israel helps us. They share intellegence, on the enemy, with us. Finally, before we can engage in nation building, the terrorists must actually be defeated. Unfortunately this has not happened yet.

It is obvious that miscalculations have been made. It appears to me that this is primarilly the fault of the CIA. The CIA can't tell us what happened to Saddam's WMD, they failed to anticipate the insurgency, and they failed to warn the administration about the oil-for-food scandal, and last but certainly not least they failed to detect 911. The resignation of George Tenet appears to be a positive step. According to some reports Porter Goss is attempting to reform the CIA. Next the appeasers are us state department needs to be reformed. The resignation of Colin Powell is a positive step here. Is condi up to the job? Time will tell.

Rob: that's odd -- your response to the Iraq war and the big-time constant mess-ups is that, among other things, the State department needs to be cleaned up. (Yeah, let's blame Powell and ask Condi, Rumsfled, and Wolfowitz to clean up the mess he left us!)

How about cleaning out the Pentagon and the Defense department? That would be more accurate blame for these errors.

Short

The state department does need to be reformed. It has undermined the war effort for quite some time. They would engage in constant diplomacy while our enemies grow stronger. The following links scratch the surface on how the state department has undermined American national security. www.nationalreview.com/mowbray/mowbray/050703.asp
www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2003/4/22/2146.shtml
www.opinionjournal.com/extra?id=110004154
www.cio.com/archive/011502/sorry.html
Suffice it to say to enhance American national security the State Department needs to be reformed. Its nickname of "Foggy Bottom" is well earned. Colin Powell was not the man to refrom State. He has shown mis-judgements in middle east policy and in China/Tawian policy, among others. I think that man literally believed the PA really wanted to stop terror attacks. Is Condi Rice the person to reform State? Time will tell I suppose. Unfortunately some reports have indicated she is already being co opted by the bueracray. The biggest priorities should be 1.)Reform the CIA. Reports suggest Porter Goss is doing this. 2.) Reform state so that it will represent national interests and not waste time on endless diplomacy that undermines national security. In otherwords, it needs to represent American interests instead of the interests of foreign governments. The resignations of Tenet and Powell are positve steps and should only help. Regarding mess ups in Iraq, this needs to be balanced agains the need to prevent more 911s. The war has caused the terrorists to divert resources that would have been used elsewhere. At this time, it seems this can only be a good thing. Will Bush's policies be successful? We should all hope and pray they are!!

With Much Respect,
Rob

The Iraq War hasn't caused the terrorists to divert a thing. It is used by them as a great recruitment tool.

Insofar as the Pentagon and the DoD were hawkish and impatient on Iraq, they were the one's not seeking the U.S.'s interests abroad. It was not vital to our interest to depose Saddam Hussein. It was vital to our interests to not get involved in some random unnecessary war against a country that hadn't done anything to us and was incapable of doing anything to us. And it was not in our interests to convince millions more Muslims that OBL's rhetoric about America is correct. Blame State for the fall of China to the commies, etc. Don't blame State for this one.

Obi Juan

The war in Iraq has in fact diverted terrorist resources that would have been used elsewhere, if they were not used in Iraq. The war in Iraq may have made some terrorists reach the decision they would have made anyway. The problem is the nature of Islam and its insatiable desire for world domination, as opposed to anything we have or have not done. The sooner we recognize this the better. In other words, this has not made them do anything they were not going to do anyway. It has simply made them choose the side they would have chosen anyway a little sooner than they may have otherwise. If we left Iraq or the world stage entirely, they would not simply become peaceful content folks. I'd rather engage them with the American military, in Iraq, than have open season on American civilians, in Boston, New York, Boise, or anywhere USA. When Fallujah was taken, terrorists from Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, "Palestine", and from various places in the middle east were found there. We have even found some westerners fighting for the terrorists. Now unless they are super natrual beings of some sort they cannot be in two places at once. If they were not engaging American troops in Iraq they would be carrying out their dastardly deeds somewhre else, perhaps in Western Europe or somewhere USA. So unless this enemy can be in multiple places, the battle field in Iraq has diverted their resources. As of this writing, there have been no more 911 style attacks. Taking the fight to the terrorists in Iraq probablly has had allot to do with this. Suffice it to say the terrorists cannot defeat us on the battlefield. They can use their media surrogates to try and get the American people to loose their will to resist. It has been observed that terrorists are streaming accross the borders of Syria, Iran, and perhaps others to engage American troops in Iraq and for some reason we cannot get this under control. Could this be by design? Perhaps someone knows this and they are deliberately trying to draw the terrorists into Iraq and away from the western world. I think it is a distinct possibility.

Perhaps I should clarify my previous post. Reforming the Arabist state department may not necessarily help us in Iraq but it will help us in the long run. The policy of accomodating tyrants strictly for the purpose of "stability" must end. 911 proved the futility of such a policy.

I actually think far from being impatient on going to war with Iraq, we waited far to long. While we played the United Nations game, Saddam and his cronies had extra time to prepare and probably to transfer his WMD to other places. Saddam undertood the stakes far better than most Americans do. Fortunately the threat posed by Saddam was taken out before it could fully materialize. Since Saddam is now gone, his media surrogates can claim that he was no threat. The sanctions were going to collapse, when they did, the threat posed by Saddam would have fully materialized and we may have been looking at another 911 style attack or worse, then what would the critics say. I'd rather take out threats before they materialize. No 911 attacks = the enemy was no threat and Bush rushed into an unnecessary war. A 911 style attack = Failure to engage the enemy and Bush failed to stop the attack. This sounds a bit like 'heads I win, tails you loose.' This is a game the administration cannot possibly win. It would probably be adviseable not to even try to play this game, as it is simply not winnable. As I have stated in a previous post, I am no Bush fan but this is ridiculous. One of Bush's many flaws, is he has consistently lied about the terrorist threat by understating it. In previous posts, I have attempted to provide links to information that document Saddam's links to Al Qaeda, as well as other international terrorist organiziations. This is information you will generally not get from the mian stream news media. We are at war with inernational Islamic terrorists who are supported by communists, in Russia and China. When all evidence is considered, I simply do not think it would have been even possible to win this war with Saddam remaining in power. Fortunately the threat was taken out before it could fully materialize. Now we need to win the next phase.