The full cost of the Iraqi war, so far...

[elfs]

The Iraq War Ledger: A Tabulation of the Human, Financial, and Strategic Costs

Human costs

• Total deaths: Between 110,663 and 119,380
• Coalition deaths: 4,712
• U.S. deaths: 4,394
• U.S. wounded: 31,768
• U.S. deaths as a percentage of coalition deaths: 93.25 percent
• Iraqi Security Force deaths: At least 9,451
• Total coalition and ISF deaths: At least 14,163
• Iraqi civilian deaths: Between 96,037 and 104,7542
• Non-Iraqi contractor deaths: At least 463
• Internally displaced persons: 2.6 million
• Refugees: 1.9 million

Financial costs

• Cost of Operation Iraqi Freedom: $748.2 billion
• Projected total cost of veterans’ health care and disability: $422 billion to $717 billion

Strategic costs

• Empowered Iran in Iraq and region
• Created terrorist training ground.
• Loss of moral authority.
• Diverted resources and attention from Afghanistan.
• Stifled democracy reform.
• Rising sectarianism in region

So...

Did we win?

Comments

[sirfox.livejournal.com]

That depends. If you're standing to make a profit from the military-industrial complex, it's a bases-loaded grand slam home friggin' run.

Everybody else, not so much.

Pyrrhic what now?

[tehrasha.livejournal.com]

I notice that there is no number representing the number of Iraqi soldier/insurgent deaths. Oh wait, there it is... 'Iraqi civilians'. I am not making light of any civilians that did die, but the lack of deliniation certainly questions how self-serving the report is.

[gromm.livejournal.com]

Yes, I noticed that too. In fact, the best-case scenario is that a little less than 500 insurgents were killed (the difference between total deaths, Iraqi civilian deaths, and coalition/Iraqi security forces deaths). Unless insurgents and Iraqi regular army deaths are included in the "Civilian" column, that's a completely unacceptable kill ratio, especially considering the technological advantage the US army has.

And if the insurgent/IRA deaths *are* included in the "civilian" column, then that's completely unacceptable reporting.

[tehrasha.livejournal.com]

The less than 500 number you found is the 'Non-Iraqi contractor deaths'.

So apparently we killed ZERO soldiers/insurgents.

[dr-memory.livejournal.com]

Well, we totally deprived Saddam of his rusting piles of chemical warheads left over from 1988, so GO USA! FUCK YEAH!

[http://users.livejournal.com/_candide_/]

Incidentally, if you look at the per-day cost over the 7 years of this war:


The non-coalition, non-contractor deaths are about 37/day, minimum (using the figures supplied by Elf).

The financial cost is about $292.6 million per day. If you prefer month-to-month cost, it's $8.89billion per month.


What I also love are all of the apologists who were bleating, "We can't cut-and-run," when we Cut-n-Ran-from-Afghan-i-stan to dive into this war in the (quick)sand. Thanks to that, Afghanistan is probably no longer savable, and the Taliban & Osama & Friends went into and have started destabilizing nuclear-armed Pakistan. Heck of a job, there.

[tagryn]

I suspect, a hundred years from now, the '91 and '03 wars will be viewed historically as Part I of a two-part act where Part II is whatever ends up resulting from Iran's current pursuit of nuclear weapons, with the Iran-Iraq war acting as prelude.