Was a $2 Trillion Dollar US Invasion in Iraq Worth it?

Question

Conservative estimate -- Iraq War Will Cost More-than-$2-Trillion

"Two scholars, one a Nobel Prize winner, revisit their estimate of the true cost of the Iraq war – and find that $2 trillion was too low. They consider not only the current and future budgetary costs, but the economic impact of lives lost, jobs interrupted and oil prices driven higher by political uncertainty in the Middle East."

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article15499.htm

Answer 1

No, it was/is not!!
$2,000,000,000,000.00 .... count it 2 trillion!! 2 thousand billion dollars...
for GW to put a hit on the man who tried but failed to put a hit on his father ....
Somehow, 2 trillion dollars for a family vendetta that also cost the lives thousands of US military men and women and maimed and ruined many thousands more, as well as causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands of mostly civilian Iraqi women, children and men ... and destabilizing the entire Middle East seems a bit steep of a price to pay. After all, they knew long before the start that there were no WMD's or programs to develop them.. So ... NO NO NO .. the bush family had no right to force the taxpayers of the US to pay for their mafia style vendetta....

Answer 2

The cost to the USA was only about $300 billion so far.

If we'd firebombed the Sunni triangle in April of 2003, then partitioned Iraq into Kurdistan, Shi'Ite-Land and a NATO airbase over an oilfield, yes. We could have "given" Saddam Hussein to the Kurds. We could have left Iraq before the end of 2003. The Turks, who did absolutely nothing to help us, would be furious, but so what? The whole plan to make Turkey the strong nation of the region was always an hallucination. Would have cost less than $100 billion.

But we didnt' do that, we set up a European-style colonial occupation and tried to foist our stooge, Chalabi, off on the Iraqi people. We under-occupied Baghdad with too few troops. So we have made a mess that isn't worth anything. We need to hold hearings in both houses of Congress on how we got into this mess and then get out and STAY OUT of all countries until we fix our terrible intelligence apparatus, which is completely busted.

So I recommend we eat the $400 billion, get out, grow up, and rebuild our hopelessly incompetent intelligence system. Every day we stay in Iraq is an expensive, dangerous waste to us.

Answer 3

Absolutely not. As to the answers above- Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 or Osama bin Laden. Iraq was a secular state- girls could attend school. Things are definitely worse for them now that religious fundamentalism is moving in. Not to mention all the girls and boys that have died directly or indirectly from the war- most people killed by cluster bombs have been civilians; the collapse of infrastructure -access to clean water, electricity....medical care...has let to more death. More people have died so far in Iraq as a result of our incursion than died in the American Civil War. That is not proportionate to the danger posed by Saddam, who everybody agrees was a bad guy who should have been removed. But not at this cost. Iraq is looking at all out civil war today because of us. That is not freedom. No, all that death was not worth more than $2 trillion -

Answer 4

So if we didn't invade Iraq I would no longer go on living or be able to live in a free society? I thought it was decided that Iraq posed no immediate threat to the US? No nuke's, no ties to Osama, etc. So.....no, $2 Trillion was a waste. We could have done it different. How? Im not sure, not my expertise. Also, please remember it was "us" that gave him the chemical and biological weapons (WMD's) he attacked his own people with. Think Iraq- Contra war. We wanted Saddam to win. So we gave him the know how to get these weapons. Screw it. Its pointless to tell people this war was not worth it. No one cares cause its already taking place and theres no way to tell if its worth it until its over. How many Iraqi sacrifices are worth their "freedom"? Over 650,000 right now, many innocent. Hell, and for us, $2 trillion sure could have provided the country w this universal health care which is just way too expensive and out of the question. whatever, you were right, I was wrong. im stupid, your smart. Your pretty, im.....not attractive....

Answer 5

Robert is right, girl. Leaving the politics aside, looking at something from only one side is like looking through a blind man's eyes. Right or wrong, don't get too caught up in your own opinion and try to make it your argument. Usually, it doesn't work. The war may or may not be a farce....but the dollars are guaranteed to be "worth" it to a lot of people with differing opinions...some justified, some not.

Answer 6

As a veteran of this war, I can say without hesitation, YES, it was worth every DIME of it. Thoseof us who were there wanted MORE spent so that we could do an even better job.

I was in Mosul with the 21st Combat Support Hospital (CaSH) right after the invasion began. We treated as many civillians as we could and they were GRATEFUL for the help.

Their hospitals had NO antibiotics. Their bandages were washed out by the family and REUSED. Before we got there, a minor infection could mean a death sentence because the Iraqi people had NO health care system AT ALL. Saddam had been allowed to sell over $3 BILLION a year of oil "for food and humanitarian supplies". Guess what? He had palaces of incredible opulence but the people had NOTHING.

WE got them safe running water. WE got them reliable supply lines of food and medicine. WE allowed the people of Iraq to be able to send their kids to school and not have to worry about someone kicking in the door at night and making the whole family disappear.

I've been on patrol in the streets and had people run up and HUG us with tears in their eyes and thank us in broken English for liberating them from a tyrant. I've seen a massive crowd of people form in celebration of the fact that they FINALLY have food to give to their children.

I don't give a crap about what you armchair quarterbacks say about the war. You don't have ANY CLUE of what you are talking about. All you have is the garbage that is constantly streaming out of the TV, like an anti-Orwellian story, that talks about how we suck and everybody hates us over there. I swear, I have no clue of where these stories of woe and dispair come from b/c we were there to do a job, we did it, and we did it well.

I've been there. I've talked to the people. I've pulled the trigger to stop someone from attacking innocent civilians with a bomb strapped to their body.

Incidentally, if you look at the numbers, it is MORE DANGEROUS for a servicemember to be stateside then it is for us to be in Iraq. An average of just over 9 servicemembers a DAY die in traffic accidents, training accidents, and by violence HERE in the US.

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it.

Answer 7

In less than 90 years, the U.S. lost over one million people to war (Civil War, WWI, WWII) when the U.S. population was much smaller. Most people don't even grasp that loss since it was so long ago. I don't think people will be taught about this fighting in 50 years. I think, in 50 years Iraq, will end up in three parts by then, but all of the parts will probably be Republics.

Answer 8

No - Iraq was not threat. The threat was OBL and Afghanistan. Iraq popped out of George's little brain and has cost thousands of lives, nearly 3000 of them US troops. Hey, I'm glad Saddam's gone and when he hangs, so be it. But OBL is running free and Iraq did nothing to preserve American safety.

Answer 9

Those "scolars" need to go live in IRAQ and the Nobel Idiots need to go with them They need to be circumcised first.

Answer 10

First, tell me the cost of...

1) Freedom
2) Stopping the slaughter, torture and rape of innocent woman/children by a dictator
3) Eliminating a terrorist stronghold/training ground and fund maker

When you have a dollar amount for these, then I'll give you your answer.