A new report from Congress has found that since 9/11, war spending has cost American taxpayers about $1.6 trillion, or about $337 million a day, every day, for the past 13 years, the International Business Times reported.
The new estimate of the $1.6 trillion estimate from the Congressional Research Service is actually about half a trillion dollars more than the CRS’s 2010 estimate. This makes the War on Terror second in spending costs to World War II.
The report breaks down how much money was spent on what. It found that 92 percent of wartime spending since 9/11 has gone into the Pentagon, 6 percent was spent on foreign aid and diplomatic efforts, and a mere one percent on veteran’s health services.
Just over half of the $1.6 trillion was spent on military operations in Iraq, with about $686 billion going to efforts in Afghanistan.
As the IBT pointed out, the Obama administration has requested approximately $6 billion in new funding to combat the Islamic State, but researchers said that trying to predict “future costs of the new US role in countering the Islamic State is difficult because of the nature of the air campaign and uncertainties about whether the US mission may expand.”
According to a Defense Department official, since August of this year alone, American taxpayers have already spent more than $1 billion on air strikes against IS in Iraq and Syria, and the Obama administration has announced it will be deploying 1,300 troops to Iraq next month.
Spending $14 million a day on military operations while claiming that there isn’t enough money to fund educational, welfare, and food stamp programs is ridiculous. It just shows exactly where the politicians priorities really lie — and they aren’t with helping the American people.
