Afghanistan Weekly Reader: Iraq, A Trillion Dollar War
Friday’s announcement that US troops will leave Iraq by the end of this year was a welcome milestone. The relief was tempered, however; by sobering reminders that the our work is far from over. In Iraq, thousands of security contractors will remain after troops leave. Soon, US-Iraq negotiations on military training possibilities will begin. In Afghanistan, costs continue to add up, and the peace process limps along.
Bringing the troops home from Iraq is a step in the right direction – but it’s just one step. We’re still a long way from a sustainable, smart strategy.
ASG
10-26-11
Navigating The Afghanistan Peace Process: It’s Going To Be A Bumpy Road
Afghanistan Study Group by Mary Kaszynski
“I don’t know any peace process that hasn’t been a bumpy process,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said during her trip to the Middle East last week. Her words proved timely. US-Afghanistan relations encountered a bump not two days later, when President Karzai said that Afghanistan would back Pakistan in the event of a US-Pakistan war.
ARTICLES
10-20-11
Calculating the Costs of War
The Washington Times by Arnaud de Borchgrave
Leon E. Panetta’s first major address as defense secretary was clearly designed to be magisterial, the credo of the Free World, still headed by the United States, cognizant of its worldwide responsibilities, albeit with much budgetary belt-tightening. He didn’t mention the two wasteful wars that had little to do with defending Western civilization.
10-22-11
Sending troops home could pave way for more non-competitive defense contracting
iWatch News by R. Jeffrey Smith
Out go all the U.S. troops by year’s end, President Obama said Friday about Iraq. And in go the contractors, along with some familiar contracting problems, say other government officials and independent experts.
10-25-11
Iraq war will cost more than World War II
The Christian Science Monitor by David R. Francis
Anyone curious about the cost of America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan can look it up on costofwar.com, up to the latest fraction of a second. Last weekend, the Iraq war had cost more than $800 billion since 2001; the Afghan war, $467 billion plus…So President Obama’s announcement that all US troops will be out of Iraq by year end should mean some drop in ongoing military spending. But the budget relief probably won’t be as much as you might expect.
10-25-11
Sen. Rockefeller: Troop drawdown in Afghanistan needs to be faster
The Hill by Daniel Strauss
Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), the former chairman and current member of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, called on a faster withdrawal of combat troops from Afghanistan.
“As I have said for some time, it’s time to dramatically accelerate the troop drawdown that began in July and end expensive reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan. Our continued commitment of 100,000 troops and over $100 billion a year to the war effort in Afghanistan is neither sustainable nor strategically wise,” Rockefeller said Tuesday in a statement.
OPINIONS
10-17-11
Plans for War Costs
Defense News by Matthew Leatherman
Ten years of conflict brought with it many reminders, including that the U.S. State Department is an equal partner in national security and that economic security hinges on a deliberate marriage of strategy and spending. Learning those lessons is proving to be its own struggle. Today, the State Department hopes to mimic one of the Pentagon’s bad budget habits even as lawmakers flirt with restraining defense spending. Congress needs to demand more responsibility from budgeters on both sides of the Potomac.
