http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/20 ... ilm_1.html
Saw this on 'Newsnight' last night. Joseph Stiglitz has released a book claiming that the Iraq war will cost 3 trillion dollars in total. The second world war, for comparison cost 5 billion.

http://www.ddaymuseum.org/education/edu ... mbers.html


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Based on the presumed figure of an "American Billion", that is one thousand million, and an "American Trillion", that is one million million, the direct cost of WW2 was $1.6 trillion dollars. It does not say if that is transposed to modern day currency or not.

I'm not an economist, I'm afraid. I certainly heard him mention WW2 costing 5 trillion in the interview (where Paxman gave him an easy ride). He was making comparisons between the two wars so I suppose he was thinking in today's currency.

I'd be as concerned (if not more so) about the 5 million life war in the DRC that although it is in a relative lull at the moment is generally ignored in the world media.

Ah ok, I can envisage the figure of 5 trillion, that would sound about right in today's money. However in your initial post you have the figure of 5 billion. A misplaced "B" perhaps!

I've been to the southern region of the DRC. It is certainly not a happy area. I've done my best on various occasions on the site to highlight the plight of the DRC and Zimbabwe. See here. We should all be placing more emphasis on the issues at hand in Africa in my opinion.

I agree it is truely a sad place and Africa may prove a lot more important than the middle East especially if we are able to reduce our dependency on oil.

How does anyone place a cost on war. If your family have been slaughtered and your home destroyed the cost is total. If your son comes home a cripple, what is the cost to you? There is something vile about costing war.

The human costs you just cannot put a price on, but the rebuilding costs after war are enormous. Just imagine how long it has taken to build any town or city in Ireland and then imagine that someone took out our water treatment, power supply, communications centres, bridges factories etc. Just how long would it take us to rebuild, it would probably take generations.

The are using 125,000 rounds of ammunition per soilder 5.56mm Nato

Now , there's a point.

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Yeah, a misplaced B. If it's bigger than a thousand I have a lot of trouble with it. We might as well be talking about scuidgeillions here!

I do know it was a lot of money to spend on a dodgy and unpopular war. Of course only a fraction has been paid yet, this will be burdening the Americans for years to come.