July 10, 2007

New numbers: Zero, 10,000,000,000 and 3,606

From the AP:
A progress report on Iraq will conclude that the U.S.-backed government in Baghdad has not met any of its targets for political, economic and other reforms, speeding up the Bush administration's reckoning on what to do next, a U.S. official said Monday.
To put that in numerical terms, "not met any" means that they've met zero targets. It's the null set.

From another AP story:

The boost in troop levels in Iraq has increased the cost of war there and in Afghanistan to $12 billion a month, and the total for Iraq alone is nearing a half trillion dollars, congressional analysts say.

All told, Congress has appropriated $610 billion in war-related money since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror assaults, roughly the same as the war in Vietnam. Iraq alone has cost $450 billion.

The figures come from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, which provides research and analysis to lawmakers.

And some context and details:

The $12 billion a month "burn rate" includes $10 billion for Iraq and almost $2 billion for Afghanistan, plus other minor costs. That's higher than Pentagon estimates earlier this year of $10 billion a month for both operations. Two years ago, the average monthly cost was about $8 billion. [emphasis added]

And of course the real cost.

As of this morning, 3,606 dead American troops (3,598 confirmed by the DoD).

Yer doing a heckova job, dubya. Heckova job.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is a scandal! Outrageous! It's costing us almost $140 million just to kill a single American soldier! Certainly Bush, Cheney, Gates, and Petraeus can figure out a way to destroy the U. S. military less expensively than that.

Social Justice NPC Anti-Paladin™ said...

The Media Lied — Iraq Did Meet Many Benchmarks

Anonymous said...

Nice off-topic, Mein Heir.