The Battle of the Budgets: New Fronts in the Afghan and Iraq Wars
Amy Goodman
Ttuthdig: March 1, 2011
Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, Idaho ... these are the latest fronts in the
battle of budgets, with the larger fight over a potential shutdown of the
U.S. government looming. These fights, radiating out from the occupation of
the Wisconsin Capitol building, are occurring against the backdrop of the
two wars waged by the U.S. in Iraq and Afghanistan. No discussion or debate
over budgets, over wages and pensions, over deficits, should happen without
a clear presentation of the costs of these wars-and the incalculable
benefits that ending them would bring.
First, the cost of war. The U.S. is spending about $2 billion a week in
Afghanistan alone. That's about $104 billion a year - and that is not
including Iraq. Compare that with the state budget shortfalls. According to
a recent report by the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities,
"some 45 states and the District of Columbia are projecting budget
shortfalls totaling $125 billion for fiscal year 2012." The math is simple:
The money should be poured back into the states, rather than into a state of
war.
President Barack Obama shows no signs that he is going to end either the
occupation of Iraq or the ongoing war in Afghanistan. Quite the opposite; he
campaigned with the promise to expand the war in Afghanistan, and that is
one campaign promise he has kept. So how is Obama's war going? Not well.
This has been the deadliest period for civilians in Afghanistan since the
U.S.-led invasion began in October 2001. Sixty-five civilians were
reportedly killed recently in Kunar, near Pakistan, where mounting civilian
casualties lead to increasing popular support for the Taliban. 2010 was the
deadliest year for U.S. soldiers as well, with 711 U.S. and allied deaths in
Afghanistan. Soldier deaths remain high in 2011, with the fighting expected
to intensify as the weather warms.
The Washington Post recently reported that Obama's controversial CIA-run
drone program, in which unmanned aerial drones are sent over rural Pakistan
to launch Hellfire missiles at "suspected militants," has killed at least
581 people, of whom only two were on a U.S. list of people suspected of
being "high-level militants." Ample evidence exists that the drone strikes,
which have increased in number dramatically under Obama's leadership, kill
civilians, not to mention Pakistani civilian support for the United States
Meanwhile, in Iraq, the democracy that the neocons in Washington expected to
deliver through the barrel of a gun with their "shock and awe" may be coming
finally, not with the help of the U.S., but, rather, inspired by the
peaceful, popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt. However, Human Rights
Watch has just reported that as people protest and dissidents organize, "the
rights of Iraq's most vulnerable citizens, especially women and detainees,
are routinely violated with impunity."
Protests have erupted in another Tahrir Square, in Baghdad (yes, it means
"liberation" in Iraq and Egypt), against corruption and demanding jobs and
better public services. Iraqi government forces killed 29 people over the
weekend, and 300 people, including human-rights workers and journalists,
have been rounded up.
Yet, the U.S. continues to pour money and troops into these endless wars.
Rolling Stone's Michael Hastings, whose reporting exposed the crass behavior
of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, has just exposed what he calls an illegal
operation run by Lt. Gen. William Caldwell in Afghanistan, in which a U.S.
Army "psy-ops" operation was mounted against U.S. senators and other
visiting dignitaries in order to win support and more funding. One of
Hastings' military sources quoted Caldwell as saying: "How do we get these
guys to give us more people? ... What do I have to plant inside their
heads?"
The recently retired special inspector general for Afghanistan
reconstruction (SIGAR), Arnold Fields, just reported that $11.4 billion is
at risk due to inadequate planning. Another group, the U.S. Commission on
Wartime Contracting, "concludes that the United States has wasted tens of
billions of the nearly $200 billion that has been spent on contracts and
grants since 2002 to support military, reconstruction and other U.S.
operations in Iraq and Afghanistan."
Which brings us back to those teachers, nurses, police officers and
firefighters in Wisconsin. Mahlon Mitchell, president of the Professional
Fire Fighters of Wisconsin, told me in the Capitol rotunda in Madison why
the unionized firefighters were there, even though their union was one not
targeted by Gov. Scott Walker's bill. "This is about an attack on the middle
class," Mitchell said. By shutting down the attacks on the people of Iraq
and Afghanistan, we can prevent these attacks on the poor and middle class
here at home.
Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.
Amy Goodman is the host of "Democracy Now!," a daily international TV/radio
news hour airing on more than 900 stations in North America. She is the
author of "Breaking the Sound Barrier," recently released in paperback and
now a New York Times best-seller.
© 2011 Amy Goodman
Distributed by King Features Syndicate
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