from a National Journal article by Ronald Brownstein:
Quote:
Iraq is the first major war that this country has fought by transferring the entire cost to future generations, including the generation fighting the war, through government debt. President Bush has never proposed raising taxes to pay for the conflict. Instead, he has presided over an increase in domestic spending and substantially cut taxes in 2003, an unprecedented step during wartime. "In every other major war ... we raised taxes," says Robert Hormats, author of The Price of Liberty, an authoritative and insightful recent book on how America has financed its wars. "This is the first major war where we have cut taxes ... and it is the first major war where we have increased domestic ... spending rather than cut it. As a result, the entire incremental cost of the war has been borrowed."
That cost is formidable. The Congressional Budget Office calculates that the Iraq war has already cost $600 billion. That bill is rising by $10.3 billion per month. Because all of that money has been borrowed, the interest on that additional debt might swell the price tag by another $600 billion over the next decade, the House Budget Committee estimates...
...
New taxes paid for one-quarter of the costs of the Civil War, for one-third of World War I's costs, and for nearly half of World War II's. Even when confronted with the unprecedented expense of those titanic wars, our leaders "had a very keen sense of not imposing inordinate burdens on posterity," says Hormats, now a vice chairman of Goldman Sachs
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Brownstein: The bottom line on Iraq - National Journal - MSNBC.com
How will our children and grandchildren begin to pay this off, assuming it ever ends over the next 100 years? Something to ponder as the tax rebates start rolling in next month, I guess.