Cost of US Wars on Terror at $6 trillion in 2019 and $7 trillion in 2023

Brown University estimates the US Wars on Terror will be $5.9 trillion through 2019. This includes direct war and war-related spending and obligations for future spending on post 9/11
war veterans.

US war spending will continue to grow. The Pentagon currently projects $80 billion in Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) spending through FY2023. Even if the wars are ended by 2023, the US would still be on
track to spend an additional $808 billion to total at least $6.7 trillion, not including future interest costs. The costs of war will likely be greater than this because the number of veterans will grow until all wars are ended. Veterans benefits and disability spending and the cost of interest on borrowing to pay for the wars, will make up more and more of the costs.

Even if all operations are terminated in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, it seems the interest payments and Homeland Security will continue. The threat of middle east terrorism to the USA seems to be a permanent condition.

Permanent Extra Costs for the USA

Could Homeland Security be provided at lower cost? If costs are reduced then every four years the spending could be $600 billion instead of $800 billion. This is $1.5 trillion every decade versus $2 trillion every decade.

Until the US pays down all of its current debt then $1.5 trillion per decade in extra interest and Homeland Security is a permanent extra budget cost.

61 thoughts on “Cost of US Wars on Terror at $6 trillion in 2019 and $7 trillion in 2023”

  1. Again, you are saying that Social Security is not backed by the full faith of the government.

    No. I didn’t say that. Because I would never dream of saying the obvious but in the wrong context.

    The phrase ‘backed by the full faith of the government.’ refers to our currency and our debt (which are inexterably tied together since we have a debt-based currecny), not SS. See what I mean by your ignorance?

    That means they can default on Social Security with no consequences.

    Now that you falsely make stuff up about what I am ‘saying’, this is just more falsehoods on your part as you are basing it on the first, main falsehood.

    Just out of curiousity, what did you mean exactly by ‘no consequences’ anyway?

  2. because Social Security is not backed by the government, they can stop Social Security payments any time they want?

    I never said that. Who did? PERFECT example of you having ZERO understanding of what even is being written as well as the basic knowledge needed to do so.

    But by pure accident of you bringing this up: actually YES. They (meaning Congress) CAN stop SS payments whenever they want. Just takes a vote in said Congress.

    Actually, in some cases even just an EO. Obama did that and screwed over millions of married couples via a rule change. Nobody in the press screamed about it because he had a (D) after his name, but he did it. He did it so it would keep SS in the black so Congress could keep on raiding it. Google it.

    still have seen zero sources for your information, please post it.

    Google it yourself. Or find all the books that have been written on this subject going back 30 years now. You don’t need more ‘sources’. You need EDUCATION.

  3. Again, you are saying that Social Security is not backed by the full faith of the government. That means they can default on Social Security with no consequences. I don’t mind being called ignorant, I am ignorant on a lot of things just like everyone else. However, I want you to show where you got your information.

  4. So they’re lying, and because Social Security is not backed by the government, they can stop Social Security payments any time they want? I still have seen zero sources for your information, please post it.

  5. Ok, now you demonstrate just poor reading comprehension issues on your part:

    The government does not default on securities.

    Intergovernmental Debentures are not securities. Pay attention.

    The Social Security trust funds are invested entirely in U.S. Treasury securities.

    Only whatever excess they have after Congress raids their surpluses with intergovernmental debentures. Which is usually ‘not much’ or ‘none at all’.

    See. Your ignorance shows on how this really works. That makes you easily fooled by articles written by others who don’t know what they are talking about OR state factually correct yet contextually inaccurate information. Either way, you fall for it because you are ignorant.

  6. See. You just understand enough buzzwords to find articles with them and then post them. You don’t understand the fundamentals at all. Else, you would never be posting the garbage.

  7. There is no ‘unified deficit’. That’s just a fiction dreamed up by people preying upon the ignorant like you. Sorry, but that is true.

  8. The government does not default on securities.

    Source: Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
    Title: Policy Basics: Understanding the Social Security Trust Funds

    The Social Security trust funds are invested entirely in U.S. Treasury securities.

  9. On a unified budget basis, when Social Security’s financial position worsens, the budget deficit grows. Social Security contributes about $53 billion to the budget deficit.

    Since 2010, Social Security has been paying more in benefits than it has collected in payroll taxes. To meet its payments, Social Security began redeeming the bonds, plus interest, from the federal government.

    In other words, money was transferred from the government’s general fund to Social Security.

  10. Source: Politifact  April 26th, 2013
    Title: Social Security doesn’t add to the federal deficit, U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan says

    To support Pocan’s claim, Pocan spokesman Samuel Lau cited federal documents from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office and Congressional Research Service to make two points:

    1. Social Security runs a surplus, and therefore doesn’t contribute to the overall federal deficit.

    2. Social Security benefits can be paid only from the Social Security trust fund, not general funds.

    But there is more to the story.

    Andrew Biggs, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and former principal deputy commissioner of the Social Security Administration, explains it this way:

    Budget experts use two main measures of the budget deficit: the “on-budget” balance, which includes everything except Social Security and the postal service, and the “unified budget,” which merges the on- and off-budgets.

    The unified budget approach is by far the most common for budget experts and the media — and when the Obama White House talks about a 2013 budget deficit of $901 billion, it’s the unified budget deficit that’s being cited.

  11. Source: Larry Kotlikoff PBS.org
    Title: Is Social Security Contributing to the Deficit?
    Date: Dec 30, 2013

    So Social Security has and is contributing to our true deficit — the annual increase in the country’s overall fiscal gap. This is a not a right wing versus left wing issue. This is an issue of older generations taking from their kids decade after decade. It’s called pay as you go, but it’s really take as you go. And you didn’t hear this from a right winger. You heard this from an economist and a father.

  12. Source: Factcheck.org October 12, 2015
    Title: Sanders Misleads on Social Security

    Sen. Bernie Sanders repeats a Democratic talking point in saying that Social Security hasn’t contributed “one penny” — or “one nickel” — to the deficit. In fact, it contributed $73 billion to the deficit in 2014.
    Sanders is talking about what’s called the “on-budget” deficit, while Social Security is considered an “off-budget” program. But in terms of actual federal revenue and outlays, and borrowing, Social Security is contributing to yearly deficits and has been since 2010. 

    “Social Security adds to the unified deficit, which is the deficit we almost all discuss all the time,” Marc Goldwein, senior vice president and senior policy director at the bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, told us in an email interview. “It does so because we spend a lot more on Social Security benefits than we raise in payroll tax and other related revenue.”

    Goldwein told us that Sanders’ statement contains a kernel of truth in that Social Security technically can’t run a debt. “That means that any [yearly] deficits it’s running now can only legally be paid because it was running surpluses in the past,” he says. But the government spent the surplus on other things. It owes Social Security the money, which is held in the form of Treasury securities. In order to pay it, the government must cut spending in other areas, raise taxes or borrow from the public.

  13. Your position is that these social programs do not increase the debt or deficit.

    No. My position is that you don’t know even the most basics of the subject matter to even discuss it with you. And you keep proving my position right.

    The federal government sells bonds to Social Security, the interest on those bonds has to be paid from somewhere.

    Yeah. Interest is paid from the general budget that raids the social security trust fund by forcing it to issue what are called intergovernmental debentures. These are un-tradeable IOUs that Congress can simply default upon.

    But you don’t know what intergovernmental debentures are, right? Because you don’t know anything about this issue, really.

    Medicare and Medicaid ABSOLUTELY hit the deficit as well as the debt and both are growing at an unsustainable rate.

    So? They aren’t funded by the general budget. Therefore they are not causing deficits in the general budget. Pay attention.

    I am very happy you are not in charge of my finances.

    What does your personal finances and whatever knowledge you have in managing thereof have anything to do with your total lack of knowledge when discussing the intricacies of the federal budget?

    Trust me. It is quite obvious that the answer to that one is ‘nothing’. Or at least you had better hope it is that answer for your personal financial sake.

  14. Your position is that these social programs do not increase the debt or deficit. Like I said, you cannot fix stupid. The federal government sells bonds to Social Security, the interest on those bonds has to be paid from somewhere. By law Social Security is not allowed to his the deficit, but it does in a round about way. Medicare and Medicaid ABSOLUTELY hit the deficit as well as the debt and both are growing at an unsustainable rate. I am very happy you are not in charge of my finances.

  15. The sad thing is the figures provided are the disclosed sums. The covert black budgets could easily double the actual figure, case and point the recent Pentagon audit.

    The even sadder thing is that had even 10% of the acknowledged 6 trillion been put into alternative energy research we’d have cracked it by now. Peace and prosperity for all! But no! We must continue pumping money into the military industrial complex

  16. How about you explain how Congress “raided” Social Security.

    Why should I have to do the equivalent of explaining that the sky is colored blue?

    You just revealed your utter ignorance on this subject if you don’t know that Congress has been raiding Social Security for decades now. This fact is Basic Social Security Budgeting 101.

    Do you think the fund is invested in the market with zero burden on the tax base of the federal government?

    No. It isn’t ‘invested’ for one thing. And how is that related to Congress raiding it?

    You just know buzzwords but don’t know the fundamentals.

    What does Social Security invest in to make fund its growth?

    Nothing. Shït. You don’t even know that it is PAYGO. Not surprised.

    It has produced a surplus, which Congress took and replaced with legally unenforceable IOUs. Learn something.

  17. How about you explain how Congress “raided” Social Security. Do you think the fund is invested in the market with zero burden on the tax base of the federal government? What does Social Security invest in to make fund its growth?

  18. Nope. Not boggled at all.

    You just don’t know what you are talking about NOR what even that article was talking about.

  19. Like the article says, if it quacks like a duck, walks like a duck it is a duck. It adds to the debt and deficit, so it doesn’t matter what you name it. Keep at it.

  20. Ok, so even an article as simple as the one I gave you has you boggled for some reason. As we say in IT, you can’t fix stupid.

  21. It doesn’t.

    SS has DECREASED the federal deficit in the general budget because Congress has raided it.

    Learn reality, and then get back to us.

  22. Why?

    I know the difference between the entitlements budget and the general budget and you don’t.

    That is all that is needed to be exposed here.

  23. Even better genius, do a search for a Forbes article called “Yes, Social Security Does Indeed Add To The Federal Deficit” and get back to us.

  24. You didn’t fight terrorism. You fought governments who were *not* sponsors of the same. If you actually wanted to fight terrorism you would have pressured Saudiarabia and made an actual attempt to find Bin laden rather than tomahawking camels in the middle of butt-fuck-nowhere.

    The arab spring and ISIS is a direct consequence of your effort to remake the Middle East in your own image. It is granted that you do not get ISIS without a backwards bronze age religion; but you also would not get ISIS without your interventions leading to several failed states. That makes you objectively *pro*-terror and $6 trillion in a hole.

  25. There will be no political backlash until we are forced to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid to pay for the wars.

    Wow! I didn’t know that SS and Medicare are now paid out of the general budget like the Pentagon is!

    Wait! It isn’t!

    Stop posting fake news.

  26. Yes. Obama was exactly just such a disaster to have handed all this over to Trump.

    Thanks for pointing that out.

  27. How about total flaming incompetence with a cherry on top? The simplest explanation is often the mostly likely explanation. If you want to go with conspiracy theories then how about “the tail wags the dog” theory. I’ve aways thought that was plausible, of course in Iraq there was the oil that certain people were always interested in but I think that was fact.

  28. I’m me again! Try logging in folks! If you are logged out instead of saying no, no, no it just gives you a bogus account name.

  29. Frankly, it’s nuts to lump the Iraq War in as part of this. Of course there are all the ISIS threats that can be directly tied to ISIS being a direct consequence of the the Iraq War so subtracting them out too lets us see what a significant part of our military missteps in the Middle East have cost us. Every time we have meddled in the Middle East in any kind of major way there have been very costly unforeseen consequences that have occurred that dog us to this day.

  30. Not wrong on both counts, you said the exact same thing I said with more words. Printing money creates inflation, whether spending “TOO MUCH” is irrelevant. Yes the government can print their own money, that is what I said. It is still a slippery slope, just ask Venezuela. It is still better to spend within the means of how much we bring in with taxation, unless you are deliberately trying to create inflation, basically devalue the currency. Too much debt might also increase the interest on the debt which opens up a whole new type of whoop azz when you want to sell more bonds to fund your….debt.

  31. Wrong on both counts. First, the limitations that apply to private entities do not apply to the federal government. As a monopoly issuer of its own currency, the federal government simply creates money on-demand, whereas private entities must earn or borrow. This latter limitation also applies to the U.S. states, as well as to member states of the E.U., since they too are not financially sovereign.

    Secondly, you only get inflation if you spent TOO MUCH. Inflation can be controlled by dialing back spending, or else increasing taxation. Either, or both, will cool things down.

  32. “We don’t need cuts in anything since the U.S. federal government doesn’t need to collect taxes or sell bonds to “have the money”. It simply spends money into existence.” That is a slippery slope unless you are fond of inflation. It’s about as smart as putting bills on your credit card because it doesn’t fit within your budget (taxes) instead of cutting spending.

  33. In fact it’s worse than it looks. This decision was the conservative position, that money is free speech and corporations are people. Considering how the conservatives are packing the courts, this issue will likely not be revisited in our lifetimes, enabling all kinds of shady influence over our elections including from other countries.

  34. Wow! So now I’m BlueGrapes. I have no idea what is going on with the comment system, but it needs serious work.

    Ordinarily I would agree, but reality precludes this. The reason is corporations are people and money is free speech. That was already ruled on by the Supreme Court, and it will take a constitutional convention to change it. Good luck with that in our hyper partisan environment. Our only choice is to put it back on the people voting them in. Until the voters get hit between the eyes with reality, they will continue to vote for politicians who fund and support these wars. They will either be forced to scale back on the wars, or scale back on our social programs. I’m good either way.

  35. Ordinarily I would agree, but reality precludes this. The reason is corporations are people and money is free speech. That was already ruled on by the Supreme Court, and it will take a constitutional convention to change it. Good luck with that in our hyper partisan environment. Our only choice is to put it back on the people voting them in. Until the voters get hit between the eyes with reality, they will continue to vote for politicians who fund and support these wars. They will either be forced to scale back on the wars, or scale back on our social programs. I’m good either way.

  36. Disagree. The way to stop it is by getting money out of politics. The reason we have (undeclared) wars of choice is because of the influence of the military-industrial complex and the money that it brings in politics. We don’t need cuts in anything since the U.S. federal government doesn’t need to collect taxes or sell bonds to “have the money”. It simply spends money into existence.

  37. I don’t want to be a conspiracy type, but in 1960, President Eisenhower did say “beware of the military INDUSTRIAL complex”.
    When you have a war between nation states, it’s “easy” to figure out who the so called enemy is.
    With this “war on terror”, it technically will never end! There is a “boogie man” behind every rock. The only winners would be the companies the produce the weapons.
    Fire off a few hellfire missiles and the company profits.
    I’ve always been pro military (except for the eggheads in the pentagon, which in my opinion are bureaucrats), but, I think for the most part, pull out of Iraq, all the “stan” countries and sit at the border and let those 14th century lDIOTS fight it out between themselves. It seems every time some “outsider” comes in, the warring parties stop fighting among each other, and gang up on the outsider (Soviet Union), then, the minute they pull out, they start fighting among themselves again!
    They’ve been fighting among themselves since the beginning of time. Just pull out,
    set up along the border to keep them confined and let em have it!

  38. The way to stop this kind of overspending is to not allow the government to put it on the debt. There will be no political backlash until we are forced to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid to pay for the wars, which is how it should be. Until then people will keep voting for politicians who espouse blowing trillions of dollars to bomb goat herders.

  39. This is crazy! My post below says it came from RedWeights? Half of the posts disappeared, including mine from earlier.

  40. The US war(s) on terror proceeds exactly as it’s creators planned. It transfers wealth from taxpayers to shareholders of weapons manufacturers, and munitions providers. It provides an excuse to expand the military, and shrink the rights of US citizens. It recruits cannon fodder for both sides, so that the conflict(s) may continue. It brings on the destruction of the US, which stands in the way of one world government.

  41. Most disastrous leadership in human history.

    Current US leadership makes the guys who ran the Roman Empire into the ground look like geniuses.

  42. We need to move even stronger in the direction working with local people and forces, intelligence gathering and air and drone bombing rather than putting troops on the ground. We need to remember that our cause is just, and we brought, also through our wars, freedom stability and progress. Love is in the air!

  43. Welfare for white people. For years white conservatives and liberals have made fun of and derided the aboriginal negros of America by stating they ‘wouldn’t get a job’ and ‘didn’t contribute’. Little did we know that their ‘jobs’ and ‘contributions’ were merely being cogs in the great war machine chewing up aboriginal peoples the globe over. MAGA – Get rid of the Euros!

  44. The US war(s) on terror proceeds exactly as it’s creators planned. It transfers wealth from taxpayers to shareholders of weapons manufacturers, and munitions providers. It provides an excuse to expand the military, and shrink the rights of US citizens. It recruits cannon fodder for both sides, so that the conflict(s) may continue. It brings on the destruction of the US, which stands in the way of one world government.

  45. Most disastrous leadership in human history.

    Current US leadership makes the guys who ran the Roman Empire into the ground look like geniuses.

  46. We need to move even stronger in the direction working with local people and forces, intelligence gathering and air and drone bombing rather than putting troops on the ground. We need to remember that our cause is just, and we brought, also through our wars, freedom stability and progress. Love is in the air!

  47. Welfare for white people. For years white conservatives and liberals have made fun of and derided the aboriginal negros of America by stating they ‘wouldn’t get a job’ and ‘didn’t contribute’. Little did we know that their ‘jobs’ and ‘contributions’ were merely being cogs in the great war machine chewing up aboriginal peoples the globe over. MAGA – Get rid of the Euros!

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