New Budget, New Payouts, Same Profiteers, Same War

[At right: five-year charts, tracking roughly since the launch of the Iraq War, stock prices of major Pentagon contractors; from top to bottom: Boeing Co., Lockheed Martin Corporation, Raytheon Co., and Northrop Grumman Corp. Charts from Yahoo! Finance.]

Economists discuss the difference between markets and nonmarkets, the latter being a stand-in term for 'government.' Interestingly, both are prone to failure, albeit in different ways.

Markets fail all the time, hence government regulation. The current subprime mortgage crisis and the ensuing radical steps by the Federal Reserve. Governments also fail, but in entirely different ways. One of the main differences is that governments find ways to use up all their money and then justify a budget increase. Case in point: in 2000, George II ran on a conservative platform of smaller government; however, bureaucracy and the billions that fund it have since skyrocketed.

The Pentagon's $515.4 billion request, part of Bush II's $3+ trillion budget for 2009, marks a 30 percent increase in spending for the military since he took office.

This includes neither the $600 billion already spent on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, nor the spending for those wars over the projected budget year.

The Times claims, "If [the Pentagon's budget] is approved in full, annual military spending, when adjusted for inflation, will have reached its highest level since World War II." Taking the paper at its word, for perspective, it is worth it to mention that military spending in the US, while still an inordinate amount of money that dwarfs combined military budgets of developed nations around the world many times over, is still less than five percent of the country's gross domestic product, one of the lower points since WWII. Compiling the costs of the Iraq war would bump this up, but not to a point, as a share of the country's economy, to rival past highs.

Perhaps, with a glance at the stock prices to the right, this is good for the economy. After all, government spending pumps in money, and high school economics teaches you that the step in an economic cycle that bridges recession with recovery is war.

Barring the claims of varying candidates for whom you voted today, considering that the Iraq War has drawn on almost six years and currently faces no serious chance of ending, how salient is the suggestion that the postmodern, globalized, [insert your own adjective here], transnational form of capitalism governing the planet makes possible the permanent (for the time being, at least) occupation of a dusty country atop massive amounts of oil reserves. The NewsHour continues with its honor roll of US personnel killed in Iraq and Afghanistan almost every night, yet as a campaign issue, the war has been bumped almost entirely off the stage.

Is the war, then, the cost of doing business?

Comments

[joe]

The democrats alone, have pushed the war off the edge of the stage because it is not going good for them as they had hoped. We are winning, the surge is working and everything they did to lose it has been a failure.

[marcus]

So, we are supposed to be thrilled about the surge? Sunnis are now the target (now that we've sided with them) and then we are going to bounce back and forth for how long? if you think were leaving anytime soon youre crazy.

[neiman]

No, I would not suppose you would be thrilled by the surge. Unless, of course, it was a surge by the terrorists. Truman and FDR put us in Korea and Germany for the better part of a century, what's a couple of decades in Iraq. Smell the coffee, marcus, and read history.

[schmeeman]

Hey marcus, while you be drinking the coffee, read page 366 of the History Book. It tell you that the Sunni sided with us. I know your narrative needs a victim , but it just ain't so.

[alex]

Iraq has been changing now for the better part of 6 months.

The Washington Post reports that al Qaeda in Iraq is trying a "softer approach" in an effort "to regain popular support in the western province of Anbar":

The new approach was outlined last month in an internal communique that orders members to avoid killing Sunni civilians who have not sympathized with the U.S.-backed tribesmen or the government.
From internal documents and interviews with members of al-Qaeda in Iraq, a picture emerges of an organization in disarray but increasingly aware that its harsh policies--such as punishing women who don't cover their heads--have eroded its popular support. Over the past year, the group has been driven out of many of its strongholds. The group's leadership is now jettisoning some of its past tactics to refocus attacks on American troops, Sunnis cooperating closely with U.S. forces, and Iraq's infrastructure. . . .

"We do not deny the difficulties we are facing right now," said Riyadh al-Ogaidi, a senior leader, or emir, of al-Qaeda in Iraq in the Garma region of eastern Anbar province. "The Americans have not defeated us, but the turnaround of the Sunnis against us had made us lose a lot and suffer very painfully."

Ogaidi said the total number of al-Qaeda in Iraq members across the country has plummeted from about 12,000 in June 2007 to about 3,500 today.

Ogaidi said the total number of foreign fighters in Iraq is "in the tens--not more than 200."

Could it be that the so-called insurgency is approaching its final throes?

[Alexandria]

god, don't we hope so!

[nisa]

Marcus, the assertion of your Sunni strategy is old disproven pulp. The “Anbar Awakening” was an organic Iraqi revolt against AQI – but the surge helped it succeed, and the surge has done much more than simply deal a devastating blow to AQI.

The Petraeus strategy has helped the United States win more and more of the confidence of the Iraqi people. The ethno-sectarian violence has plummeted. And Iraq, for all its problems, is on the road to repair.

If you had your way, there is a very good chance Iraq would be a hell on earth. The Sunni, as you put it, are not victims, but part of the solution.

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