We pay our military if they fight of not. Why do Americans protest the $ cost of war?

Granted combat pay is a little more, and it costs some money to move military vehicles overseas; however, the difference is not going to be huge as far as money expenditure goes. America pays its military whether it is fighting or not. Americans are really kind of stupid to think a lot of money is wasted in Iraq. If we weren't using bullets, fuel, and other expendable resources there, we'd be using and paying for them during combat training manuevers here. The only real difference is that a few more soldiers die in combat than in training manuevers. However, what is the total loss of US soldiers over 5 years in Iraq? A frikkin' 2000? 400 a year. That is not even a drop in the bucket as far as wars go. Heck, we lose more soldiers to friendly fire. I'm sick of pansies worried about the $ cost of war. There is no substantial cost difference in peace or war with a frikkin' suicide army of insurgents when you have US combat technology. What an embarrassment that US citizens whine about this

We pay our military if they fight of not. Why do Americans protest the $ cost of war?
I don't have that problem. Why?
Reply:The cost of the war has been over $360 billion, all of which is BEYOND the normal funding of the military. The normal expenditures that you talk about are already covered in the money given to the armed forces each fiscal year in the government budget. The $360 billion has all been in supplemental appropriations that come after the setting of the Pentagon's original budget. These supplemental appropriations are almost entirely for the Iraq war. The Pentagon's regular budget for training is separate.
Reply:We should spend more on the military. They don't get paid enough.
Reply:Job security!!!



I love a president who stands and fights the islamo-fascists on their turf



The dems "best president eva" dodged the draft, then when it came time to kill osama (8 times) he cut and run, saying "what about the innocent civilian lives!!"



On 9-11 we had those innocent civilian lives, and they were ours.

They brought the fight to our homes, now we brought it to theirs, lets hope it stays that way, but one day a Dhimmi-crat will come to office, cut and run from the middle east, and we will go all over again, bloodshed on our soil. Preventable blood because we didnt stand tall for the long haul when the chips were down. I will never vote for someone with a D next to their name.



US Army- Five years, still going



Angel- thank you, thumbs up
Reply:As you know, there are some Americans that will *****, whine and protest, about dam near everything!!
Reply:Wow, either your the most callous person this side of Osama or you are really stupid. Soldiers are neccessary for diplomacy. War is a failure of diplomacy. Read about the lead up to Iraq. Diplomacy is like poker and your military is there to back a busted hand when you bluff. Sometimes you get called no matter what and then your soldiers pay the price of your leaders idiocy.The soldiers pay in blood.They don't die by accident and a lot more of them do die. Thats the difference between not fighting and fighting.Money is great as long as someone else is dying so you can spend it. Teuklune.
Reply:Yes, actually there is a big difference in cost between peace and war. I don't have time to name them all, but here are a few to get you started. First, I'll start with our troops. No, we wouldn't be paying them to sit around or to train. A majority of the troops fighting this war are reservists. They are the weekend warriors and they normally work full-time civilian jobs. The government doesn't pay them unless they are called to duty. Second, life insurance. This one probably balances out, but figure that the government provides our troops with low cost life insurance that pays $400,000. With 2,000 troops dead, that's a total of $800,000,000! Now on to our equipment. Yes, our military does fly aircraft and shoot guns for training. But, our military doesn't normally use this much equipment nor as often as they do during war. It all adds up.



Just to emphasize and elaborate a bit more on some of the points that I made, probably the largest expense of this war is manpower. A significant portion of our troops over there are reservists or guardsmen and they do NOT get paid regardless whether or not they are at war. An activation is the only time they get receive the same compensation as their active duty counterparts. Otherwise, they only get paid a few hundred bucks a month (or less, depending on their pay grade). Just like most organizations, labor is always going to be the costlliest expense. On a side topic, the life insurance offered to the military is called Service member's Group Life Insurance, or SGLI for short. It costs the service member about $56/month for $400,000 of coverage. I just thought it would be interesting to point out that this insurance is offered to military members by the government because most other insurance providers have clauses in their contracts which specifically exclude war and war related deaths from being paid out. And you're right, $800 million is just a drop in the bucket for our nation. But it's still $800 million.
Reply:People have to have something to b*tch about. If it wasn't that it would be something else. I think Bush just done what he thought had to be done. It can't be easy to run the USA. I'm sorry that innocent people have died, but that's the way of war.
Reply:I am also sick of hearing people say things about the cost of war. My husband is in the Army and is currently in Iraq, coming home in a few weeks though YAY, and I don't think the military gets paid enough. They are risking their lives more than we are back in the US. Yea you risk your life everyday, but when you are there sleeping is risking your life. The protesters just need something to ***** about and they need to shut it! We had that stupid church come to our base and protest and you don't screw with a bunch of military wives!