(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Source: National Journal
Secondary Source: You must login or register to view this content.

The cost of bin Laden: $3 trillion over 15 years

The most expensive public enemy in American history died Sunday from two bullets.

As we mark Osama bin Laden's death, what's striking is how much he cost our nation—and how little we've gained from our fight against him. By conservative estimates, bin Laden cost the United States at least $3 trillion over the past 15 years, counting the disruptions he wrought on the domestic economy, the wars and heightened security triggered by the terrorist attacks he engineered, and the direct efforts to hunt him down.

What do we have to show for that tab? Two wars that continue to occupy 150,000 troops and tie up a quarter of our defense budget; a bloated homeland-security apparatus that has at times pushed the bounds of civil liberty; soaring oil prices partially attributable to the global war on bin Laden's terrorist network; and a chunk of our mounting national debt, which threatens to hobble the economy unless lawmakers compromise on an unprecedented deficit-reduction deal.

All of that has not given us, at least not yet, anything close to the social or economic advancements produced by the battles against America's costliest past enemies. Defeating the Confederate army brought the end of slavery and a wave of standardization—in railroad gauges and shoe sizes, for example—that paved the way for a truly national economy. Vanquishing Adolf Hitler ended the Great Depression and ushered in a period of booming prosperity and hegemony. Even the massive military escalation that marked the Cold War standoff against Joseph Stalin and his Russian successors produced landmark technological breakthroughs that revolutionized the economy.

Perhaps the biggest economic silver lining from our bin Laden spending, if there is one, is the accelerated development of unmanned aircraft. That's our $3 trillion windfall, so far: Predator drones. "We have spent a huge amount of money which has not had much effect on the strengthening of our military, and has had a very weak impact on our economy," says Linda Bilmes, a lecturer at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government who coauthored a book on the costs of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars with Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz

Obama's Secret: You must login or register to view this content.

Certainly, in the course of the fight against bin Laden, the United States escaped another truly catastrophic attack on our soil. Al-Qaida, though not destroyed, has been badly hobbled. "We proved that we value our security enough to incur some pretty substantial economic costs en route to protecting it," says Michael O'Hanlon, a national-security analyst at the Brookings Institution.

But that willingness may have given bin Laden exactly what he wanted. While the terrorist leader began his war against the United States believing it to be a "paper tiger" that would not fight, by 2004 he had already shifted his strategic aims, explicitly comparing the U.S. fight to the Afghan incursion that helped bankrupt the Soviet Union during the Cold War. "We are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy," bin Laden said in a taped statement. Only the smallest sign of al-Qaida would "make generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving anything of note other than some benefits for their private corporations." Considering that we've spent one-fifth of a year's gross domestic product—more than the entire 2008 budget of the United States government—responding to his 2001 attacks, he may have been onto something.

It may have cost $3 trillion, but I think most Americans would consider it money well spent.

they would because the average level of iq in the states is below 70

If any atall believes that binladen was killed this week and thrown in the sea then you are an idiot. obamas approval rating is at an alltime low and then guess what bam "we got obama" but we threw him in the sea and all you pig thick americans believe the copius amounts of BS you are fed without questions.

Bin laden was a very very sick man even back in 2001, he has an uncurable lung disease and died not long after 9/11. they kept his body on ice and brought it too light when it was it was needed to boost the presidents approval rating. you yanks need to actually look into these things and start thinking on your own and stop taking the word of your corrupt government.

They spend 3 billion on this stuff, but they don't have money on education makes me wonder what kind off goverment we have.

Imagine what we could do with 3 Trillion Dollars?

What a waste or money. Killing him will make no difference, if anything it will increase terrorist attacks.

Also, full copy and paste, closed.