The cost of war to U.S. Taxpayers

EDITORIAL
The cost of war
Bangkok.com

The new president of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, addressed a speech to the world's wealthiest nations urging them to make the process of globalisation more inclusive and to increase the amount of development aid to the world's poorest nations.

Almost simultaneously a report was released by a number of nongovernmental organisations, including Oxfam, which estimated the monetary cost of armed conflict in Africa to the continent's development between 1990 and 2005 at nearly $300bn, which was roughly equal to the amount of developmental aid African nations received in the same time period. The report says that in the 15-year period 23 African nations were involved in conflict. On average this cost individual nations about $18bn a year.

Certainly other factors such as disease and abundance of natural resources also play major roles, but it is no coincidence that the African nations which are showing the most promise, such as South Africa, have been remarkably free of armed conflict in recent history.

The NGO report should in no way discount the commitment or wisdom of Mr Zoellick's proposals, but it does show the futility of working for developmental progress without peace as a prerequisite.

This is true not only in Africa. The cost of armed conflict is easy to see right here in Southeast Asia. Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam, for example, have remained free of external and internal armed conflict on a large scale for an extended period of time, and all have strong, healthy economies.

Contrast this to Burma under the harsh military rule which has kept armed conflict as its hallmark. Cambodia is just now beginning to recognise its own potential after its unwilling involvement in the US-Vietnamese conflict and subsequent plunge into darkness at the hands of the Khmer Rouge.

The relationship between war and prosperity holds not only in the so-called developing world.

The United States was considered unquestionably the world's richest nation only five or six years ago, but this is now in doubt, thanks in large part to the enormous expense of conducting the war in Iraq. New York Times columnist Thomas L Friedman in a recent piece argued that unpopular tax increases are necessary to pay for the war. The column included this incredible line: ''Visit Singapore, Japan, Korea, China or parts of Europe today and you'll discover that the infrastructure in our country is not keeping pace with our peers.''

The message has been clear and obvious through the ages. While war is certainly profitable for some, the overall devastation to the human, social and economic fabric of a nation is unparalleled. There is a point to stating the obvious, however. It is awareness of the terrible cost of war that prevents external conflicts from escalating and internal conflicts from developing into civil wars. This is probably the biggest danger for Thailand today. Fortunately it appears that the Thai government on the whole is taking an approach that seeks to contain and suppress the southern unrest without adding fuel to the fire. Over time, hopefully, the numbers of the insurgents will steadily dwindle as they are unable to win new converts.


Today there is rampant speculation that there may be a pre-emptive military strike on Iran which would at the least have disastrous worldwide economic repercussions, with oil prices skyrocketing and tourism likely hit hard due to the threat of increased international terrorism.


The UN Security Council has passed a resolution to push the leadership of Iran to make concessions in line with the near-unanimous opinion of the international community that it should suspend uranium enrichment. This is well and good.

A separate resolution by the UN General Assembly should push the leadership of the US and certain other countries to commit unambiguously to a peaceful resolution of the crisis, also in line with the near-unanimous opinion of the international community.