(Click on Image to Enlarge)The Dead, The Dollars, The Drones: 9/11 Era By The Numbers -- The Danger
Ever since the Twin Towers fell, the United States has been at war. The costs of that decade of conflict have been unimaginably high: trillions of dollars spent, hundreds of thousands of lives lost. The numbers are almost too big to grasp, let alone quantify. The graphics below are our incomplete attempt to do so.
These figures are also a way of showing the radical transformation the U.S. military has undergone during the 9/11 era. Drones, once an afterthought in tactical plans, have become a central component, flying millions of hours in combat. Special operations forces have added tens of thousands to their ranks. Bomb-resistant armored vehicles, absent from the American arsenal in 2001, are now a primary means of battlefield transportation — even as Afghanistan’s militants find new ways to render them irrelevant.
My Comment: And these costs show no sign of decreasing .... let alone stopping.
1 comment:
I think it is extremely important to put those numbers into context. Sure, they look huge - but compared to what? Overall, the increases in military spending amount to as little as 1% of GDP ... The defence budget has been significantly lower than any other time since the cold war - as % of GDP.
I wrote a blog here, you might find interesting.
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