Cost of War

At 24 years old, I do not really remember a time when the United States was not in Afghanistan. But, having pulled the last US soldier out of Kabul on August 30, 2021, the nearly 20-year conflict has come to an end.

Officially the longest war in US history, beating Vietnam by five months, it has been one of the most expensive operations in American history. While not having the official numbers, the cost of the Afghan war has been reported to be anywhere from 2 trillion to 3 trillion dollars.

Even taking the lowest end of that spectrum, 2 trillion, is enough to give every single American citizen over 6,000 dollars. Another way to look at the two trillion-dollar price tag is to look at that over the duration of the ten years. At 2 trillion, the daily cost of the war is over 500 million dollars a day for ten years straight.

The US government spent half a billion dollars a day for ten years. For comparison, the cost of free college in the US would cost about 75 billion for the first year. If the department of education had the same budget as the department of defense, that cost would have been paid in 150 days, less than half a year.