The costs of war

Gordon Jackson says: "According to the 3/12/03 issue of The Monterey County Herald, "Bush has received an array of cost estimates on a possible war, but he has decided not to share them with the public. He says the estimates will come to light after war starts--if he chooses war--when he asks Congress for the money to finance it. Others who have been too chatty about the costs of the war have been scolded." (p. A12) Like most people, the president is his own worst enemy. He should read the letter from Leon Panetta that appeared in the Herald". The cost of the war is a serious problem, and we must ask how deeply involved is the military-industrial complex against which Eisenhower warned. It involves not just incredibly expensive machinery and weapons systems but such mundane things as hundreds of thousands of tubes of tooth paste.

During the Soviet period I was in Moscow, and, following the Russian custom, the waiter in the hotel restaurant sat me at the same table as a German salesman. He looked very gloomy, and he told me that business was very bad. He concluded "There wil have to be another war". I could not believe my ears. After the havoc World War II wrought on Germany, a German salesman thought only another war would save his business.

Ronald Hilton - 3/20/03