Iraq: A Hard Account to Pay Off

Historians will speak of the war in Iraq, perhaps of the number of natives that died in the invasion and operation carried out by U.S. hordes and its European allies — and a few others among the lackeys. Errors and crimes will be recognized or they will continue to be hidden — who knows in what circumstances the Mesopotamian people will live, and if the U.S. will be in an economic crisis or boom. But something is still pending: For at least 50 years, an important part of taxes paid by Americans will be dedicated to the debt left by a waste of lives and resources; the money needed for the war in that half century will be $80 billion annually.

In an analysis from the website MarketWatch, it was stated that $4 billion of the total cost will include interest payments of the billions that were borrowed to finance the war. This includes the cost of maintaining U.S. bases in Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain, the ones that “protected” occupied Iraq, and the army of mercenaries under the name of private company contractors that guarded U.S. properties on Iraqi soil.

Almost the entire amount shall be used for the two million veterans, especially those who survived terrible mutilations on the battlefield, who returned to a depressed economy with a load of physical or mental disabilities, or both.

Under the premise that everything was a “success,” that the war was an event with “extraordinary benefit,” and that the troops could keep their “heads held high,” as President Obama said, announcing that this December was the month to withdraw combat troops, it is very difficult to settle this account and to also put aside the many war crimes inflicted.

Many in the U.S. find it difficult to understand that the war was a victory and success. There remain thousands of private armies, even to guard the world’s largest embassy. And in U.S. territory, half of the population has a “much lower level of income,” according to the Census Bureau.

That’s the way things are, meanwhile the U.S. moves toward an election year, in which the definitions will be scarce, or rather, the status quo will be preserved. But, those who are outraged may have found their place, though they might not know for sure what it is; many veterans feel the disappointment of another useless war. One percent of the rich continues to enjoy itself, while the rest of the world experiences a crisis that goes beyond the economy, because it has pervaded an entire system.

When the bill is handed down to the empire, it will see what a hard account it has to pay off.