Billion s of US Dollars were spent on Al Maliki and his gang who are nothing but Iranian puppets.Al Maliki was elected with the support of Muqtada Al Sader who is the leader of Al Mahdi army which is fully equipped and trained by Iran.All our money in Iraq have gone to our staunchest enemies, the Shiites and their death squads. We have been shooting ourselves in the foot without knowing it. A drastic change in our allies in Iraq is needed before it gets too late. Maybe a military coup with a Sunni leadership is the only solution available now.

Bush has repeatedly asked for patience on the part of Americans, as if that was all he needed from us, as if our troops and treasury belonged to him, along with the DoJ, Congress, WaPo...

$249 Million divided by 30 days =

$8.3 Million a day for the war in Iraq.

This daily amount pays for a war that was never Declared, never brought before the Public so taxes could be raised to pay for it.

This 'war' is illegal, ill considered, unplanned, unpaid for and clearly is NOT in America's interest to pursue. Thank You

Lets see now, Who would feed at the never empty trough of war funds. Worst offenders would have to be republicans. They just can't keep their blood-soaked sticky fingers out of the trough. Who in their right mind thought this war was ever going to end with the repubs when every day is like X-mas. Second worse offenders would be the corrupt Iraqi govern. Can't blame them their just trying to emulate our govern. Then the last worse are our patriotic contractors. Most of these are the repugs freinds. They get to go over there and hang around the Green Zone and do absolutly nothing and collect billions of dollars for that. Throw in a ton of repug Generals who refuse to be left out of the cash-fest then you see the republicans are truly living up to their motto of PROFITS BEFORE PATRIOTISM.

I have a friend who is working with a Contractor in Iraq as a clerk and he makes over 80,000 a year not counting the 40+ hours he gets in overtime. THIS is where our tax dollars are going.

And some of the contractors actually had to pay people like tribal officials and warlords as well as INSURGENTS as protection money just so they could work on various projects. That sounds like quite a racket. Get protection money while they build the building or utility and then destroy it when it is finished so they have to build it again or else give up on it. And the contractors walked away at that point.

Where did it go. Wasted but there's no way anyone can dispute that a huge part of it went to Bush and Cheney's friends, the defense companies and the security companies and private supply and support companies who had to be Bush's friend's and support his policies and politics to get the contracts/jobs in the first place. As if this is still a secret to anyone paying attention.

No, its about power, money, and oil. Its called lets see how much money we can piss down the drain for nothing.

It's off-point, but I just finished reading Barbara Tuchman's "The March of Folly". The last section of this wonderfully well researched and well written book deals with the Vietnam War. It is incredibly disheartening to read this book and realize that we are repeating all of the mistakes made in that sad and costly (lives and dollars) war.

Dear Dick Cheney,
At the moment I am a little bit stretched because I do not have enough of the folding stuff. Could you please ask Halliburton to send me a few million. My guess is that they are creaming off 30% of the funds received and, therefore thay dshould have a few Benjamin franklins blowing around the floor.

..........................................

After the IRA no longer had a war to fight they used their skills to intimidate and bully the society in which they live. It gave them power and riches. I guess they get an adrenailine rush from seeing the Euros roll in and by being recognised as 'men to be feared'. I expect that the same will flow out of any war zone. The Chechans have produced very competent and brutal crime lords.

Arkin,

In the future, when referencing a CRS Report, can you please cite the Report number. I personally would like to read the report for myself rather than your interpretation of it (no offense).

In particular, a number of questions are raised that your column doesn't address. For example:

How is the figure of $640B arrived at? Is is supplemental funding authorized by Congress exclusively for the wars? Or does it also include "base budget" funding (salaries, R&D, training, etc)? And does it include the recently touted "indirect costs" of the war? And how much of that funding is DoD versus State, VA, or other agency?

When trying to understand "where the money goes", the devil is always in the details. It easy to jump to a simple conclusion, but in nearly every case, things aren't as simple as they appear. I personally like to understand the details before drawing a conclusion. Having access to the CRS report you mention would go a long way in helping my evaluate the strength of your arguments.

This is how you find where the money went :

Get real estate data for the greater Washington DC area for the last five years.

Find out the names of whoever has built or moved into the most expensive residences. Look at who spent five million or more.

In that list are many of the profiteers.

It would be so easy, a high school kid could do it.

You are in the news business - get busy.

The Eric Prince's and Brent Wilkes' of this world. We should be able to see who signs the checks and who cashes them.

Maybe we should just fire a bunch of these congressmen and senators. Oh yeah, we already tried that! OK. How about next April 15th, nobody files a tax return! Remember "NO TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION". One of the things this country was built upon. If congress won't cut off the money, maybe WE should. This is our country, and we can do as we danm well please. What are "they" going do? Arrest 200 million people? This might sound a bit "revolutionary", but we're running out of things to do. Remember, Reagen didn't bring down the Berlin Wall. Five million Germans did! I'm sure there are those who will say, "what a dumb idea", and they might be right, but man, I'm tired of giving my taxes to these thieves.

One thing for sure: We know that the money is not being apportioned, fairly, to the men and women who are fighting the war(mercenaries or not)!

Just how many Iraqi generals, foreign covert operatives and swing-men are there who are walking around in Afghanistan and Iraq with briefcases full of down-sized American worker's money?

One can only wonder! Perhaps the gov't has been secretly purchasing poppy plants from Afghanistan with the unaccounted for Iraqi loot! The question is why?

Or, come to think about it Republicans need extra money in order to purchase services in American bathroom stalls!

Well, based on the answers you're getting it seems that a large section of the population already has a strong suspicion about where the money is going.
Considering the track record of this administration they are probably right. Some fat republican has our money, and he is not going to it give it back.
Oh well, I'm sure George will order up another couple hundred billion Walmart dollars from the Bank of China. I hate to say it but when the Red Chinese became our bankers, we officially lost the cold war to Beijing (and here everybody keeps telling me Reagan won that thing).

The phoney Iraq War on Terror is just a smokescreen for "The Largest Robbery In History" still being written in action by the Fascist/Criminal Enterprise of Bush/Cheney and rubber stamped by the brown shirt Republicans in Congress, and supported by the RNC and all of it's minions including the brown shirt poodle journalists in the press. Who pays? The value of the dollar has only about 50% of its value since Bush took office, the National Debt has increased over 57% under his corrupt mis-administration, and the decline will continue until 1-20-2009. Your children and grand children will be paying for the total disaster Fascist/Criminal Enterprise of the Fascist Party (previously known as the Republican party).

I don't believe it! The tax payers of this country might be waking up. For seven years they've been lied to. Over and over the story kept changing. We have to invade because of this. We have to invade because of that. We have to stay because of this. We have to stay because of that. ALL LIES.
What we have in Iraq today is exactly what was wanted all along. A country completely controlled by corporations. A puppet government financed with Iraqi oil and American taxes, and protected by the armed forces and corporate armies, (also paid for with our taxes).
The proof of this can be easily shown by simply doing a little "investigative reporting". Wouldn't it be nice if someone, (anyone!), would just start a list of who OWNS things in Iraq. Things like electricity, water, transportation, and the rest of the infrastructure. I believe that right now every grain of sand in Iraq is owned by an American corporation. That's why we're there, and that's where the money went. I will wait for some reporter to prove me wrong. A warning should be given though. There are certain parties who don't encourage such questions. Maybe we should take a closer look at who those "certain parties" are. They shouldn't be too hard to find. Just look in the cars that Blackwater is guarding!

It has become so obvious that this ugly war in both Iraq and Afganistan is unwinnable by mere force.We are not fighting regular armies and well identified enemies.We are fighting individuals or small groups of individuals whom we can neither detect nor identify.Sleeping cells of such terrorists have already been deployed all over the whole world. Such type of war could go on and on for many decades without any definite outcome. However,we can win this war very easily by finding out the real cause behind such terrorist formations and trying to eliminate it. The short sighted step of creating Israel on the ruins of Plaestine and its innocent people has led to the creation of such terrorist groups who are ready to sacrifice their own bodies in a holy war against Israel and the countries that suport its apartheid regime.Once we stop our unlimited support to the Israeli military gangs whose only game is to kill as many Palestinian women and children as they can everyday,once all Palestinian refugees return home to their stolen land and belongings under un resolution 194 which Israel arrogantly refuses to implement,once a fair and adequate solution is reached to the Palestinian dilemma,all terrorism in the world will definitely disappear even without firing one single shot

OK, gang, here we go. It's a sad thing when you're in the midst of an ongoing argument with your girlfriend -- in this case a deeply distressing and painful undertaking -- and realize that reading yet another tale of the Bush administration's incompetency and irresponsibility makes me feel worse than the girlfriend situation.

Listen up, all ... I am not extreme in my political views, and I am not given to knee-jerk reactions based on ideology, but these past seven years have made me feel like I've been waterboarded one drip at a time, Chinese water torture-style. (It started with the Florida recount farce.)

So, with that said, can someone PLEASE tell me how Bush still has a 30% approval rating??? I mean it. I'm not trying to be a wise-ass or anything like that. I just want to know how any serious person can genuinely believe Bush is doing a good job. I don't get that. Day after day, week after week, I am astounded that there are people who, when asked to assess his performance, actually say, "You know, when I think about it ... yeah, President Bush IS doing a good job."

Whaaaaaaaaat???!!!

Later, folks ... I think I'll argue with my girlfriend some more. I need to lift my spirits.

PRIVATE CONTRACTORS is where the money went, and a MISSILE DEFENSE SYSTEM that doesn't work! In other words, CORPORATE WELFARE!

Buy off the bad guys? Sounds like a good idea. Could be more cost effective than the current strategy.

One question, do you think they - the bad guys - would want to be paid in euros too, like Gisele?

Around here, the answer is that the money goes into the pockets of well-connected Republicans. Remember DBT, the computer company that compiled the convicted felon list for Florida in 2000? They have a big contract in Iraq.

We saw firsthand what happened when Katrina struck in 2005. Contracts went flying all over the place, outsourcing the clean-up and recovery of New Orleans. Now we have thousands of never-used trailers sitting in a field in Arkansas.

The Bush presidency has been an unqualified disaster on so many levels for the American people. I confess to keeping a countdown clock till we can send them packing, but mostly I just wish they would resign and go away. Far away.

For all of Congress's battles ... Isn't it time we ask who is really benefiting financially?

Mr. Arkin,

Many of us, along with Congress have been wondering, and asking for accountability since the war began. Where did all of the Katrina Hurricane dollars end up?

It is sad that this war has been punctuated by inepitude, and gross mismanagement by republican congressmen along with an republican administration that have been so adept at scuttling the efforts by any group or individuals who have called for accountability?

Americans are on a 'don't need to know' basis, it would appear. And once again - the reason for the American travesty and illegal intervention in Iraq has changed again! Nonetheless, the administration keeps coming back to the 'money tree', asking for another government handout!

Tragically, the Iraq war is largely about war profiteering - whether it's enriching contractors, bribing people or just helping out the oil industry. Bush should be impeached.

Like everything else this administration throws our money at. Who keeps track?
Simply come up with a clever moniker to name the effort, give it a million to a billion or more and never check on it again. As long as someone with connections to Washington is enjoying themselves and becoming richer. Who cares? There's more where that comes from.