here is a famous qoute that defiantely states "if you stand for nothing, you'll fall for anything." With millions of internet websites and television newscasts dedicated to covering every inch of the War on Terror, how is it that political, diplomatic, and even media spin has convinced America to follow through with invading Iraq and Iran? Like Julia Roberts screamed in Erin Brockovich, "why is it that people tend to complicate situations that shouldn't be complicated?" I, in Katie Couric or Anderson Cooper fashion, have searched what seems like millions of internet articles and viewed hundreds of videos that express opinions about the war, personal beliefs on congressional agendas, and why Bush really is or really isn't to blame, looking for answers. A world of suggestive and thought provoking articles, statements and speeches, reasons and reasonings, are available to us nowadays that can lead us to our answers. The problem is, who can we really trust to tell us why this war has costed more than $450 billion dollars+ ? We all want to stand for something more, but we end up falling for anything less. The only way to figure out where all this money is going is to add it up ourselves. So let's do the math.

n January of 2005, a scandalous inspector general's report surfaced that said the United States-led administration that ran Iraq up until June of 2004, had lost track of $9 billion dollars in Iraq War funds. The $8.8 billion was reported to have been spent on salaries, operating and capital expenditures, and reconstruction projects between October 2003 and June 2004. The money came from revenues from the United Nations' former oil-for-food program, oil sales and seized assets -- all Iraqi money. Auditors were unable to verify that the Iraqi money was spent for its intended purpose. In one case, they raised the possibility that thousands of "ghost employees" were on an unnamed ministry's payroll. Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told CNN that the provisional authority was operating under "extraordinary conditions" and relied on Iraqi ministries to manage development money that was transferred to them, which in lesser words, basically blames Iraq itself for misplacing nearly $9 billion dollars. Staffing shortages and turnover also resulted in inadequate oversight of budget execution by Iraqi ministries. But didn't allegations of corruption in the oil-for-food program should raise concerns about the Iraqi government's ability to manage the reconstruction funds? Again, who knows? What we do know is that we are $9,000,000,000 in the hole.

ccording to warresisters.org, the federal budget for the War on Terror will reach $727 billion by the end of 2008. Already, the US is overspending its current budget and we could reach a tremendous $1,000,000,000,000 (that's $1 TRILLION!) by the end of 2009. But as of now, here is how the budget really breaks down: Military Personnel costs $136 billion, Research and Development costs $70 billion, Construction costs $10 billion, Family Housing costs $4 billion, Retired pay and benefits costs $52 billion, International Security costs $10 billion, and Homeland Security (military) costs $31 billion. Matched with the $9 billion that was mismanaged and unaccounted for, that equals a total of nearly $312,000,000,000. Estimations aside, this leaves a ridiculous $138 billion in the dark! Where does all this money go you ask? Below is a chart that visualizes money distribution throughout five different categories:

"Past Military" represents veterans' benefits plus 80% of the interest of War debt. This is expected to rise an estimated 10% by early summer 2008. To break that down into simplified terms: what costs $52 billion right now, will cost $61 billion next summer. After this increase, it could very well rise 15% which would make $61 billion turn into $70 billion. Now, let's review our math: We have a total cost of $312 billion that is completely accounted for. NASA reportedly claims $9 billion, the Executive Office of the President reportedly claims $1.1 billion, the Department of Defense has reportedly said it uses $6 billion for miscellaneous items, and the military reportedly stakes claim over about $1 billion in "uncategorized" dollars. Those reports equals up to roughly $18 billion and when added to our accounted for total, it equals up to about $332,000,000,000 overall, still leaving $118 billion in the dark. The more questions we ask, the less answers we get. The more answers we search for, the more congress sets out to spin the story. The chart above breaks down the spending of our Iraq War budget pretty evenly and comes with sources for spending information. The chart below is a government view of the budget, a distortion of how our income tax dollars are spent because it includes Trust Funds (such as Social Security), and the expenses of part military spending are not distinguished from nonmilitary spending:

And there you have it. $332 billion barely accounted for and $118.7 billion unaccounted for. With a new Presidential election coming next year, will the spending for the war and the war itself slow down? Hillary Clinton has promised to end the war by 2009 if she were to win, but can Clinton recover our financial losses?

Join me in discovering how we can recover nearly $120 billion dollars. Join me in my conversation on how we can recover America's huge financial loss. Leave your views and reviews and let's get talking!