The U.S. is once again locked in conflict in the Middle East, and Bilmes, a Harvard Kennedy School public policy lecturer and author of “The Ghost Budget: U.S. War Spending and Fiscal Transparency,” is once again sounding the alarm on the true cost of war.
Bilmes said, just like 20 years ago, the U.S. is continuing to underestimate how much money will be required to fund the war and its aftereffects. In an interview with Fortune, she outlined the often-overlooked war spending that persists even years after the conflict is over, arguing the expenses could further burden America’s $39 trillion debt.
“Wars always have a long tail of costs,” she told Fortune. “Wars cost more than we expect. Wars take the cost to go on for longer than we expect, and some of these costs are very consequential.”
When most people talk about the cost of war, they are thinking of the direct costs of munitions and combat, according to Bilmes, “which are themselves understated.”
“Not only are the costs high, but we have these in this imbalanced situation where costs are disproportionately high compared to the cost of producing drones,” Bilmes said.
The Pentagon declined to respond to Fortune’s request for comment.
“Before this war, Congress was lukewarm toward this idea, but the obvious depletion of many, many stockpiles and inventories and munitions and so forth, is leading to an environment in which probably the president will secure a much larger increase to the defense budget,” Bilmes said.
“In this case, we’re borrowing [at] high rates, largely for things that will end up in the sand,” she concluded.
