OUR PATHWAY
Among those people who sit around figuring up such statistics, it is reported that we have now spent about one per cent of our Gross National Products total on the Iraqi War of 2003. The same people have also calculated that we spent 134% of our G.N.P. value on World War II. The whole idea, of course, is to show how economical making war seems to have become over the years.
Don't be too quick to believe any such figures.
It is difficult to price war-making in relation to the prices of commodities, many of which are essential.
The contrast provided by such figures does - even logically - suggest that one was larger than the other in cost, but they were very much different as well, in dimensions, texture and quality. I you replace a small bag of potato chips on the grocer's shelf and select a much larger one , you expect it to cost you more.
Wars do not come cheap. If the Iraqi war had lasted as long as WWII and expanded to include as many nations in active conflict, the cost of the total war would be quite a bit larger. Ironically, the same statistically minded people would still be around but quoting opposite figures, no doubt.
No count, no list, tally, or detailed , in-depth studies can ever tabulate the true costs of war. It costs area are far removed from things countable. There is psychic and emotional damage, there are physical damages which will not become evident until the passage of many years, there are mental aberrations which, while they may never surface in an individual's lifetime, may affect others in his or her extended family.
A little more honesty concerning the actual cost of wars, might be one pathway toward avoiding them.
A.L.M. September 25, 2003 [c320wds[
