The Pentagon has told US lawmakers that the war against Iran has cost US taxpayers at least $47.1 billion so far. The estimate, released last week, comes days before Tuesday’s midterm elections, which will determine whether President Donald Trump’s Republican Party will maintain control of Congress for the next two years. the department. In July of last year, Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBA), which outlines the tax and spending plans that went into effect this year. We take a closer look at the Pentagon’s estimate and what it means for the US economy and the midterm elections. What has the Pentagon spending report revealed? The Pentagon told Congress that the cost of the US-Israel war against Iran as of October 16 had risen to at least $47.1 billion. Congressional officials shared the Pentagon’s cost breakdown estimate with The New York Times. According to the Times and other US media, the Pentagon’s estimate covers the operational costs of the war and includes a projected cost of $29 billion needed to replace spent munitions such as bombs, bullets and other military equipment that has been deployed in the war so far. It also reveals that since the war began on February 28, the US Air Force has spent $7.6 billion on fighter and bomber units, the US Navy has spent $1.5 billion. on two dozen warships and aircraft carriers and the US military has spent $2.1 billion to sustain its troops in the Middle East. According to the US military’s Central Command, there are more than 50,000 US troops stationed in the Middle East, including personnel deployed at large permanent bases and smaller forward sites across the region. Officials told the Times that the Pentagon has spent $6.1 billion to replace damaged aircraft and munitions, $645 million on transportation and support to commands in the region and $24.5 million on “domestic medical support” for U.S. service members. A congressional official added that US Transportation Command also spent $92.2 million to move equipment and US Cyber Command spent $14 million on “cyber support operations.” War. While the Pentagon has publicly acknowledged 18 U.S. service member deaths in the war, the Washington Post has cited six unnamed U.S. officials who say the actual death toll is at least 22. According to the Pentagon’s official Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS) database, 865 service members have been wounded in the war with Iran. Jazeera said the Pentagon’s $47.1 billion estimate should be treated as a cumulative total and not the total cost of the war. “If the war continues without a lasting outcome, the United States risks paying repeatedly to maintain military pressure while simultaneously trying to rebuild the capabilities it has consumed,” he said. He said replacing advanced weapons also requires industrial capacity and time and that the money and production resources committed to this conflict may also compete with other defense priorities. “What worries me most is the possibility of an indefinite commitment: continuing to spend heavily without a clear political outcome or an agreement that provides lasting security,” he said. Currently, the United States must weigh three costs, Phillips said: the money spent, the military capacity consumed and the economic disruption generated. “A tactical victory is not necessarily a strategic victory. If the conflict leaves American arsenals depleted, energy markets unstable, and regional security unresolved, the question is not simply how much the war will cost but whether its lasting benefits justify the price,” he said. Had it been? According to an October 19 USA Today report, five Democratic Party senators had written Admiral Brad Cooper, head of Central Command, demanding that the Pentagon reveal the true cost of the war. Their letter said that the “continued efforts of the Trump administration to hide the true cost of this war are outrageous and unacceptable.” Trump has not commented on the latest Pentagon estimate. But the Trump administration’s war against Iran has become increasingly unpopular among American citizens because of its impact on American and global energy costs. Since early March, shortly after the war began, Iran has closed the critical Strait of Hormuz in the Gulf, through which until then about a fifth of the world’s supplies were shipped. of oil and liquefied natural gas. This has sent the price of oil soaring and caused global shortages. In the United States, diesel, on which farmers and small businesses largely depend, has almost doubled in price. In a post on “Trump and his ego led us into this war without a plan, without authority and without an exit strategy,” he added. Calculations? Estimates of the cost of the Iran war to the US have steadily risen as the war continues. The Pentagon’s latest estimate is higher than the $38 billion the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecast in September. until the end of September. Hegseth’s July estimate was already about $8 billion higher than the previous figure released by the Trump administration in May: $29 billion. Before the May estimate, in late April, Pentagon Comptroller Jules Hurst reported that the war would cost $25 billion. As long as it continues. The Pentagon inspector general also said last month that U.S. troops face “strategic inventory deficits” as the war continues. But the Trump administration has denied that it is running out of weapons stockpiles. “Cowards and traitors would like to say that the United States is short of ammunition, but that is not true. We have more ammunition than we could ever imagine using. And we are producing it at levels we have never reached before,” Trump told the United Nations General Assembly in New York in September. Trump has also repeatedly stated that the Iran war will end whenever he wants. Last week, at an election rally in Texas, according to a CNBC report, Trump said, “Someone asked me earlier, ‘When will the war in Iran end?’ I said, ‘Whenever I want it to end.’ What does the rising cost of war mean for the midterm elections? The US-Israel war against Iran has affected the US economy through direct government spending as well as rising energy and fuel costs. On Wednesday, the average price of a gallon of diesel in the U.S. hit $6.35, up from $3.75 last year, according to the American Automobile Association. Higher fuel costs are also driving up the cost of food, with oil and gas in short supply. which affects almost all stages of the food supply chain. Meanwhile, the country’s national debt has surpassed a record $40 trillion, two years ahead of schedule. As a result, the war has become deeply unpopular in the United States and Trump’s approval ratings have fallen to just 33 percent, the lowest they have been at any time during his two terms as president. With five days until the midterm elections, analysts say the Pentagon’s confirmation of the high cost of war is likely to affect how people in Democrats currently lead Republicans 51.4 percent to 43.2 percent, a difference of 8.2 percentage points, according to the RealClearPolling average of national polls. Chris Featherstone, a political scientist at the University of York in the United Kingdom, said this is an issue that affects two key pillars of Trump’s political rhetoric: his promise not to start “new wars” during his campaign for the presidency in “The rising cost of the conflict to the taxpayer and the lack of a clear endpoint resemble the criticism Trump leveled at the war in Afghanistan in his first presidential election campaign,” he told Al Jazeera. According to Brown University’s War Costs Project, the war in Afghanistan, which began in 2001, cost the United States between $2.26 and $2.3 trillion in total across multiple presidential administrations, including George’s. W Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump. “While many of Trump’s most loyal MAGA voters are likely to remain loyal to Trump in the midterms despite the cost of the conflict with Iran, more peripheral supporters appear to be shifting away from the president ahead of the midterms, and the significant impact of this conflict on the cost of living appears to be a major factor,” Featherstone said.
