🚀 go-pugleaf

: Ok, you can include the cost of Desert Storm, but we get to count
: the *profit* from Desert Storm. Hint, the Allies, including Japan
: and Germany, kicked in more money than the operation cost us. Saudi
: Arabia alone kicked in $38 billion in direct payments to the US
: Treasury.
: Gary Coffman KE4ZV          |    You make it,     | gatech!wa4mei!ke4zv!gary

We are still paying.  Are they still paying us?  Furthermore Saudi
Arabia raised the cost of oil soon after the invasion.  The cost of
that increase was greater than the payments they made to our
government.  So we the ratepayers were the ones who really funded that
war.

And selling weapons to lots of countries is a false economy.  Notice
how many of *our* weapons are being used against us?

But part of the point is that some of the cost of *maintaining* our
rather well supplied military is needed to protect the oil supply.
Desert Storm was just a case of deploying a military that we were
already paying for.

The nuclear angle sounds presuasive, except that we were friendly with
Iraq right up until they invaded a major oil producer.  If we were
really concerned about their nuclear program (as we should have been)
we would have been concerned before they attacked.
--
  Allen C. Brown  abrown@cv.hp.com or hplabs!hpcvca!abrown or "Hey you!"
      Not representing my employer.
    "'Moderation in all things' is for wimps."