Military spending is real spending

I'm glad we're (belatedly) getting around to a conversation about the cost of the war in Afghanistan. Steve Clemons rounds up the debate this morning: The White House says it will cost $500,000 per new soldier per year, which means the actual cost will be much higher; and Rep. David Obey, the chairman of the House appropriations committee, wants a surtax to pay for a surge.

This is a long-overdue conversation in the U.S., where we tend to treat military spending as if it isn't "real" spending. Obama needs to ask whether his proposed goals in Afghanistan are worth the price -- human and financial.

As I've said before, though, it's really not that useful to compare Afghanistan war spending to Afghanistan's GDP. Clemons points out that the U.S. is on pace to spend $105 billion in Afghanistan next year, roughly 10 times the Afghan GDP. That's an eye-popping statistic, yes, but as a metric it doesn't really prove anything.