The decades-long military involvement of the United States in the Middle East expanded once again this week after its warplanes bombed at least three of Iran’s nuclear facilities.
According to a briefing by US General Dan Caine, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, seven B-2 stealth bombers, each valued at approximately $2.1bn, dropped at least 14 bunker-buster bombs worth millions on Fordow and Natanz.
In total, more than 125 US aircraft participated in the mission, including bombers, fighters, tankers, surveillance aircraft, and support crews, all costing hundreds of millions of dollars to deploy and operate.
The US spends more on its military than any other country in the world, more than the next nine countries combined, spending about three times more than China and nearly seven times more than Russia.
In 2024, the US spent $997bn on its military, accounting for 37 percent of all global military spending, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
The human cost of US-led wars
According to an analysis by Brown University’s Watson Institute of International & Public Affairs, US-led wars since 2001 directly caused the deaths of about 940,000 people across Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and other post-9/11 conflict zones.
This does not include indirect deaths, namely those caused by loss of access to food, healthcare, or war-related diseases. These indirect deaths are estimated to be 3.6 to 3.8 million, bringing the total death toll, including direct and indirect deaths, to between 4.5 and 4.7 million and counting.
During that time, at least 30,000 US military personnel, contractors, and allied troops were also killed. This includes at least 7,052 soldiers, 8,189 contractors, and 14,874 allied troops.
Half a million people killed in Afghanistan, Iraq wars
The war in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as a response to the September 11 attacks and aimed to destroy al-Qaeda and remove the Taliban from power. Less than two years later, on March 20, 2003, the US and its allies launched the war in Iraq, aiming to eliminate its alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) and remove Saddam Hussein from power. However, no stockpiles of WMDs were ever found.
Spanning nearly 20 years, the Afghanistan conflict, including those killed in the bordering regions of Pakistan, became the most prolonged military engagement in US history and resulted in an estimated 243,000 direct deaths. In Iraq, about 315,000 people were directly killed during the war.
Together, they account for at least 558,000 direct deaths between October 2001 and August 2021, according to the Watson Institute.
The economic cost of US-led wars
The US has spent an estimated $5.8 trillion funding its more than two decades of war.
This includes $2.1 trillion sp