Like a movie scene, the whole world is watching the bombed buildings and the destruction of war. Movies always say: follow the money and you will find the criminal. Let's do the same.
America is said to have lost close to 20 billion dollars in the Iran War. There is nothing to suggest that this money disappeared somewhere or that it was spent in a country other than America. Instead, it went to arms companies. So money has gone out of the hands of America's taxpayers and into the pockets of the government that wants war and the arms companies that support it. It's that simple. But it's deep.
There is a figure we hear a lot lately: 20 billion dollars. We see comments that this money, which is said to have come out of the US budget, has “disappeared”, “evaporated” or “been lost”. However, when we look at the issue a little more carefully, we see that the money has not actually disappeared, it has just been concentrated in certain hands.
Route of Money
Yes, 20 billion dollars out of the pockets of American taxpayers. And where did it go? Was it loaded onto a cargo plane that disappeared in Iraq? Or was it blown away by the wind in the deserts of the Middle East? No, it didn't. This money followed a very specific route: First into the Defense Department budget, then into the coffers of America's giant arms companies. It can be traced in the balance sheets of Lockheed Martin, Raytheon (now RTX Corporation), General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman and Boeing. .
The Real Winners of Wars: Arms Companies
This picture is not new. Since the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, the defense industry companies, the weapons companies, have been the biggest winners of the war economy. The figures make the situation clear:
In September 2001, at the start of the war in Afghanistan, if you had invested an equal amount of $10,000 in the five largest American defense companies, by 2021 your money would have reached about $97,000. In the same period, $10,000 invested in the S&P 500 index was worth only $61,000. In other words, defense stocks earned 58 percent more than the overall market. .
On a company basis, the picture is even more striking:
Lockheed Martin: A $10,000 investment in 2001 skyrocketed to $133,000 in 2021. In 2003 alone, the company earned $21.9 billion from war-related tenders. .
Northrop Grumman: In the same period, 10 thousand dollars reached 129 thousand dollars. In the last quarter of 2006, the company increased its profit by 37 percent to 453 million dollars. .
Boeing: A $10,000 investment turned into $107,000. The company's weapons division increased its profit to 1 billion dollars in the last quarter of 2006. .
Halliburton: This giant, the former company of former Vice-President Dick Cheney, made a profit of 8 billion dollars in 2004 alone on contracts for the reconstruction of Iraq. .
The presence of retired senior military officers on the boards of these companies reveals the system known as the “revolving door”. A mechanism that feeds on war is organized in a way that guarantees its own continuity. .
How Are War Budgets Inflated?
The Pentagon's budget has spiraled out of control in the last 20 years. Set at $885.7 billion for 2025, the defense budget has reached $1 trillion for 2026. A significant portion of this money is transferred to arms companies through “emergency” and “extraordinary” funds outside the normal budget process. This method makes it almost impossible to control spending. .
Who Won, Who Lost?
There is no money evaporating. There is a transfer: The transfer of public resources to private companies. And what happened in return for this transfer? Destruction in the region, migration, children dying, families left homeless, cities torn apart... In Iran, Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Israel... It is not the people of those countries, not the financial experts analyzing the balance sheet figures, but the civilians targeted by the bombs who pay the real price of war.
Do Decision Makers Care?
No one can claim that Netanyahu or Trump cared one iota about this human tragedy. What mattered to them were domestic political balances, relations with lobby groups and promises for the next election. The $2.4 billion the defense sector has spent on lobbying Congress since 2001 shows the extent of this relationship.
A Question of Sustainability
“This is not sustainable,” they say. Yes, no country can survive in the long run with a perpetual war economy. But the concept of “loss” needs to be understood correctly. There is no money lost, there are human lives lost. There is lost trust. There is a lost future.
Ultimately, the economics of war is a dark accounting system. In this system, taxpayers' money flows to arms companies, arms companies support politicians, politicians prepare the ground for new wars, and so the cycle continues. In the middle of this cycle, the same question always remains: What have we humanity really gained in return for all this money, all this blood, all these tears?
Answer: Bloodshed in the Middle East, destroyed cities and extra zeros in the coffers of arms companies. The rest, humanity, has always lost.