Costs of War Project

The Costs of War Project is a nonpartisan research project based at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University that seeks to document the direct and indirect human and financial costs of U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and related counterterrorism efforts.

[10] On August 31, 2021, the project's figures for the financial cost of the War in Afghanistan were cited by U.S. President Joe Biden in a speech defending the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the nation.

Contributors to the project include Steven Aftergood, Nadje Al-Ali, Andrew Bacevich, Catherine L. Besteman, Linda Bilmes, Cynthia Enloe, Lisa Graves, Hugh Gusterson, William D. Hartung, James Heintz, Dahr Jamail, Jessica Stern, and Winslow T. Wheeler.

This brings the estimated total of direct and indirect deaths to 4,500,000-4,700,000 people in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, and Yemen.

[1][2] A 2021 report from the project concluded that since September 11, 2001, four times more U.S. veterans and service members had died by suicide than had been killed in combat.