The Indicator from Planet Money - How much is the Iran war costing us?

Episode Date: March 18, 2026

It’s really hard to estimate the total cost of war in the middle of one. Over the first six days of the Iran war, an estimated $11.3 billion was charged to the public purse. But long-term costs take years to manifest. Even daily costs are fuzzy. Take munitions: the Department of Defense hasn’t budgeted for  many of the bombs it's dropping. One more time. The bombs – the bombs! – are not totally priced in.On today’s show, estimating the cost of the Iran war right now. And how healthcare, disability benefits, environmental costs and interest payments could add to its future price tag.Come see Planet Money live on stage in April! Twelve cities. Details and tix here: https://tix.to/pm-book-tour. Related episodes: A trucker, a farmer, and an entrepreneur walk into a global supply shockA lot of gas trapped, oil reserves tapped, and Live Nation gets a (tiny) capWill Trump’s shipping insurance plan work?For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Fact-checking by Sierra Juarez. Music by Drop Electric. Find us: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Newsletter.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

NPR. This is the indicator from Planet Money. I'm Ricky Mulvey. And I'm Darien Woods. Lately on the show, we've been discussing some of the broader economic costs of the U.S. Israel war with Iran. And those expenses vary day by day.

Yeah, finding out how much money war costs is a difficult task in the moment. The Center for Strategic and International Studies first estimated that the early days of Operation Epic Fury cost roughly $900 million per day. More recently, the New York Times reported that Pentagon officials estimated the cost to be more than twice that number, about $1.9 billion per day. And even these numbers don't tell the whole story.

These estimates are the tip of an iceberg. Today on the show, we're looking at the costs of Operation Epic Fury, why post-9-11 wars cost trillions of dollars more than early estimates suggested, and the underestimated expenses that American taxpayers, will be paying now and far into the future. That's all after the break. Wars are expensive, and it's difficult to find out just how much one costs in the middle of it. Mark Gantzian is a retired U.S. Marine Colonel. He's also done budgeting for the Department of Defense and helped come up with that daily $900 million or so estimate.

But that number is already significantly higher. The munitions mix appears to have been a little richer than we had first estimated, and the damage to the bases is higher than we had estimated. He's talking about the types of bombs the U.S. has been dropping and the U.S. bases that have been hit in the Gulf. And here's an interesting thing. Those bombs don't actually count in the Department of Defense's current budget. After the U.S. drops a bomb in Iran, the military says that's not a part of our regular budget,

and now we need to immediately pay to replace these bombs we just dropped. They'll need to go back to Congress to ask for more money regardless. of how long the war goes. So one reason this war is already expensive is that many of the costs are not already budgeted for. But Mark says that while the costs of the first days in Iran were high, he expects the daily cost to go down now that the U.S. has established air superiority. The military can drop cheaper bombs from airplanes versus launching long-range precision-guided

weapons. Still, Linda Bilmes is worried that the cost of war in Iran will not be controlled and she thinks that the long-term costs could be dramatic. Linda has studied how the U.S. pays for post-9-11 wars as a public finance professor at the Harvard Kennedy School. This is very similar territory, not only to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, but to wars dating back thousands of years,

where those who initiate them tend to be optimistic about how long it will take and tend to significantly underestimate the wars. The Bush administration's initial public estimate for the Iraq War was about $50 billion. Nita Crawford co-founded the Costs of War Project at Brown University. Nita estimated that the real number for Iraq and Syria was closer to $3 trillion. And she believes that we should consider long-term expenses of going to war.

Most importantly, perhaps, the cost of veterans' care. There are tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers and Air Force officers. and other service members and many Navy personnel involved in this war. Caring for veterans is expensive long after the conflict ends. Linda says we're paying billions of dollars a year to take care of veterans from the relatively short Gulf War, and these costs can go beyond health expenses. Our total obligation to veterans who have been hurt by war is in the trillions. The amount of accrued disability benefits, not counting health care, just disabilities.

disability benefits that we have already promised to veterans is $7.3 trillion. This is the money we pay to veterans who were hurt through injury or illness during their service. Anita adds there's one other long-term cost she's concerned about, the cost of war on the environment. Let's say we look at 2024's military emissions for the Department of Defense. They were 47 million metric tons CO2 equivalent. Okay, larger than many countries, annual emissions. Nita says these emissions are from moving large planes and ships around, fighter jets flying faster than the speed of sound. Plus, this war has included strikes on oil facilities.

Iran reportedly bombed a Saudi oil refinery, though the Iranian regime denies responsibility. And the U.S. Israel joint strikes have hit oil facilities in Iran. Regardless, bombing oil facilities creates long-term environmental damage. One of the more significant economic costs of going to war is financing. Other than the Revolutionary War, the United States has financed wars with a mix of debt, higher taxes, and budget cuts within the government. That changed after 9-11. Now, America's wars are financed almost entirely through debt without higher taxes or budget cuts. All of the money that we're spending is being borrowed, so there is interest that we will have to repay.

Mark Kansian says the cost is a concern, but not. how the U.S. finances it. I think from an economics point of view, it's a watch. Mark is talking about an economic theory called Ricardian equivalence, which says that spending through raising taxes or increasing deficits have similar effects on the economy. Linda disagrees and says the way we finance war matters. There have been many studies on this and show that people experience the cost of anything

in a different way if they are asked to pay taxes than if they incur debt. She believes financing war through debt shifts the burden to future generations. And raising taxes to pay for war changes the buy-in that presidents ask from the public. President Truman, for example, made 206 speeches on this topic, basically saying if this is important enough that we have to go to war, then it's important enough we have to pay for it. So the costs of war aren't the only expense. of dropping bombs or fueling airplanes.

They go on long after the war is over, through health care, disability benefits, environmental costs, and interest payments. She also believes it sets the stage for increased military spending, which is already a significant chunk of federal spending. Earlier this year, President Trump asked Congress

to approve a $1.5 trillion military spending budget, which is more than 50% higher than its current budget. Although Congress is kind of lukewarm to this idea, the backdrop of a live act of war and all of this discussion around using up of munitions and supporting our troops and so on is going to enable President Trump to secure a much larger amount of like base increase to the Pentagon budget. And Linda worries this increased budget for defense spending will not go back down,

even if the president doesn't get everything he asks for. Once that gets added into the, The Pentagon's annual budget, it stays there pretty much forever so that every year you have a higher base that you start from. Precisely economic figures can provide certainty in an uncertain time. But the chaos of war is precisely what makes those numbers so uncertain. The economic costs of war, like the physical damage, are not daily figures. They go on long after the conflict is over. Tomorrow we dig deeper into this issue with a look at drone warfare economics and how the US is learning a lesson from Iran.

This episode was produced by Corey Bridges with engineering by Robert Rodriguez, who was fact-checked by Sarah Juarez. Cake and Kenneth edits the show and The Indicator is a production of NPR.