The Commons Defence Committee has reported that the cost of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan is likely to nearly double this year, bringing the estimated cost of the conflict to £3.3bn, or 1.5% of the entire UK gross domestic product.
The government says the money is needed to pay for better troop protection, although some critics point out that 12,000 British personnel are currently serving in the region, and it would cost considerably less than £275,000 each to simply bring them all back to the safety of the UK. However, the government responded by saying that this was far too simplistic a view of the complex Middle East situation, and that furthermore the Americans would be very upset.
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